The Big Beach Clean Up is about a little girl Cora who is excited to enter a sandcastle contest. Unfortunately due to litter at the beach it is cancelled which makes Cora determined to save her favorite place. Cora sets out to collaborate with her community to clean up the beach. Not only is this book a great conversation starter but can be an inspiration to children in helping keep clean their community together.
After reading the story you can set up a small world play sensory bin to extend the literacy experience. Small world play is simply when children explore figurines, loose parts, and sensory materials that reenact scenes from nature, books, fairytales, or a subject matter of interest. When small world play is accompanied with sensory materials it enhances comprehension, language, imaginary play, and tactile play.
To set this small world play you will need sensory bin, sand, materials to make an ocean, rocks, shells, trees, people figurines, sea creatures, boat, trash cans, and a whole bunch of trash. After creating the small world invite the child to do their own beach clean up by removing the trash from the small world into the mini trash cans.
It’s never too early to teach children about how we can all help make the world a better place. Not only is this great sorting practice, it’s also wonderful practical life activity through play. Activities for care of the environment are both fun and great for developing order, concentration, coordination, and independence. There are a series of steps that children will go through in this invitation such as sorting. That’s wonderful for developing concentration, organization, and the ability to follow directions.
By reading the story to build their knowledge and have the materials that go with it, makes for an experience where that they are proud to do over and over again! Through play they can reenact what they see and hear in the story and feel even more empowered to have the ability to make imagination come to life just as the young girl did in the story