For small children there is a lot to learn about cooperation and teamwork. Preschool offers an environment to learn these skills. This is what happened when we played with straws and connectors.... Someone showed me a square they had made. Soon everyone was making squares and joining them together. Someone said that it looked like hopscotch. So everyone decided to jump in the squares. With the jumping, some of the squares broke apart. So they worked together to do repairs. It started with a square and then a few more. It then turned into a game. And everyone worked together to make sure it kept on working; repairing and adding on. Cooperation at it's finest!
0 Comments
Things do not always go as planned. Preschool is no exception. I plan my class I have a goal, end result and theme I want to cover. Sometimes the class or the supplies have other plans for me... I used painter's tape to make the outline of the snowflake and then after painting over it the plan was to remove the tape and have a print of a snowflake. Sounds simple enough...I decided to use glitter in the paint. Having used glitter before in paint I knew once it dried it would fall off. I had learned this before!! So this time I decided to add a little white glue to the paint. Whoops! The paint turned into a glob of goop!! All things considered, it all worked out. Everyone loved playing with the "goop". They tried to see how long it would stretch and they tried to push it over their paper. There were squeals and shouts. At first I was disappointed that the craft didn't work out as planned but it was clear that the children didn't care about the plan. They were happy and enjoying themselves. And isn't that what really matters?
It started with a song. A song about winter clothes. During the song, we pretended to get dressed. We put on our hats, coat, boots and mittens. And we were ready for a snowball fight! Everyone ripped up pieces of paper. This task is actually more difficult that it sounds. Ripping paper takes skill and practice for little hands. My group were eager for the challenge! After all the paper was ripped they scrunched them into little balls. Then we played a game of copy cat. I place snowballs on the board and everyone tries to copy by putting their snowballs in the same position. Then we had a snowball fiiiiiighhhhhtttttt! Because the snowballs were so cold we used tongs to pick them up. And then...we did it again!!! The tongs were so popular they even made an appearance in the kitchen!
I teach a group of 3 year olds and a group of 4 year olds. Sometimes I plan the same activity for both groups or it might be something completely different. Other times the activity might be varied just slightly. This was the case when we worked with ice. For the 4 year olds I had a 2 cup measuring cup to pour the water into small containers. I also had marbles, feathers, buttons, glitter and food coloring on hand to add to the water. I quickly realized that the large measuring cup was a little heavy and I had to spend a great deal of time refilling. For the 3 year olds, I filled large bowls with water and let them fill their containers with various spoons. Scooping and pouring are great fine motor activities. Yes, it was messy! Yes, water was everywhere! And yes, everyone got a little wet! But it was so much fun!!! For the 4 year olds the excitement was filling all the containers with "stuff" and then seeing if there was room for water. This ice making activity was part of the winter theme. Before we made the ice we discussed how it was made. Everyone agreed that we needed cold, cold weather to make ice. The week we made the ice the weather was not quite cold enough in the night to have everything freeze for the 4 year olds. So I popped all the containers in my freezer. Then, next class... Playing with ice. 4 year oldsHere are the magnificent blocks of ice we discovered!! I think they look just beautiful! So, what should we do with these ice sculptures now? As some of the ice blocks had colored water I decided to use them to paint snowflakes. I had the children cut snowflakes out of coffee filters. This was a little difficult for some so I had them make snips on the edge and then pull off pieces. Then we colored the snowflakes with the ice blocks. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of the finished snowflakes...oops! Now as everyone was handling the ice, of course, it started to melt. When this happened we were able to dislodge some of the marbles and buttons. This was very exciting! We spent lots of time working on this. |
Miss DawnI teach preschool in my home to 3 and 4 year olds. It's a wonderful adventure filled with lots of laughter and learning. Archives
January 2017
Categories
All
|