Can you SEA me now?

We have been swimming in the ocean in my speech room. Well at least figuratively. All the kindergarten classrooms have an ocean unit so I knew it was a perfect time to dive into my ocean theme boxes. It has been fun opening the boxes and rediscovering games, books and more. Honestly I am finding by “themeing” my materials I am using them more effectively.

My kids had been so excited about our Pirate Unit that when I took it down they were very sad. Then they asked if I was going to put them on my board again just like in our pirate ship. So this is what I came up with… I used the app I’m in! Traveling. This is a free app but to get the all the scenes it costs 1.99 which I needed for the beach scenes. I took their pictures and added them into the app. Check it out below!

Don’t you just love the parachutist’s face! I did not ask him to make that face but as soon as I saw it I knew I had to do something special with it. I found a parachute picture and glued his face onto it. The can you sea me now  board was created using brown paper for the beach, blue for water, yellow for sky and an orange circle for the sun. I used the I’m in! Traveling app and cut out out the pictures to glue on the “sea board.”  This time I did not add all my students but so far no one is complaining!

I used the beach cut outs on the bottom of my door to work on describing. One student chooses an item with “their eyes” and then gave two clues before the others could guess. You can download the pictures here: Ocean Pictures

Games we played:  I am including links to Amazon (if available) but most of these I purchased elsewhere.

1. Splash! This game is fun play the rules but I never stop there. The toy dolphins included in the game we’re a fun tool to use with my students. After learning Dolphin facts we could have our toy dolphins act them out.

2. I created another He/She board like I did for the pirate unit but this time using the beach theme. You can download it here: ocean he -she

3. I created an Ocean Bingo game using Custom Boards. You need to print out each bingo card. Print one extra card to cut apart and use as the calling cards.You can download it here: Bingo A   Bingo B   Bingo C   Bingo D   Bingo E   Bingo F   Bingo G

4. There are some fun and inexpensive ocean/beach materials at Perkilou Products  that we used- Ocean Adventure, Beach Barrier Game

5. Piranha Panic is a game that I picked up at a thrift store and had proven to be a favorite.

6. Splash Attack is a fast paced game and relies on quick visual discrimination.

7. Spongebob Squarepants Splash n Roll Game– who doesn’t like Spongebob!

8. Curious George Beach Game

9.  This was a great tool to work on as a team. I had the students ask their partner for the pieces they needed. ” I need a small yellow rectangle.”

10. Finding Nemo Storytelling Game

Create an Ocean in a Bag:

This is an activity I did last year and repeated again this year with my site based autism classrooms.  I found all the materials at the dollar store. The sand was different this year and  made more of a mess. I liked the gravel like sand I used in the past but it was not there this year. I’m sure you can look around and find lots of options for your bag! I first used  my iPad to look at an Ocean Video.  We talked about what we find in an ocean and then created our own ocean in a baggie! Here is the visual I used: Ocean in a Bag

If you would like to see another great idea for an ocean in a bag check out Jenna’s post at her Speech Room News blog!

My Room-

This time I bought a large ocean mural from a dollar store and cut it in half. I put the whale on my wall and the undersea half on my white board.

The green sand pail has liquid marbles inside. I bought ocean erasers and put one set inside the pail. The kids take turns trying to find matches by touch or sometimes we just pull one out and talk about the sea creature. The erasers and liquid marbles are both from the dollar store. We used the large conch shells to listen to the ocean (a great way to get it really quiet for a minute!).

Apps – here are some of the ocean apps we splashed in!

My Ocean Friend ( iPhone)   My Ocean Friend ( iPad)

To the Sea (iPhone)    To the Sea (iPad)

Ocean Animals for kids (universal)

Oliva the Octopus (universal)

Hit the Beach (iPad)

Tiny Ocean (universal)

Lettermen go the seaside (universal)

Splish Splash Inn   Splish Splash Inn HD

Learn Sharks Now (universal)

Fisherman and the Goldfish   Fisherman and the Goldfish lite

Sunny Bunnies   Sunny Bunnies HD

Scott’s Submarine (universal)

Josh and Emma go to the beach (iPad)

Candy Fish (iPad)

Sandcastle Maker (universal)

Jellyfish Jam- free (iPad)

Fraise Puzzle (universal)

Little sub abc learn to spell (iPad)

Deep Sea Submarine HD  Deep Sea Submarine (universal)

Lalla Funny Stickers Sea World (universal)

iDraw Ocean

Little Mermaid’s Surprise (universal)

Mermaid dress up – lite

Mermaid Sticker HD

Ocean Sticker book

Shape Collage – this is what I used to create the images at the top and bottom of this post

Now it’s your turn to add your own twist!

Cindy