This book documents the work of a master preschool teacher, her co-teachers, student teachers, and very young children as they explored the automotive laboratory adjacent to their early childhood classroom at a community college. In addition to introducing the project approach, the master teacher also introduced the staff and students to documentation practices, including systematic curriculum-based assessment through the use of the Work Sampling System. The book's introduction discusses the challenges and opportunities presented by the location of the early childhood classroom in the college's Automotive Mechanics Building. The first chapter, "Planning and Anticipating the Car Project," discusses reasons for choosing cars as a project topic, the generation of a topic web, and reasons for using the project approach and the Work Sampling System. The second chapter, "Phase 1: Beginning the Project," describes the early stages of the project and individual children's experiences starting their exploration of cars. The third chapter, "Phase 2: Building the Car," describes how individual children solved the problems that arose in the course of the project, in addition to discussing various topics, including the challenges presented by the irregular attendance patterns of the children at the center, when to include teacher-initiated activities in project work, and the value of demonstrating a new activity. The fourth chapter, "Phase 3: Sharing and Celebrating Accomplishments," discusses displaying documentation as a record of the project, documenting the project in portfolios, and the final display of the car. The publication concludes with four ERIC digests: (1) "The Project Approach"; (2) "Issues in Selecting Topics for Projects"; (3) "The Contribution of Documentation to the Quality of Early Childhood Education"; and (4) "Performance Assessment in Early Childhood Education: The Work Sampling System." Includes 91 illustrations. (LPP)