Help your preschooler to better understand transportation's past by creating cute crafts and awesome art projects. Try a variety of projects that are based on different old-times modes of transportation. Include both defunct and still-used types such as the stagecoach, horse-drawn carriage, steam train and boat. Collect and reuse old shoe, cereal, cracker, packing or electronics boxes, and gather a few basic art supplies such as construction paper, school glue, tempera paints, tape, modeling clay, craft sticks and markers. Use the box as the main structure for your chosen mode of transportation. For example, a child's shoe box can be a stream train's engine. Add wheels or other necessary parts with cut construction-paper shapes, craft sticks or modeling clay. Complete the project with designs and details in markers or tempera paints.
Free online printable coloring pages and worksheets provide an easy-to-use alternative to a more elaborate arts and crafts project. Visit a preschool activity or printable website such as DLTK's Growing Together or First-School. Look for pages that include pictures of boats, hot-air balloons or old-time trains. Print the pages and invite the preschoolers to color them with crayons or markers. After the pictures are complete, display them around the classroom to remind the students of the different modes of transportation that were available in the past.
Engage preschoolers in the learning process and try a few different gross-motor activities that focus on an old-times transportation theme. These games and lessons can overlap with dramatic play and dance or creative movement. Discuss different old-times modes of transportation. Show illustrations from books or posters of people riding in wagons, sailing an older boat or driving a stagecoach. Ask the children to imagine that they are the driver or passenger. Get the kids up and moving and encourage them to act out a transportation scene using their bodies. For example, the entire class can make a steam train with one child as the engine and the other as the cars. The children can use their arms as wheels and walk in a line to represent the train on its tracks. Try similar activities for other types of transportation.
Song can be a powerful way for children to learn. Use ready-made old-time transportation songs or create your own music that focuses on a variety of loco-motor themes. Many preschool-themed songs take traditional standard tunes such as "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" and change the words to match new, specific content. Using the song's original tune, you can write your own words that speak about how a horse-drawn carriage moves, when people rode horses or a ship sailing across the ocean. Look for ready-made songs on preschool and music websites such as The Teacher's Guide. This site provides lyrics for old time transportation titles that include Bicycle Built for Two, Down By the Station and Morningtown Ride.