Our PlayLearning theme for the week ahead is Emergency Services. I’d like to introduce the concept and help Ameli to learn about Emergency Services as I think she’s old enough to know how and when to call the police, the fire service or an ambulance. I was trying to arrange a police station visit for our Mamaventurers group, but unfortunately the police felt that our group were too young, which is unfortunate, really. Even the fire department have not been overly helpful. I’m disappointed so far, as visits are great ways to get help children learn who to turn to – I know we had them when I was a child!
Anyway, we’ll see what we can do about a visit, but in the meantime we can still do our regular activities and crafts and so on, and get the ‘theory’ in there.
Virginia from VirginiaGeorge.com wrote a post that really stood out to me. She says “Imagine being in a smoky room, afraid, and you’re approached by a masked and helmeted being. Would you go to them? Would you come out from hiding? Do your children know that these scary beings are people who have come to help?” Read her post, please. Married to a fire fighter, Virginia has great advice.
Activities and Crafts To Help Children Learn About Emergency Services
- Royal Baloo has a fabulous pack you can download with 35 pages of activities, from letter writing, to spot the difference and more. It’s really a fantastic download pack.
- I love this Heads and Tails game from them too for Aviya (she’s two now, so this is a great way to include her in the theme)
- Teach Preschool set up a firestation made from tape on a table. Really clever, and a great role play opportunity for children.
- Use a real telephone unplugged or a play telephone to practice emergency numbers. Explain the dangers of prank calling.
- I’ve never heard of lap books before, and probably won’t do them this week, but I love the idea! Here are a fire safety and a police one.
- Fabulous resource with suggestions for discussion points for emergency services.
- While it’s something you hope a child will never ever need – I lost a friend in a house fire while still in school – I think this idea from Lalymom on how to do a fire crawl is great.
- Demonstrate checking the fire alarm. I know we don’t check ours near enough, so having two little helpers to remind us to check it is a great idea.
- A fun singalong sheet with re-worked songs to familiar tunes, and a fun riddle game to play with children.
- For slightly older children, I think, a fingerprint experiment could be good. We did something similar in the body learning week, but less detailed.
- This mama turned her son’s room into a police station. We won’t be doing it, but it deserves an honorable mention for being a superbly cool idea!
- Bake or decorate cakes with your local emergency services numbers to help reinforce them.
- Finally, Twinkl has a superb list of printable resources, with everything from colouring in sheets (standard free) to a PowerPoint with videos of fire engines (paid version)
Watch and Learn About Emergency Services
- Short Youtube cartoon of fire truck, contents and follow the fire truck as it puts out a fire.
- Greenlight cartoon about road and traffic safety.
- Lego City Police Stories – though I’m not overly sure what this is teaching!
Play and Learn About Emergency Services
We have the Melissa and Doug Vehicle Sound Puzzle, which isn’t strictly Emergency Services, but entails enough to involve 2-year old Aviya in the theme. We also have several fire fighter, police, and other rescue service puzzles that will come out to play this week.
Who can forget fancy dress! I bought the girls a policeman outfit and a fireman’s outfit for some well themed role play.
Twinkl (Platinum) download – Fire Station Role Play Pack
Heroes of the City – you can download the app from the Google Store or for Apple Store here.
Read and Learn About Emergency Services