Transportation Theme

Pre-K & Preschool theme ideas for learning about transportation

Find more Transportation Activities for Pre-K

Books

Click here for a complete list of Books about Transportation!

Transportation Large Motor Games

Airplane Game

Children fly around the room when their first initial is called.

Red Light, Green Light Game

When green light is on, children roll a car around on the floor. When they see the red light, the cars should stop.

Transportation Fine Motor

Play Dough Tire Tracks

Children flatten out play dough and roll toy cars and trucks on it to make tire tracks.

Train Scissor Skills

Children pretend the scissors are a train, cutting along the railroad tracks (straight, curved & jagged lines). They stop when they come to the animal sticker.

Transportation Art Activities

Craft Stick Airplanes

Children use craft sticks and colored masking tape to create airplanes.

Tire Tracks in Paint

Children dip the tires of toy cars in paint and roll it across their paper to make tire tracks. Oriental Trading also has some car stamps that can be used for this activity. (Item number IN-56/2906)

Transportation Literacy Activities

Name Trains

Children glue squares with the letters of their name onto a strip of construction paper to make a name “train”. We add a paper engine and draw on the wheels.

Letter Roads

Children drive over the shapes of the letters with mini toy cars. Get these free printable Letter Roads here.

Roll and Write Game

Children love this game to practice writing skills! Read about and print the Roll and Write Game here.

Transportation Roll & Write Game Printable

Truck Bingo Stamping Game

Use this bingo stamping game to practice letter or numeral recognition. Print out the bingo page, write the letters or numbers you want your students to practice, and make copies. Get the printable here: Truck Bingo Game here.

Story Retelling

This is an activity that goes with any theme. Choose a book that goes with the theme, and have the children retell the story.
Read the blog post here for details: story retelling

Transportation Math Activities

Transportation Roll and Cover

This roll and cover game can be used to practice counting and numeral recognition. Read about and print it here: Roll and Cover Games

Train Patterns

Children work in pairs, each choosing one color of the Unifix cubes to work with. The children make an AB pattern: one child adding one color and the other adding the next color, taking turns adding to the train.

Airplane Counting

Each month, we kept track of how many airplanes flew over our playground while we were outside. Whenever the children saw airplanes outside, we would keep a count in our heads (usually no more than 3 flew over). Then when we went inside, we would add that many airplanes to our chart. The children were often spotted at the chart counting how many we had seen so far.

Transportation Graph

I used the transportation clipart pictures (available in the Printables section) to place in the top of the pocket chart graph. Children choose their favorite mode of transportation and placed their name card under it on the graph.

Wheels Grid Game

Read about about print here: Grid Games

Transportation Science Activities

Parachutes

Make parachutes with a 14-inch (approx.) square from a plastic trash bag, tape a 16-inch (approx.) string to each corner with masking tape, and tie all four pieces of string to a 3/4-inch metal washer. This is not easy for children to do. You could make this with each child, or send home the materials and directions for a home activity. Either way children will need individual help. I also made a larger parachute using a whole trash bag tied on four sides to a stuffed animal. The kids had fun dropping this from the classroom loft. (Children are exploring properties of air.)

Ramps & Cars

The children bring a small car or truck to school for this experiment. We test the cars to see how well they roll on a ramp covered with various materials. We used aluminum foil, sandpaper, bubble wrap, and corrugated paper. Also, change the height of the ramp and test it again.