Teachable Moments

The children became so interested in Miss Michelle and Ms. Maria’s hats that as a team we decided to add hats to our dramatic play area. Hats seems to be a new interest and we are thinking of ways in which we can tie it to our Music and Movement project. Hats are used by musicians and we will soon add pictures of musicians wearing hats as well as people out in our community. If you have hats you aren’t using, please donate them to our classroom. Today we brought some hard hats and sombreros and spoke to the children about the textures, size, and who wears them. The children had a blast wearing all the hats we brought out.

One day after a rainfall, there were large puddles on the pavement in our yard. The children were enjoying themselves splashing and jumping in the water. One child had the idea of bringing a marker to the puddles and trying to color in it. The colors spread through the water in a very interesting way; however, the action had to be redirected so that our marker would not get ruined. This idea inspired me to think of a way that we could follow the children’s interest in an appropriate way.

In Extended Care, during the week of October the 7^th, we created sidewalk chalk paint! The children helped to fill the squeeze bottles with corn starch, water, and watercolors using funnels. I talked to the children about how we used a mixture of dry and wet ingredients to create something new. This simple recipe provided an opportunity for the children to experience cause and effect through observing the mixing of ingredients and colors.  The children were able to use their fine motor skills and eye-hand coordination while carefully pouring the ingredients into the bottles and then squeezing it out onto the sidewalk. Here is the recipe if you would like to try making it at home:

 

• Cornstarch and water in equal parts
• Liquid watercolor
• Squeeze bottles (can be found at Family Dollar)

 

 

The children enjoyed squeezing the paint and stepping on it with their bare feet. Some children began to carefully squeeze out shapes and name letters. We watched the colors mix together and were able to find some colorful footprints!

“Scribbles may not make any sense to an adult. The look like a lot of lines, loops, and squiggles. But these marks are very important to a  young child. They are a child’s way of writing her thoughts. Drawing and scribbling are the first steps in using the skills children will need later for writing.” Mincemayer,2013

The children had the opportunity to explore paint at the art table in the outside play yard on Tuesday and Wednesday the 10th and 11th September. Room 1 teachers offered the children primary colors (red, yellow, blue) to use. During the activity the teacher spoke to them about how they moved their brushes by using words such as round, across, up and down, fast and slow, and mix. Exploring paint is also a great way for young children to learn about cause and effect as they see how two colors mixed together make a new color. For example, yellow and blue makes green. This is a simple science experiment for toddlers.

As Room One children play with the sensory tub materials, they begin to understand concepts such as more/less, full/empty and cold/warm . Sensory experiences provide open-ended opportunities where the process is more important than the product – how children use the materials is much more important than what he/she makes with them. Sensory experiences are thought-provoking because each child can use the materials differently.

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During the past few weeks we have been reading the books Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Eric Carle and The Wheels On the Bus by Jane Cabrera.The children have really enjoyed these two books during story time and throughout the day they have also chosen to look at books by themselves or have a teacher read to them.

Music and Movement: We have been dancing and singing to the songs the ABC’s, The Wheels On The Bus, The Itsy Bitsy Spider and Twinkle, Twinkle Little star, and the Freeze.As children listen, sing, dance and enjoy music, they can develop skills in math(rhythm) and literacy.

Another song that we sing to help the children get ready for transitions is our clean up song. While singing this song the children help clean-up the environment and take ownership of their classroom. Here are lyrics to the song:

Clean up, clean up everybody everywhere.

Clean up, clean up everybody do your share.

I have also attached an article that is very informative about how beneficial it is for young children to be exposed to music and movement.

http://www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/201003/ParlakianWeb0310.pdf