On Concept/Question board, display various types of transportation photos.
Students can label and ask questions about pictures and bring in their own pictures of modes of transportation.

Use any children's action songs to get children moving. My favorites are "Riding on the Bus" and "Red Wagon."

We told the children about the new theme... they launched themselves into a huge brainstorming list of Things that Go, which led to discussing vocabulary like vehicles, automobiles and transportation... We talked about ideas for lists of kinds of buses, kinds of planes, kinds of trains... the kids are excited to make some lists like this for workshop time... We connected this conversation to Freight Train by Donald Crews... and how that book is a specialized list stretched out over many pages...

Then the students browsed some other Books About Transportation, and we took them to the computer lab, where they each drew a picture and wrote a sentence about a vehicle or form of transportation that they would like to learn more about during this unit...

We are sending home a letter asking first graders to bring in some small toys that home of things that go. They are also being asked to bring pictures of themselves related to the unit theme. The teacher is planning to introduce the unit by reading Richard Scarry's Things That Go and then have the students share the "things that go" they bring in. The teacher will be taking picture of the students at this time to add to the Concept/Question board. After that, in small groups, the students will sort pictures of things that go and things that don't go and then place the things that go on the Concept/Question board, labeling the pictures. The teacher is also providing die-cuts of things such as a boat, plane, car, or train and have the students choose one mode of transportation that they've been on and write a sentence about it for the C/Q board.

I made Ellison Die Cuts of as many transportation vehicles I could. I found a bus, car, airplane, train, covered wagon, tractor, skip loader, excavator, sailboat, ship and a stop sign, slow sign, and a RR crossing sign. I also brought a picture of my husbands motorcycle.

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