When Your Kid Loves Cars and Everything With Wheels: Part 2

A toy school bus and firetruck are on the road.

In ‘When Your Kid Loves Cars and Everything With Wheels: Part 1’, I posted on how to build your own town just by using some thick black paper, and some strips of yellow paper as road dividers. You saw how I added details to the town with some recycled stuff and how I used other toys as well to build up the town. Today, I want to share with you the games that you can play using this town and all those cars you may have. Choose the activities that suit your child’s level. Too easy and it’s boring but too hard and it may be frustrating.

Game 1:

Game 1: The Maze

This has to be our favourite game in our little town. I pick up a starting point for Hisham after making some adjustments to it. Like some roadblocks here and there, muddy puddles (we consider it a no crossing part unless you wanna get your car dirty!) and some dead ends. Then I ask Hisham to take one car of his choice to get to an end point which I point out.

Variations to the Maze

Variations to the Maze

House on Fire

Hisham loves fire trucks so the story is that there’s a house on fire (you can add some paper ‘fire’ to it) and that the firetruck has to travel from the fire station to the fire the quickest way possible.

Ambulance

Another variation is there’s someone hurt and he needs to get to the hospital so the ambulance has to get to the patient and then to the hospital.

Robbery

There’s a robbery at the mall. Can the police catch them in time? Have him drive the police car to the mall in the quickest way possible to catch the bad guys. To make it more interesting tell him he has a certain amount of time to get there (I’d say, ‘Hisham, the robbers are going to get away in 10 seconds!’. Then I count to 10 slowly) .To spice it up you can have 2 kids at the same time racing against each other (Caution: smaller kids have a harder time losing so it’s a good social skill to work on) . You can also time your child.

A simple stop watch is by the way, something good to have to make learning fun for a competitive child. Kids love it when they’re racing against their own personal record. You can write down their times so that they can keep track of it too.

Game 2: The story

A red car is being towed.

Make up a story as you play along with your child. Making up stories together is fun and helps improve their oratory skills while building up their vocabulary. An example would be that your car has broken down.Pretend to call him. He’s the tow truck or the mechanic that’s gonna come to your rescue. I like to add in a new word now and then, some easy ones and some a little more bombastic. It’s cool to see how easily they remember a new word and try to use it in their own stories when they play on their own. If you’ve had a made up story that he really likes, why not turn it into a book that you can read to him before bedtime. Hisham loves it when I retell a story he made up during the day.

Game 3 : Traffic Jam Subtraction

We all hate traffic jams but this is one traffic jam you and your kid are gonna love. Make a cause for a traffic jam: road block/ accident/ broken down car…just use your imagination. Have cars lined up. Count the number of cars stuck in the traffic jam together or have him count it. Open up part of road and tell him one car can pass at a time. After each car leaves ask how many cars are left. Depending on his math ability you can vary the number of cars that pass and how you ask him.

Game 4: Park in that Number Spot

Number the parking spots yourself and have him park a certain car on a specific number.

Game 5: Number Order

Let your child be involved in labelling the parking spots and this would be an activity in cutting and pasting. While you are labelling the lots, tell him that parking lots always are numbered in order, so that they are easier to find. That means that the first lot would be number 1 and the next number 2 etc. You can ask him to paste the numbers in order one by one. A variation of this activity would be for you to paste some of the numbers but leave some of it out. Then ask him to fill in the missing numbers.

Game 6: Tracking Empty Lots 

Some parking lots like in big shopping malls or airports let you know how many cars are parked and how many lots are available at each parking level. If you happen to come across one, point it out to your child. You can make one of this signs on a smaller scale and use this to teach your child about numbers. The sign should have the following : Vacant, Full and Total. Show him how to keep track of the numbers as the cars go in and out of the lots. Soon he’ll wanna keep track of the lots all by himself.

Game 7: Parking Attendant

Teach him that sometimes you have to pay money to park your car. Take turns being a Parking Attendant. For smaller kids, just pretend to exchange money and a receipt. For bigger kids, it is a good way to teach them how to use money and count change. For a more challenging game, the parking lot can be a pay by hour kind. For instance it could be SAR1 an hour. You can have a kids clock (or make one using a paper plate) that you move, say two times around to show him that 2 hours has passed and ask him how much do you have to pay. The parking attendant should be the one to do the calculations.

Game 8: Pick Up the Kids and Send Them Back Again

As you can tell by the title of the game, we pick up the school kids and send them back again. We use a school bus from Melissa n Doug that has 6 students in it. Hisham named all of the kids based on his friends names. Then he places them at their houses (cardboard boxes). We then have the school bus pick them up one by one and send them to school. The school is also part of the school bus set but because it has only a front, I taped it to a box. We put a flash light inside the bus when the school is on and switch it off when we pick up the kids from school. We also placed a zebra crossing here (good time to sneak in some road safety tips.

You can make this game into a memory game as well, by picking up the kids in a certain order and asking your child to follow this order. Then, reversing the order on the way home from school like a real school bus on a set route. You can make it easier and at the same time add in some writing activities by labelling everybody’s house and writing down the names of the kids he has to pick up in the order of pick up. This will encourage him to read the names. He can tick the names off as he picks them up. Have an opposite order for going home time.

So there it is. 8 Little town games! Have fun playing!