Toddlers. Let's toddle along the journey that awaits us.
Green Eggs and Ham
Literacy: Read Out Loud
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Rug/Open Space
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/3/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
Children, which are at a critical and young age, need to have their minds fed. There is no better way to do that than through storytelling. Children also need to be seen and heard, and that means that we need to make lessons that will allow this, inviting them to share their own stories. When children are learning, they need to have the social emotional development in order to do so. They need to feel welcomed, appreciated, and confident in the learning environment of the classroom. To achieve a successful learning period, it is always a good idea to bring up something that children are already familiar with. That will engage them in further growth and it will inspire them, having consideration for their very being and what they are capable of doing. When we witness a classroom where children freely get involved in the literacy implementation, it is can easy to see what the children’s interests are during their interactions in free play. For example, there are a few children that get really curious about illustrations in books, so they will always take out a few books from the shelf, bring them to a caregiver to read and then ask them to read it more than once. This enables the teachers to spark their imagination with further discussions about the books that have come to the child’s liking, and they seem to like that because it motivates them to share their own thoughts and connections outside the story.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
To achieve a routine with all the children and the teacher in an engaging learning environment, everyone is brought together in a group as a whole in a read-out-loud activity that makes the individuals talk with their peers about the subject of the lesson that is being taught. In this case, it is the book “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr. Seuss with the following activity of identifying the green foods from the not-so-green foods. Throughout the period of the read-out-loud and the activity after, children will be discussing the story by making predictions, sharing their thoughts about the story and its characters, commenting on whether they are interested in eating the meal that was presented in the book, and talking about the foods that they already like/don’t like. With this, they will be able to express themselves freely as well as having the excitement of trying something new based on something they may already be familiar with, like the book itself.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C4 Indicators: Demonstrates ability to interact with an increasing number of children, begins to use words in social situations with peers, and participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Follows more complex directions/requests, active listening strategies, increased understanding of questions, and increased receptive vocabulary.
D2. C6 Indicators: Combines words to express more complex ideas, initiates socially expected communication, and speaks clearly enough to be understood most of the times.
D2. C7 Indicators: Initiates/participates in stories, begins to follow what happens in a story, shows awareness of pictures and print symbols, and understands that written symbols have more meaning.
D3. C8 Indicator: Notices and describes how items are the same or different.
D3. C10 Indicator: Represents thoughts and feelings in a variety of ways.
D5. C14 Indicator: Shows initiative by making choices and taking risks.
Materials and Resources
Instructional Procedures
Reading The Book
Discussing The Book
Short questions may be asked after the book has been read.
Green Food Identification Activity
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
This read out loud session will invite young children to read and explore engaging children’s books. Children will be invited to connect things that have been read with what happens around them that they can relate to. Children will be making meaningful predictions and connections to little things in the story. Children will be learning new foods based on the activity that comes after the out-loud reading of the book by looking at the names and pictures of all the different foods that are or are not green. Children will be able to group the newly-learned foods in their places along with the foods that they already know. Children will become more familiar with their emotions and their needs by expressing their thoughts about what they think about the meal in Green Eggs and Ham. Children will engage in thinking and expressing their thoughts on how the characters react throughout the story and why, relating to the character’s situation upon trying new things.
Assessment
Evaluating children’s responses to questions.
Determining what they already know how to read.
Determining what they know about books.
How they are making connections.
How they are making predictions.
How they are interpreting known information.
How they are interpreting unknown information.
Accommodations
One accommodation that needs to be set in place is that children must gather together so that they can discuss things they have been doing with peers, so they can engage in the activities that come after the read out loud portion. Though this lesson is goaled for a small group setting, it may be performed with one focus child as well. The children need to move around and express themselves to others for sharing, guidance and development. Another good accommodation to keep in mind is that children respond better with things they are already familiar with, which brings them to be more excited in learning new things through the things that are already familiar with. It is really good for the brain to engage in the entertainment of a literacy (whether through music, film or book) that repeats a story that they have already seen, read or heard. For example, if they have seen the “Spongebob” movie and they watch it again, it is refreshing their brains for better function as it provides them more oxygen, handing them better general understanding. One last important accommodation to mention is to have every child involved in order to achieve their needs and interests. If a child has a different style of learning, or if there are a variety of needs (including those of children with disabilities) that I am trying to accomplish other than the ones currently goaled for, then I would alter the lesson plan in respect to those different learning styles and needs. If children had other interests than I would change the book and alter the activities accordingly.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
If the presented lesson plan was not enough or if I needed a “back-up” plan for a follow-up activity in the classroom, I would choose to do an activity where the children are informed to come up with their own colored-food recipes like the green eggs and ham presented in the book. They may use anything they desire (paper-pencil, clay, paint, block sculpture, etc.) to share their created meals with others. This activity falls in place with the intended outcomes of the lesson plan when they express themselves and spark their imagination when they talk about their finished creations.
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Human Beings and Animals
Music and Movement
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Rug/Open Space
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/10/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
At a young age like two, children hunger for knowledge. They want to explore the world and fill their curiosities. This is the perfect time to help them fill their brains with knowledge about the world we live in, so they can apply it to their daily lives and become more familiar with the way things work. They receive more comprehension when they are already familiar with something. To achieve successful learning, it is always a good idea to bring up something that the children are already familiar with. That will engage and inspire them in further growth while considering their very being and what they are capable of doing. Children become extra interested in learning things that they are most curious about. At this moment, the children are interested in animals. This is due to the possible pets at home, they hear animal talk from other peers, they see it on TV, animals are presented in games they play, or they see animals out in the streets. This is the perfect opportunity to give them the knowledge they are seeking about animals. At the young age children are, they should be allowed to learn as much as they can, and one of the most important things to learn about is themselves, like their emotions or how to use their bodies. This is why music and movement is a perfect way of combining the children’s curiosity for animals in fun songs that engage them in bodily movement as a group together. This kind of activity is entertaining, and it will teach them about themselves and everything else around them in life.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
To achieve a routine with all the children in an engaging learning environment, everyone is brought together in a group as a whole in a music and movement activity. As a group, music and movement will allow the children to motivate each other in the open space to follow along the dance routine of the song that is being played. It will also help them loose their shyness or embarrassment of moving in a domino effect, in which one child participating will motivate another to do so too. They will feel better about expressing themselves and they can explore more about music, dancing and movement as they listen to the presented songs, where they also gain knowledge about things (in the case of this activity, about themselves and animals). The children will be guided throughout the lesson plan by the way they are dancing through most of the songs. Songs will be played one at a time that come with a specific dance that will be demonstrated so the children mimic the moves to that particular song in the open space. This is until an instructional song is reached, which will inform about the kind of movements to present, and the finale song of the lesson plan will be used to allow the children to show off their own dances in a game of freeze/dance.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C2 Indicators: Demonstrates self-awareness; learns to do things by self, and shows awareness as part of a group.
D1. C3 Indicator: Trusts and interacts comfortably with familiar adult.
D1. C4 Indicators: Demonstrates ability to interact with an increasing number of children, and participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Follows complex directions/requests, and shows active listening strategies.
D2. C7 Indicator: Initiates and participates in songs.
D4. C11 Indicator: Demonstrates coordination, balance and control in a variety of ways.
Materials and Resources
Instructional Procedure
Introducing the First Song About the Body
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
In this music and movement lesson plan, children will be invited to do physical movements that help their very being, and this happens by working on their gross motor skills to entertaining songs all kids enjoy. They will be practicing their coordination, balance and a variety of control. Children will be making meaningful connections to little things in the songs that will engage them with one another. They will be encouraged to open up in the group in self-expression through dance movements and vocals, building connections through the songs played, and sparking further growth on their social emotional development that will get them to participate positively in the activity with their child or adult peers. This activity will also encourage children to be more open with adults that may or may not be there all the time as well as with their child-peers. Children will practice following instructions and performing song routines, which will improve how they follow directions by how well they engage in their listening strategies. They will be using their imagination when they join the movement of the songs they hear because there is no screen telling them what they are seeing, and so instead they use their creativity to make scenes for themselves based on the stories they are hearing in the songs that are being played.
Assessment
How they are involved in the activity itself.
Evaluating how they involved with one another.
Evaluating their development in gross motor skills.
Their cooperation in coordination, balance and control.
How they are expressing themselves through dance.
How they are making connections.
How they are interpreting known information.
How they are interpreting unknown information.
Accommodations
One accommodation that needs to be set in place is that children should gather together as a group so they can get involved and engage in the music and movement activity. This lesson plan can be goaled for a small group setting, a large group setting, or it may be performed with one focus child if that were the case in the matter. No matter how, children will be able to move around and express themselves to others through guidance and move forward on development like they need to, and no child would be left out of it. Another great accommodation to keep in mind is that children respond better with things they are already familiar with, where we catch them to be more excited in learning new things through those things that they are already familiar with. They learn better this way and it will also expose them into learning newer things that show up in chain of that original thing that they were familiar with. If there were children that had a harder time following the routine of the activity for movement or speech or whatever else, I would use a different approach upon guiding the child. I could keep the child by my side or give him space (however it’s comfortable for the particular child) and give him the attention he needs to involve him in the activity somehow, and he could do his best to participate in the best of his ability. I would alternate the instructions of the activity with the child so he could have a different choice in action that relates to the activity that allows him to participate in the music and movement and still have fun with everyone else because he would still be allowed to engage with them. One of the things that the child could do is grab an instrument and play the instrument of the songs in the activity and still join right in as well as dancing his own way.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
If the presented lesson plan showed up in the moment to where there was not enough time filled or the children wanted an encore for music, I would choose to select more songs from the songs that they may already be familiar with in the classroom of which the teacher already has in store. We could use those songs as more song selections to continue the activity. If they wish to do so, they may take out instruments so they could play along to the song in their own music and movement. After all the movements of dancing, it would be a good idea to sit down with them and do an activity that does not require as much movement, such as playing with animal toys or letting them go off into dramatic play. Something like this may be done to rearrange the lesson plan if we needed a back-up plan because the previous one may not have been going so well before. Another type of activity that can be done after this music and movement lesson plan is done is that the children can read or be read stories about human beings or animals.
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Color Shape Blocks With Numbers
Mathematics
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Outside Playground
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/24/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
The children of the classroom simply adore playing with colored blocks. It has been observed that they come up with a range of ideas with blocks or Legos that are provided in the classroom in the toy center. They always have some stories around the structures built inside the classroom, such as a princess’s city or Batman’s bat cave. This kind of activity is perfect for the children because it really helps their development grow. They will have the opportunity to expand their knowledge on colors, shapes and the concept of numbers while their imagination/creativity is at work. I know that these children also get really attractive to items that have a lot of colors, especially when so many colors are not that often exposed with teacher-leading activities. Because they are gaining knowledge and their thinking through a creative activity, the block structure is like another example of when they draw something on paper and start expressing their story behind the drawing, in which everything that we see in their work is not there by accident but on purpose, all of it meaning something, so when the child is asked about the drawing (or in the activity, about their structure), we are finding out how they interpret all those little details on their work. As every line in the paper art is essential, so is every block piece on their structures when it is being built.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
When I am performing this lesson plan with the children as a little group outside in the playground, I am going to be there with them to guide them all the way through. As a caring educator wanting to demonstrate guidance, I will be paying attention to how the children are engaging in the activity. I would want them to be interested, and if the case occulted that they are starting to lose interest or they simply don’t completely understand what they are supposed to do, then I would guide them in the activity with different approaches about the blocks that they will be playing with to encourage them to use them in the way that they wish upon building their structures. I would be motivating them to come up with ideas based on the colors and shapes of the blocks, because that tiny bit of information will start a whole range of brain storms for the child as to what structure to create. I will remember to move between each child to see what they have accomplished so far and guide them into accomplishing even more with the blocks, and allow them access to a variety of ideas about their structure and not just that they have built one and hit the end of the activity. This activity is great for the children because they use their imagination and gain more knowledge.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C4 Indicator: Participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Shows active listening strategies, and an increased understanding of questions.
D2. C6 Indicator: Combines words to express more complex ideas.
D3. C8 Indicator: Notices and describes how items are the same or different.
D3. C9 Indicator: Demonstrates knowledge in beginning numbers.
D5. C14 Indicator: Pretends/uses creativity and imagination during play.
Materials and Resources
Instructional Procedures
The Colored Shape Block
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
There are a few objectives that I hope to accomplish in this lesson plan by the time the activity is over. Whenever the children are requested to build their own structures with the blocks that are provided to them, I would like for them to use their creativity to spark their imagination through the colors, shapes, and the number of blocks they are using for their particular structure. I would like for them to also practice their understanding for beginning number concepts when they are using the blocks. I would also like to see what they know or don’t know about the colors and shapes of the blocks, and how they are making connections with that information. The most exciting outcome I would like to see accomplished is to see how capable they are in expressing their ideas and thoughts when they are being asked about the kind of structures they are building and what the story is behind that particular structure they chose to do.
Assessment
Identifying what they know about shapes and colors.
Identifying what they don’t know about shapes and colors.
Evaluating their understanding for beginning numeracy.
How they are making connections using language skills.
How they are expressing their thoughts/ideas.
Accommodations
There are several accommodations that can be taken into consideration when going through with this lesson plan for the children in the classroom. First off, I would pay close attention to the children that I am working with. There may be a child or several children that may or may not struggle with the directions/requests of the activity. In this case, I would come close with the child and I would, as one example, if a child happened to know Spanish as their first language in the family, then I could use that to speak to the child in Spanish and translate the instructions, with simpler requests if the current requests were too difficult to follow. I would also give easier questions based on the activity about the colors, shapes and numbers of the blocks. If they have trouble coming up with an idea of what to build, I can encourage them to start up a non-identified formation by starting one up with my own blocks and then hand them over to the child. I could use little clues with the corresponding shapes and colors for the child to build something that seems familiar to them that will help them come up with an idea. On the contrary, with the children that I notice understand the more complex directions/requests of the lesson plan, I would start to engage in more complex questions based on the structure the children are building so I can help them expand their critical thinking skills and their knowledge based on the shapes, colors and numbers of the blocks to see more of their capabilities. In the activity overall, the children I am working with will come together as a group and share the blocks with each other, and this way, one child can help motivate another child engage in the activity.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
In the event of a back-up activity or simply an activity that may be performed after the one that has been presented, there are a lot of different other ideas that can be taken into place if the children refused to build their own kind of structure with the blocks or have lost their interest, but they could still learn about the shapes, colors and numbers. One way is to have them stack up the blocks and then have them count the blocks that they stacked up. We could use this information to compare which child has more blocks than another child, and this will encourage them to count the blocks to see who happens to have more. We could also compare which child has more of a specific color than another child, such as (who has more red and who has more blue). Another type of activity that can be done is to present the children with some kind of attractive poster board that has the shapes of the blocks with their corresponding names and/or colors, and since the children enjoy putting puzzles together, they can work on putting the colored shape blocks unto their corresponding places on the board with the empty spaces. There are other nameless activities with blocks that can be improvised with the children to gain their interest. To share, one that has worked in the past is to ask what the shapes remind the child of, or the teacher can start pretending that one the blocks is an animal or human and explain how the character is what it is because of the corresponding shape/color that is being used for the pretend, and then the child can be encouraged to make up their own characters and responsive play. If that has succeeded to engage the children, then they can be asked about the numbers, colors and shapes based on that play and try for the goals.
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Washing The Dishes
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Children Age/Group Size: A group of four 2-year old children
Date: 11/21/16
Time: 20 minutes
Connection to Sensory, Movement, and Problem Solving Areas of Development
Children need to have loving relationships, a stable environment, and the opportunity to see the world as an interesting place. This way, they underlie the healthy growth of all areas of development and learning. Sensory helps children with their manipulation in their small motor skills, which is using their hands and fingers when they use the dishes and they are free to move around the sensory table when gathering soap water. They may also go through events where problems may need to be handled, and the caregivers are there to help them solve their own problems when they occur, like sharing with each other. They can make sense of the world they live in by using their imagination, and develop self-esteem with experience, and gain more successful accomplishments for tasks. Children need exploration to grow, and one of the most important ways they need to explore is with their senses and that is why sensory activities exist. Their social emotional development is essential to ensure growth on a child, so participating in this kind of activity will allow them to engage with their peers whether it is their caregiver or other children, and they will develop on their social skills when passing through fights and friendships to grow up. Anything a child is surrounded with in this world influences every detailed action in that individual’s life, and that is why it will do children good to bring them together in an activity like this and show them good examples we would like for them to follow as they grow into adults.
Materials for Experience
Planning the Experience Space
The space is that going to be used for this activity with the children is going to be in the outside playground where the sensory table is located. It is the perfect place for this sensory activity because the table provides enough space for the children to move around the sensory table to interact with the table and their peers, and use the dish materials they are given to play with the water that is going to be poured inside this table. The floor in the playground outside is soft and will soak up the water if there are any spills from the table. It will not cause a big mess of water in other spaces outside the soft portion of the playground that will irritate someone else that is participating in something different, such as another child from a different class playing with other objects of the playground. The weather is getting a little cold at this month of November and that is why the water introduced inside the sensory table is going to be warm (as where in summer weather, it makes more sense to have colder water) so the children can feel more comfortable playing with the water outside. The most important and most interesting thing in the environmental space is the live human being, and children need real responsive people more than they need animate/inanimate objects. When setting up a space, children only need a few things to look at, because too many things to look at can be overwhelming and chaotic, and just like indoors spaces, children need to feel safe and the set-up space should give them plenty to do.
The Role of Language in the Experience
The majority of children speak English and are comfortable with that language, so that is going to be the main language that is going to be used to communicate with the children. However, there is a child that understands Spanish more than English because he comes from a Spanish-speaking family, so it is best to speak Spanish with this particular child so that he can better communicate and perform in the activity he is participating in. Language is important in order to build relationships through communication. There is verbal and non-verbal language and both are used in our daily lives. Language helps very much to make children feel like they belong to their families and they can also feel at home. That is why supporting a home language is very effective, like the Spanish speaking child in this particular group of children. A multicultural multilingual curriculum is created to connect children to their families and culture. When the children get this support, they are willing to feel more comfortable opening up to the world through multicultural education, in which the whole point of is to help children appreciate their own culture and cultural differences with their peers. There is also a balance with language communication. It is good to “bathe” the children and not “drown” them with language. In other words, we cannot let it be overwhelming for these young human beings. We need to feed their minds enough to enhance growth in their development, but we don’t want to bore/tire them out. When taking the role of language with the children during this sensory activity, they will be asked about the play they are performing at the sensory table and a conversation will commence to help them think critically about what they are doing and how they can continue their free play in a fascinating way. Language will also be used to help them identify what they are feeling with their senses and the materials placed in front of them. They will be able to analyze how the water, soap or sponges feel in their hands, how light or heavy their dishes get when they pour in and out water into or out of the dishes (also depending whether it has a sponge inside or not), the change they see in the water with/without soap, and how the water smells after the soap is provided. If problematic situations occur, communication will take place in order to help these children think up solutions on their own, guiding them into using their words with the other child/children in conflict with them and solving the issue they are going through at that moment.
Planning for Sustained Attention during the Experience
To keep children’s attention during the activity, the children will be watched on what they are doing with the dishes and the warm soap water. If they start to fall off interest, there are different approaches that can be taken to hold the children’s interest for a little bit and engage in development. Starting a conversation that contains questions helps the child think critically about solutions and create an idea as to what to play in the activity. The materials can be held in hand and the children can be given ideas for prediction as to what happens with the water and soap interacting with the dishes. It keeps them distracted from getting bored and being done with the activity when they seem not to know what else they can do and it helps them grow in the world. They may be surprised by the results of their predictions when they test them. A caregiver can join these children to start a scene with the items that they have been provided with to encourage them to use them in the first place. A scene that might become engaging to children that, for example, love playing kitchen is a scene where they are cooking and the child will be encouraged to take the dishes and start washing them with the soap water using the sponge in a creative way. Another scene that is kitchen-related is where the children are cooking a meal with the dishes and the soap water. In this scene, they may use the soap bubbles or sponges as food for the plates and/or bowls, and the water might be the drinks, or a soupy recipe. Depending on the situation with the cooked meal, they make take the soap bubbles and soap water and make their own ingredients with the dishes and show them off. Another scene that is non-kitchen related for children that don’t like to play in the kitchen could be a scene where they are making a potion in the making for a witch, or since the sensory table has an underwater design inside with built-in sea creatures like star fish, the child may be encourage to participate in the underwater life, for example feeding or fishing or trying to capture a sea creature coming from their own imagination, or they may even interact with the built-in sea creatures that inside the sensory table. In general, there are many scenes we can use to engage the child to use the items and that will help them come up with their own ideas that will keep them busy with the items in this sensory activity, because there are many possibilities for unique interactions to cover their attention span. If they find themselves tired of one scene, then an approach can be made to use another one to hold their interest before the activity is stopped altogether soon enough because their attention cannot be held for so long, especially for children that are at such a young age.
Building Child-Child and Adult-Child Relationships in the Experience
The activity is perfect to help the children create a fun adventure through play time with their peers. When they are washing the dishes, making a dish or feeding a fish in their free paly, they can look to their fellow peers and tell them about what they are doing and they can use their imagination to work together on their own little scene. If they are playing solo (and for example, playing kitchen), then they may be encouraged to look to someone else that is also playing kitchen and they can share each other’s recipes and possibly work together to mesh those recipes or create something new of their own. If two children are playing two completely different scenes, for example someone making their potion for a witch and the other one is catching a sea monster during their play, those two individual children can be encouraged to bring those scenes together and create their own dramatic play about those two things like children do all the time. Getting involved in the outside world shows children that they can share their differences with people and relate to them as unique individuals that have a lot of similar interests. The child-to-child peers is not enough because children still need their caregivers because that is where they receive their main support and care that helps them get involved with the rest of the world in the first place. A great framework that caregivers can use with children is scaffolding, a term that comes Vygotsky’s concept of zone of proximal development, which helps children through learning, support and problem-solving. Children need dependable adults in order to build trust, confidence and self-esteem to learn, which is why a caregiver needs to be present mentally as well as physically and show the child the excitement and loving warmth of an activity, so they can realize they can enjoy it without any hesitation. If there is an isolated child, then approaches may be used to take them out of that loneliness and have them present a play time with their peers and show off the creativity of their play. If children feel safe in an environment, they can gain trust by others when they encourage them to take place in an open activity that invites them right in for the fun and once they feel good in that scene with their peers, no matter if it’s their child friends or their adult caregivers, they will be able to find themselves comfortably and freely experiences endless ways of moving and exploring through the world through the sensory activity.
Sequencing the Experience
The first thing that is going to happen is that the children will be brought into the outside playground where they will be introduced to the sensory table in front of them. They will be explained that they will be playing with the water that is going to be placed inside the sensory table after they are asked what they asked what they think will be in the sensory table. The water then will be poured inside and soap is then going to be presented. They will see as they are told that soap is going to be placed inside the water and they will be asked how the water feels and what they think the soap is going to do with the water. A child might answer that the soap is going to make bubbles. The children will be encouraged to explore this idea by mixing the water up with their hands and watching the bubbles build up and they will be able to smell the soap, and then asked how the soap feels and smells. Next, the dishes will be placed inside the soapy water so the children can gather up some of themselves to play with, exploring the materials in a fun way as it opens the doors for free play and social interactions. The activity will come to an end when the children are starting to lose their interest and there seems to be no more ideas as to what to do with the activity. The children will have the cue that they are coming to the end of the activity and be asked if they liked the activity in the first place and what they have learned/liked from it, and then they will be given thanks for participating in the activity in hopes that they had fun and let them know that it is time to leave the sensory table so they can play in the playground.
Learning Objectives/Outcomes
Evaluating…
How they are making connections.
How they are making predictions.
How they are thinking critically.
How they are using their imagination.
How they are communicating with peers.
How they are engaging in free play.
How they are using their motor skills.
How they are engaging in social skills.
ELG Domain 1 Indicators: C2; Demonstrates self-confidence; learns to do things by self and shows awareness of self as part of a group, C3; Begins to initiate or portray roles and relationships, C4; Ability to interact and participates positively with more than one child, uses negotiation skills, uses words in social situations.
ELG Domain 2 Indicators: C5; Demonstrates active listening skills, increased understanding of questions, C6; Combines words to express more complex ideas, initiates socially accepted communication and asks simple questions in home language and may use gestures or single words to ask questions in second language.
ELG Domain 3 Indicators: C8; Begins to organize materials and information, C9; Expresses understanding of cause and effect, C10; Demonstrates increased problem-solving ability and represents thoughts and feelings in a varied of ways.
ELG Domain 4 Indicators: C11; Demonstrates coordination, balance and control in a varied of ways, C12; coordinates several senses.
ELG Domain 5 Indicators: C14; Attempts to learn new things he is curious about, shows initiative by making choices and taking risks, pretends and uses imagination during play and begins to find novel solutions to problems.
Documenting the Experience
When I am engaging in this activity with the children, I will be observing their behaviors and their exploration, looking to see if the goals listed are being presented in the activity. I will be paying attention to their responses amongst themselves and with other children whether or not I am making interactions with them.
Literacy: Read Out Loud
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Rug/Open Space
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/3/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
Children, which are at a critical and young age, need to have their minds fed. There is no better way to do that than through storytelling. Children also need to be seen and heard, and that means that we need to make lessons that will allow this, inviting them to share their own stories. When children are learning, they need to have the social emotional development in order to do so. They need to feel welcomed, appreciated, and confident in the learning environment of the classroom. To achieve a successful learning period, it is always a good idea to bring up something that children are already familiar with. That will engage them in further growth and it will inspire them, having consideration for their very being and what they are capable of doing. When we witness a classroom where children freely get involved in the literacy implementation, it is can easy to see what the children’s interests are during their interactions in free play. For example, there are a few children that get really curious about illustrations in books, so they will always take out a few books from the shelf, bring them to a caregiver to read and then ask them to read it more than once. This enables the teachers to spark their imagination with further discussions about the books that have come to the child’s liking, and they seem to like that because it motivates them to share their own thoughts and connections outside the story.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
To achieve a routine with all the children and the teacher in an engaging learning environment, everyone is brought together in a group as a whole in a read-out-loud activity that makes the individuals talk with their peers about the subject of the lesson that is being taught. In this case, it is the book “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr. Seuss with the following activity of identifying the green foods from the not-so-green foods. Throughout the period of the read-out-loud and the activity after, children will be discussing the story by making predictions, sharing their thoughts about the story and its characters, commenting on whether they are interested in eating the meal that was presented in the book, and talking about the foods that they already like/don’t like. With this, they will be able to express themselves freely as well as having the excitement of trying something new based on something they may already be familiar with, like the book itself.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C4 Indicators: Demonstrates ability to interact with an increasing number of children, begins to use words in social situations with peers, and participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Follows more complex directions/requests, active listening strategies, increased understanding of questions, and increased receptive vocabulary.
D2. C6 Indicators: Combines words to express more complex ideas, initiates socially expected communication, and speaks clearly enough to be understood most of the times.
D2. C7 Indicators: Initiates/participates in stories, begins to follow what happens in a story, shows awareness of pictures and print symbols, and understands that written symbols have more meaning.
D3. C8 Indicator: Notices and describes how items are the same or different.
D3. C10 Indicator: Represents thoughts and feelings in a variety of ways.
D5. C14 Indicator: Shows initiative by making choices and taking risks.
Materials and Resources
- Green Eggs and Ham (Dr. Seuss, 1960)
- Any materials for Green/Not-Green piles
- Pre-made Index Cards of Food
- A Box or Bag
Instructional Procedures
Reading The Book
- Book-handling knowledge will be presented by introducing the title page, pointing at the title of the book, the author, the illustrator and any other existing pages, such as the copyright page or the dedication page, before moving to read the story. The children will be engaged to make predictions before reading the book. They may be asked questions like: Have you read this book before? If so, what do you remember about it? If not, what do you think the story is about? What do you think will happen in the story?
- During the read-out-loud, questions will be asked to encourage the children to make meaningful predictions and connections. This may be done with questions like: What do you think will happen next? Do you think the male in the hat will continue to deny Sam-I-Am until the very end? Will he ever taste the food? How do you think the story will end? How are the characters feeling? How do you think they will feel later? Are you going to hear the same rhyming words over and over again? What will Sam-I-Am do or say next with every “no” he gets? How does Sam-I-Am finally convince the male in the hat to finally eat the food?
Discussing The Book
Short questions may be asked after the book has been read.
- What was the story about?
- What did you think about the story?
- What are some ways Sam-I-Am tries to convince the man in the hat to taste green eggs and ham? Why doesn’t he give up?
- How do you think the characters were feeling throughout the story? Do you know any words that let you know how they felt?
- How do you think the characters felt at the end of the story?
- Have you been bothered to try something you thought you didn’t like and then realized that you liked it?
Green Food Identification Activity
- Using any kind of material to make color-coded sections on the floor, one section will be labeled as “GREEN” and the others will be labeled as otherwise, such as blue, yellow, red, etc. The index cards will have words and colored pictures of foods that are green or not green. Those cards are placed inside the box or bag, where they will be mixed.
- The children may be asked to name any foods they may already know that are green.
- After that discussion, the children can be brought into a line or be called one by one from the group gathering to come up and pick out a card from the mixed bunch in the box/bag so they can identify what the food is, if it’s green or not, and put it in the right pile until all the cards are gone.
- Do we have more green foods than non-green foods? Compare how many green foods there are by how many non-green foods there are.
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
This read out loud session will invite young children to read and explore engaging children’s books. Children will be invited to connect things that have been read with what happens around them that they can relate to. Children will be making meaningful predictions and connections to little things in the story. Children will be learning new foods based on the activity that comes after the out-loud reading of the book by looking at the names and pictures of all the different foods that are or are not green. Children will be able to group the newly-learned foods in their places along with the foods that they already know. Children will become more familiar with their emotions and their needs by expressing their thoughts about what they think about the meal in Green Eggs and Ham. Children will engage in thinking and expressing their thoughts on how the characters react throughout the story and why, relating to the character’s situation upon trying new things.
Assessment
Evaluating children’s responses to questions.
Determining what they already know how to read.
Determining what they know about books.
How they are making connections.
How they are making predictions.
How they are interpreting known information.
How they are interpreting unknown information.
Accommodations
One accommodation that needs to be set in place is that children must gather together so that they can discuss things they have been doing with peers, so they can engage in the activities that come after the read out loud portion. Though this lesson is goaled for a small group setting, it may be performed with one focus child as well. The children need to move around and express themselves to others for sharing, guidance and development. Another good accommodation to keep in mind is that children respond better with things they are already familiar with, which brings them to be more excited in learning new things through the things that are already familiar with. It is really good for the brain to engage in the entertainment of a literacy (whether through music, film or book) that repeats a story that they have already seen, read or heard. For example, if they have seen the “Spongebob” movie and they watch it again, it is refreshing their brains for better function as it provides them more oxygen, handing them better general understanding. One last important accommodation to mention is to have every child involved in order to achieve their needs and interests. If a child has a different style of learning, or if there are a variety of needs (including those of children with disabilities) that I am trying to accomplish other than the ones currently goaled for, then I would alter the lesson plan in respect to those different learning styles and needs. If children had other interests than I would change the book and alter the activities accordingly.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
If the presented lesson plan was not enough or if I needed a “back-up” plan for a follow-up activity in the classroom, I would choose to do an activity where the children are informed to come up with their own colored-food recipes like the green eggs and ham presented in the book. They may use anything they desire (paper-pencil, clay, paint, block sculpture, etc.) to share their created meals with others. This activity falls in place with the intended outcomes of the lesson plan when they express themselves and spark their imagination when they talk about their finished creations.
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Human Beings and Animals
Music and Movement
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Rug/Open Space
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/10/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
At a young age like two, children hunger for knowledge. They want to explore the world and fill their curiosities. This is the perfect time to help them fill their brains with knowledge about the world we live in, so they can apply it to their daily lives and become more familiar with the way things work. They receive more comprehension when they are already familiar with something. To achieve successful learning, it is always a good idea to bring up something that the children are already familiar with. That will engage and inspire them in further growth while considering their very being and what they are capable of doing. Children become extra interested in learning things that they are most curious about. At this moment, the children are interested in animals. This is due to the possible pets at home, they hear animal talk from other peers, they see it on TV, animals are presented in games they play, or they see animals out in the streets. This is the perfect opportunity to give them the knowledge they are seeking about animals. At the young age children are, they should be allowed to learn as much as they can, and one of the most important things to learn about is themselves, like their emotions or how to use their bodies. This is why music and movement is a perfect way of combining the children’s curiosity for animals in fun songs that engage them in bodily movement as a group together. This kind of activity is entertaining, and it will teach them about themselves and everything else around them in life.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
To achieve a routine with all the children in an engaging learning environment, everyone is brought together in a group as a whole in a music and movement activity. As a group, music and movement will allow the children to motivate each other in the open space to follow along the dance routine of the song that is being played. It will also help them loose their shyness or embarrassment of moving in a domino effect, in which one child participating will motivate another to do so too. They will feel better about expressing themselves and they can explore more about music, dancing and movement as they listen to the presented songs, where they also gain knowledge about things (in the case of this activity, about themselves and animals). The children will be guided throughout the lesson plan by the way they are dancing through most of the songs. Songs will be played one at a time that come with a specific dance that will be demonstrated so the children mimic the moves to that particular song in the open space. This is until an instructional song is reached, which will inform about the kind of movements to present, and the finale song of the lesson plan will be used to allow the children to show off their own dances in a game of freeze/dance.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C2 Indicators: Demonstrates self-awareness; learns to do things by self, and shows awareness as part of a group.
D1. C3 Indicator: Trusts and interacts comfortably with familiar adult.
D1. C4 Indicators: Demonstrates ability to interact with an increasing number of children, and participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Follows complex directions/requests, and shows active listening strategies.
D2. C7 Indicator: Initiates and participates in songs.
D4. C11 Indicator: Demonstrates coordination, balance and control in a variety of ways.
Materials and Resources
- Songs CD
- A Radio
Instructional Procedure
Introducing the First Song About the Body
- The children will be gathered in the rug/open space of the classroom, where we will be standing near one another with enough space that allows us to move around. The first song that will be presented is “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.” The children will get a heads-up to follow what body part the song tells us to identify by touching it. I will continue to encourage the children to continue the dance movements of the song as they identify the body parts the singer tells us to until the song is over.
- When the first song is over, the next song that will come on is “Listen and Move,” and the children will be informed about what the song is all about. This song will give us different sequences of music and it will tell us what to do in the specific sequence of music. If the song tells us to walk and the sequence of music starts, then I will be motivating the children to walk around the open space, and when the music stops and a new sequence begins and the singer tells us to gallop, then I will encourage the children to gallop, and so on. In the second part of the song, we will be asked to remember what movement each sequence of music represented, so if we hear music in which we were told to walk, then I will be encouraging the children to walk in that specific music in play after I ask if anyone remembers what the command was, and so on until the song is done.
- The children will be seated down right on the spot of the open space that they were standing in. The next song the radio will play is the sounds of animals with no background music. The children will be informed ahead of time that we will be entering the wild, listening to a few animal sounds, and together we will be identifying what each of the animals that we hear are as the track plays.
- Next, a song will play called “The Animals Song,” and this song will sing about the animals and the types of sounds that they each make. I will encouraging the children to sing along to the song and imitate the sounds of the animals specified in the song along with hand movements to present the animal that is being imitated.
- The children will stand up on the open space of the floor again. The next song that will come up is “The Ants Go Marching One By One.” I will encourage the children to start marching around the open space of the carpet. As the song continues, I will encourage them to follow the demonstrated movements, in which the story of the song tells about the ants marching to and from their home until the song is over.
- As the end of the lesson plan shows up, the children will be informed that the last song that will come up will be set in a game of Freeze/Dance, where the children will be able to express their own dance moves until the song stops (because they will freeze) before the song starts up again, and this will go on until the song ends. The song that will take place in this game will be “It’s A Jungle Out There” by Phil Lawrence from the movie Rio 2.
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
In this music and movement lesson plan, children will be invited to do physical movements that help their very being, and this happens by working on their gross motor skills to entertaining songs all kids enjoy. They will be practicing their coordination, balance and a variety of control. Children will be making meaningful connections to little things in the songs that will engage them with one another. They will be encouraged to open up in the group in self-expression through dance movements and vocals, building connections through the songs played, and sparking further growth on their social emotional development that will get them to participate positively in the activity with their child or adult peers. This activity will also encourage children to be more open with adults that may or may not be there all the time as well as with their child-peers. Children will practice following instructions and performing song routines, which will improve how they follow directions by how well they engage in their listening strategies. They will be using their imagination when they join the movement of the songs they hear because there is no screen telling them what they are seeing, and so instead they use their creativity to make scenes for themselves based on the stories they are hearing in the songs that are being played.
Assessment
How they are involved in the activity itself.
Evaluating how they involved with one another.
Evaluating their development in gross motor skills.
Their cooperation in coordination, balance and control.
How they are expressing themselves through dance.
How they are making connections.
How they are interpreting known information.
How they are interpreting unknown information.
Accommodations
One accommodation that needs to be set in place is that children should gather together as a group so they can get involved and engage in the music and movement activity. This lesson plan can be goaled for a small group setting, a large group setting, or it may be performed with one focus child if that were the case in the matter. No matter how, children will be able to move around and express themselves to others through guidance and move forward on development like they need to, and no child would be left out of it. Another great accommodation to keep in mind is that children respond better with things they are already familiar with, where we catch them to be more excited in learning new things through those things that they are already familiar with. They learn better this way and it will also expose them into learning newer things that show up in chain of that original thing that they were familiar with. If there were children that had a harder time following the routine of the activity for movement or speech or whatever else, I would use a different approach upon guiding the child. I could keep the child by my side or give him space (however it’s comfortable for the particular child) and give him the attention he needs to involve him in the activity somehow, and he could do his best to participate in the best of his ability. I would alternate the instructions of the activity with the child so he could have a different choice in action that relates to the activity that allows him to participate in the music and movement and still have fun with everyone else because he would still be allowed to engage with them. One of the things that the child could do is grab an instrument and play the instrument of the songs in the activity and still join right in as well as dancing his own way.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
If the presented lesson plan showed up in the moment to where there was not enough time filled or the children wanted an encore for music, I would choose to select more songs from the songs that they may already be familiar with in the classroom of which the teacher already has in store. We could use those songs as more song selections to continue the activity. If they wish to do so, they may take out instruments so they could play along to the song in their own music and movement. After all the movements of dancing, it would be a good idea to sit down with them and do an activity that does not require as much movement, such as playing with animal toys or letting them go off into dramatic play. Something like this may be done to rearrange the lesson plan if we needed a back-up plan because the previous one may not have been going so well before. Another type of activity that can be done after this music and movement lesson plan is done is that the children can read or be read stories about human beings or animals.
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Color Shape Blocks With Numbers
Mathematics
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Location: Early Head Start
Location in Classroom: Outside Playground
Lesson Time: 20 minutes
Lesson Date: 10/24/16
Age: 2+
Children’s Interests and Needs
The children of the classroom simply adore playing with colored blocks. It has been observed that they come up with a range of ideas with blocks or Legos that are provided in the classroom in the toy center. They always have some stories around the structures built inside the classroom, such as a princess’s city or Batman’s bat cave. This kind of activity is perfect for the children because it really helps their development grow. They will have the opportunity to expand their knowledge on colors, shapes and the concept of numbers while their imagination/creativity is at work. I know that these children also get really attractive to items that have a lot of colors, especially when so many colors are not that often exposed with teacher-leading activities. Because they are gaining knowledge and their thinking through a creative activity, the block structure is like another example of when they draw something on paper and start expressing their story behind the drawing, in which everything that we see in their work is not there by accident but on purpose, all of it meaning something, so when the child is asked about the drawing (or in the activity, about their structure), we are finding out how they interpret all those little details on their work. As every line in the paper art is essential, so is every block piece on their structures when it is being built.
Guidance Routines and Learning Environment
When I am performing this lesson plan with the children as a little group outside in the playground, I am going to be there with them to guide them all the way through. As a caring educator wanting to demonstrate guidance, I will be paying attention to how the children are engaging in the activity. I would want them to be interested, and if the case occulted that they are starting to lose interest or they simply don’t completely understand what they are supposed to do, then I would guide them in the activity with different approaches about the blocks that they will be playing with to encourage them to use them in the way that they wish upon building their structures. I would be motivating them to come up with ideas based on the colors and shapes of the blocks, because that tiny bit of information will start a whole range of brain storms for the child as to what structure to create. I will remember to move between each child to see what they have accomplished so far and guide them into accomplishing even more with the blocks, and allow them access to a variety of ideas about their structure and not just that they have built one and hit the end of the activity. This activity is great for the children because they use their imagination and gain more knowledge.
New Mexico Early Learning Guidelines
-Infants/Toddlers-Older Toddlers
D1. C4 Indicator: Participates positively in activities with more than one other child.
D2. C5 Indicators: Shows active listening strategies, and an increased understanding of questions.
D2. C6 Indicator: Combines words to express more complex ideas.
D3. C8 Indicator: Notices and describes how items are the same or different.
D3. C9 Indicator: Demonstrates knowledge in beginning numbers.
D5. C14 Indicator: Pretends/uses creativity and imagination during play.
Materials and Resources
- Colored Shape Blocks
Instructional Procedures
The Colored Shape Block
- The children will be encouraged to gather up as a group together in the outside playground, where a box of color shape blocks will be presented to them. As the blocks are being taken out of their box, the children will be briefly encouraged to answer questions about the kind of blocks that they see in the box based on the colors and the shapes of the blocks, along with any possible connection.
- The blocks are taken out the box completely and handed out to the children. They will be informed to use these blocks to create any kind of structure that they please. As they do this, they will be asked about the kind of shapes or colors they wish to use to make their unique structures: What are you building? What colors is your structure going to be? What kind of shapes are in your structure? How many [shape] are there? How many colors of that shape are there? How many shapes are [color]? And any other questions that may show up in the moment of the activity.
- As it is noticed that a child or children finish up their structures, they will be asked to talk about what kind of structure they have decided to build, and they will be encouraged to tell the story behind their built structure, like what it inside it or why they have decided to build that particular structure in the first place. They will also be asked how many blocks they have used to make the structure, and they will be encouraged to count the blocks on the structure to find out.
Objectives or Intended Outcomes
There are a few objectives that I hope to accomplish in this lesson plan by the time the activity is over. Whenever the children are requested to build their own structures with the blocks that are provided to them, I would like for them to use their creativity to spark their imagination through the colors, shapes, and the number of blocks they are using for their particular structure. I would like for them to also practice their understanding for beginning number concepts when they are using the blocks. I would also like to see what they know or don’t know about the colors and shapes of the blocks, and how they are making connections with that information. The most exciting outcome I would like to see accomplished is to see how capable they are in expressing their ideas and thoughts when they are being asked about the kind of structures they are building and what the story is behind that particular structure they chose to do.
Assessment
Identifying what they know about shapes and colors.
Identifying what they don’t know about shapes and colors.
Evaluating their understanding for beginning numeracy.
How they are making connections using language skills.
How they are expressing their thoughts/ideas.
Accommodations
There are several accommodations that can be taken into consideration when going through with this lesson plan for the children in the classroom. First off, I would pay close attention to the children that I am working with. There may be a child or several children that may or may not struggle with the directions/requests of the activity. In this case, I would come close with the child and I would, as one example, if a child happened to know Spanish as their first language in the family, then I could use that to speak to the child in Spanish and translate the instructions, with simpler requests if the current requests were too difficult to follow. I would also give easier questions based on the activity about the colors, shapes and numbers of the blocks. If they have trouble coming up with an idea of what to build, I can encourage them to start up a non-identified formation by starting one up with my own blocks and then hand them over to the child. I could use little clues with the corresponding shapes and colors for the child to build something that seems familiar to them that will help them come up with an idea. On the contrary, with the children that I notice understand the more complex directions/requests of the lesson plan, I would start to engage in more complex questions based on the structure the children are building so I can help them expand their critical thinking skills and their knowledge based on the shapes, colors and numbers of the blocks to see more of their capabilities. In the activity overall, the children I am working with will come together as a group and share the blocks with each other, and this way, one child can help motivate another child engage in the activity.
Possible Follow-Up Activities
In the event of a back-up activity or simply an activity that may be performed after the one that has been presented, there are a lot of different other ideas that can be taken into place if the children refused to build their own kind of structure with the blocks or have lost their interest, but they could still learn about the shapes, colors and numbers. One way is to have them stack up the blocks and then have them count the blocks that they stacked up. We could use this information to compare which child has more blocks than another child, and this will encourage them to count the blocks to see who happens to have more. We could also compare which child has more of a specific color than another child, such as (who has more red and who has more blue). Another type of activity that can be done is to present the children with some kind of attractive poster board that has the shapes of the blocks with their corresponding names and/or colors, and since the children enjoy putting puzzles together, they can work on putting the colored shape blocks unto their corresponding places on the board with the empty spaces. There are other nameless activities with blocks that can be improvised with the children to gain their interest. To share, one that has worked in the past is to ask what the shapes remind the child of, or the teacher can start pretending that one the blocks is an animal or human and explain how the character is what it is because of the corresponding shape/color that is being used for the pretend, and then the child can be encouraged to make up their own characters and responsive play. If that has succeeded to engage the children, then they can be asked about the numbers, colors and shapes based on that play and try for the goals.
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Washing The Dishes
Teacher: Sharon Forester
Children Age/Group Size: A group of four 2-year old children
Date: 11/21/16
Time: 20 minutes
Connection to Sensory, Movement, and Problem Solving Areas of Development
Children need to have loving relationships, a stable environment, and the opportunity to see the world as an interesting place. This way, they underlie the healthy growth of all areas of development and learning. Sensory helps children with their manipulation in their small motor skills, which is using their hands and fingers when they use the dishes and they are free to move around the sensory table when gathering soap water. They may also go through events where problems may need to be handled, and the caregivers are there to help them solve their own problems when they occur, like sharing with each other. They can make sense of the world they live in by using their imagination, and develop self-esteem with experience, and gain more successful accomplishments for tasks. Children need exploration to grow, and one of the most important ways they need to explore is with their senses and that is why sensory activities exist. Their social emotional development is essential to ensure growth on a child, so participating in this kind of activity will allow them to engage with their peers whether it is their caregiver or other children, and they will develop on their social skills when passing through fights and friendships to grow up. Anything a child is surrounded with in this world influences every detailed action in that individual’s life, and that is why it will do children good to bring them together in an activity like this and show them good examples we would like for them to follow as they grow into adults.
Materials for Experience
- A Sensory Table
- Bowls, cups, plates
- Warm Water
- Baby Soap
- Sponges
Planning the Experience Space
The space is that going to be used for this activity with the children is going to be in the outside playground where the sensory table is located. It is the perfect place for this sensory activity because the table provides enough space for the children to move around the sensory table to interact with the table and their peers, and use the dish materials they are given to play with the water that is going to be poured inside this table. The floor in the playground outside is soft and will soak up the water if there are any spills from the table. It will not cause a big mess of water in other spaces outside the soft portion of the playground that will irritate someone else that is participating in something different, such as another child from a different class playing with other objects of the playground. The weather is getting a little cold at this month of November and that is why the water introduced inside the sensory table is going to be warm (as where in summer weather, it makes more sense to have colder water) so the children can feel more comfortable playing with the water outside. The most important and most interesting thing in the environmental space is the live human being, and children need real responsive people more than they need animate/inanimate objects. When setting up a space, children only need a few things to look at, because too many things to look at can be overwhelming and chaotic, and just like indoors spaces, children need to feel safe and the set-up space should give them plenty to do.
The Role of Language in the Experience
The majority of children speak English and are comfortable with that language, so that is going to be the main language that is going to be used to communicate with the children. However, there is a child that understands Spanish more than English because he comes from a Spanish-speaking family, so it is best to speak Spanish with this particular child so that he can better communicate and perform in the activity he is participating in. Language is important in order to build relationships through communication. There is verbal and non-verbal language and both are used in our daily lives. Language helps very much to make children feel like they belong to their families and they can also feel at home. That is why supporting a home language is very effective, like the Spanish speaking child in this particular group of children. A multicultural multilingual curriculum is created to connect children to their families and culture. When the children get this support, they are willing to feel more comfortable opening up to the world through multicultural education, in which the whole point of is to help children appreciate their own culture and cultural differences with their peers. There is also a balance with language communication. It is good to “bathe” the children and not “drown” them with language. In other words, we cannot let it be overwhelming for these young human beings. We need to feed their minds enough to enhance growth in their development, but we don’t want to bore/tire them out. When taking the role of language with the children during this sensory activity, they will be asked about the play they are performing at the sensory table and a conversation will commence to help them think critically about what they are doing and how they can continue their free play in a fascinating way. Language will also be used to help them identify what they are feeling with their senses and the materials placed in front of them. They will be able to analyze how the water, soap or sponges feel in their hands, how light or heavy their dishes get when they pour in and out water into or out of the dishes (also depending whether it has a sponge inside or not), the change they see in the water with/without soap, and how the water smells after the soap is provided. If problematic situations occur, communication will take place in order to help these children think up solutions on their own, guiding them into using their words with the other child/children in conflict with them and solving the issue they are going through at that moment.
Planning for Sustained Attention during the Experience
To keep children’s attention during the activity, the children will be watched on what they are doing with the dishes and the warm soap water. If they start to fall off interest, there are different approaches that can be taken to hold the children’s interest for a little bit and engage in development. Starting a conversation that contains questions helps the child think critically about solutions and create an idea as to what to play in the activity. The materials can be held in hand and the children can be given ideas for prediction as to what happens with the water and soap interacting with the dishes. It keeps them distracted from getting bored and being done with the activity when they seem not to know what else they can do and it helps them grow in the world. They may be surprised by the results of their predictions when they test them. A caregiver can join these children to start a scene with the items that they have been provided with to encourage them to use them in the first place. A scene that might become engaging to children that, for example, love playing kitchen is a scene where they are cooking and the child will be encouraged to take the dishes and start washing them with the soap water using the sponge in a creative way. Another scene that is kitchen-related is where the children are cooking a meal with the dishes and the soap water. In this scene, they may use the soap bubbles or sponges as food for the plates and/or bowls, and the water might be the drinks, or a soupy recipe. Depending on the situation with the cooked meal, they make take the soap bubbles and soap water and make their own ingredients with the dishes and show them off. Another scene that is non-kitchen related for children that don’t like to play in the kitchen could be a scene where they are making a potion in the making for a witch, or since the sensory table has an underwater design inside with built-in sea creatures like star fish, the child may be encourage to participate in the underwater life, for example feeding or fishing or trying to capture a sea creature coming from their own imagination, or they may even interact with the built-in sea creatures that inside the sensory table. In general, there are many scenes we can use to engage the child to use the items and that will help them come up with their own ideas that will keep them busy with the items in this sensory activity, because there are many possibilities for unique interactions to cover their attention span. If they find themselves tired of one scene, then an approach can be made to use another one to hold their interest before the activity is stopped altogether soon enough because their attention cannot be held for so long, especially for children that are at such a young age.
Building Child-Child and Adult-Child Relationships in the Experience
The activity is perfect to help the children create a fun adventure through play time with their peers. When they are washing the dishes, making a dish or feeding a fish in their free paly, they can look to their fellow peers and tell them about what they are doing and they can use their imagination to work together on their own little scene. If they are playing solo (and for example, playing kitchen), then they may be encouraged to look to someone else that is also playing kitchen and they can share each other’s recipes and possibly work together to mesh those recipes or create something new of their own. If two children are playing two completely different scenes, for example someone making their potion for a witch and the other one is catching a sea monster during their play, those two individual children can be encouraged to bring those scenes together and create their own dramatic play about those two things like children do all the time. Getting involved in the outside world shows children that they can share their differences with people and relate to them as unique individuals that have a lot of similar interests. The child-to-child peers is not enough because children still need their caregivers because that is where they receive their main support and care that helps them get involved with the rest of the world in the first place. A great framework that caregivers can use with children is scaffolding, a term that comes Vygotsky’s concept of zone of proximal development, which helps children through learning, support and problem-solving. Children need dependable adults in order to build trust, confidence and self-esteem to learn, which is why a caregiver needs to be present mentally as well as physically and show the child the excitement and loving warmth of an activity, so they can realize they can enjoy it without any hesitation. If there is an isolated child, then approaches may be used to take them out of that loneliness and have them present a play time with their peers and show off the creativity of their play. If children feel safe in an environment, they can gain trust by others when they encourage them to take place in an open activity that invites them right in for the fun and once they feel good in that scene with their peers, no matter if it’s their child friends or their adult caregivers, they will be able to find themselves comfortably and freely experiences endless ways of moving and exploring through the world through the sensory activity.
Sequencing the Experience
The first thing that is going to happen is that the children will be brought into the outside playground where they will be introduced to the sensory table in front of them. They will be explained that they will be playing with the water that is going to be placed inside the sensory table after they are asked what they asked what they think will be in the sensory table. The water then will be poured inside and soap is then going to be presented. They will see as they are told that soap is going to be placed inside the water and they will be asked how the water feels and what they think the soap is going to do with the water. A child might answer that the soap is going to make bubbles. The children will be encouraged to explore this idea by mixing the water up with their hands and watching the bubbles build up and they will be able to smell the soap, and then asked how the soap feels and smells. Next, the dishes will be placed inside the soapy water so the children can gather up some of themselves to play with, exploring the materials in a fun way as it opens the doors for free play and social interactions. The activity will come to an end when the children are starting to lose their interest and there seems to be no more ideas as to what to do with the activity. The children will have the cue that they are coming to the end of the activity and be asked if they liked the activity in the first place and what they have learned/liked from it, and then they will be given thanks for participating in the activity in hopes that they had fun and let them know that it is time to leave the sensory table so they can play in the playground.
Learning Objectives/Outcomes
Evaluating…
How they are making connections.
How they are making predictions.
How they are thinking critically.
How they are using their imagination.
How they are communicating with peers.
How they are engaging in free play.
How they are using their motor skills.
How they are engaging in social skills.
ELG Domain 1 Indicators: C2; Demonstrates self-confidence; learns to do things by self and shows awareness of self as part of a group, C3; Begins to initiate or portray roles and relationships, C4; Ability to interact and participates positively with more than one child, uses negotiation skills, uses words in social situations.
ELG Domain 2 Indicators: C5; Demonstrates active listening skills, increased understanding of questions, C6; Combines words to express more complex ideas, initiates socially accepted communication and asks simple questions in home language and may use gestures or single words to ask questions in second language.
ELG Domain 3 Indicators: C8; Begins to organize materials and information, C9; Expresses understanding of cause and effect, C10; Demonstrates increased problem-solving ability and represents thoughts and feelings in a varied of ways.
ELG Domain 4 Indicators: C11; Demonstrates coordination, balance and control in a varied of ways, C12; coordinates several senses.
ELG Domain 5 Indicators: C14; Attempts to learn new things he is curious about, shows initiative by making choices and taking risks, pretends and uses imagination during play and begins to find novel solutions to problems.
Documenting the Experience
When I am engaging in this activity with the children, I will be observing their behaviors and their exploration, looking to see if the goals listed are being presented in the activity. I will be paying attention to their responses amongst themselves and with other children whether or not I am making interactions with them.