Safari Centers

During our third week of camp, we will be exploring the Jungle/Safari. We plan to incorporate communication skills during our center time. 

Dramatic Play: Children will have the opportunity to drive the "safari jeep", dress up in hats and binoculars, and search through the grass and trees for the hidden animals. 

• Communication Goal: Increase vocabulary. Encourage peer interaction. Using complete, 3-4 word sentences. 

Literacy: Provide a variety of books about the jungle, safari, animals and habitats. A clinician will be available to help read and facilitate communication. Flipbooks of the alphabet will be provided. 

• Communication Goal: Attend to a story for 5 minutes. Answer questions about the content. Make comments about the pictures and story. 

Writing: Provide paper, pencils, and vocabulary words of the week for the children to practice writing, tracing the letters, and how to properly hold pencils. 

• Communication Goal: Students will be encouraged to practice their fine motor skills by holding a pencil correctly, while beginning to write their names, as well as vocabulary words related to the jungle. 

Sensory Table: Provide alternating sensory tables: sand and water table. Sand table will be full of sand with hidden jungle animals. Water table will be full of water and soap, as well as jungle animals. The children will be encouraged to practice "washing" the animals. 

• Communication Goal: Communicate with peers by working together to search through the sand to find the hidden animals. Practicing fine motor skills, turn taking, and requesting at the water table.  

Manipulatives: Provide jungle safari animals, sticks, rocks, playdough, and leaves to encourage children to build their own jungle habitats. 

• Communication Goal: Communicate with peers about the habitats they are building by using descriptive words and adjectives. 

There will also be some cues provided in the classroom:

• Written Cues: Picture cards with theme related vocabulary to use during literacy and written language. 
• Visual Cues: Real photos of various animals and habitats discussed throughout the week. 
• Literacy: Various books emphasizing the animals and habitats within the jungle for reading. 
• Graphic Organizers: Bubble Maps, Venn Diagrams, Alphaboxes, and Story Charts that are completed as a whole group activity, and also as individual activities in each camper's written language folder.