This week we had lots of fun learning about traffic lights in Nursery! We started by sitting together and sharing what we already know about traffic lights. We looked at a photograph as a starting point, which prompted our discussion. Here is what we already knew about traffic lights:

• Zayan: “Red means stop. The black pole holds up the lights”.
• Eva: “Green is go”.
• Yosef: “Amber”.
• Selimo: “They tell us to ‘stop’ and ‘go'”.
• Ryan: “Children need to cross the road at the line with a traffic light”.
• Milan: “Traffic lights for buses”.
• Ryan: “They are for cars”.
• Luca: “It won’t be safe without traffic lights”.

We learnt that the very important person who invented the traffic light was called Garrett Morgan. We discovered that he lived a long time ago in a place called the USA. We now know that the traffic lights that he invented have three lights on them, and we linked this to our own knowledge of the traffic lights that we have seen around us in the local area. Many of us are very interested in transport and so learning about his important invention really sparked our interest!

Traffic Light Printing

Twinkle Twinkle Traffic Light

Throughout the week, we learnt the song ‘Twinkle twinkle traffic light’ and continued to practise it. On Wednesday, we had a special performance of our song and filmed it for our families. You could share the video together at home and practise singing it together. During our performance, we proudly displayed our traffic lights and pointed to the colours as we sang.

This week at Nursery, we learnt why Garrett Morgan is a special person in history and learnt more about traffic lights. We enjoyed singing and painting together this week as part of our learning about this important invention. Look around when you are outside and see if you notice any traffic lights on your travels!