October 10

October 10

Hi Mom, 

There are two major changes I want to see happen in my school this year. One is the curriculum and the other is behavior management.  Before we even consider going through accreditation, I want these teachers to understand developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) and emergent learning.  DAP entails teaching to the individual child not the whole group.  It means that what we do is aligned with who the children really are, not who we “expect” them to be. 

For example, 4 year olds are not going to learn the letter A by bingo dotting red paint and then placing apple seeds onto a coloring sheet of an apple.  To expect them to learn from that experience is inappropriate. This school currently uses the worksheet method of teaching.  The teachers will show an apple to the group, say ‘this is an apple, everyone say apple.  Apple starts with A. Everyone say A.  Now let’s glue 4 apple seeds onto our paper. 

This is really boring!  The children are better than that.  They deserve to be treated with the same respect that we offer each other.  They have natural curiosity and want to learn as much as they can about things  that are interesting to them.  Children are always looking for connections.  How is that apple relevant in my life?  Does it smell familiar?  Have I had this before?  Why is this one green?  Do green ones taste the same?  I love how they taste, I wonder what else I can do with this. 

What the teachers need to learn to do is plan for children who are investigators.  The classroom needs real apples laid out on a table for them to “discover”, then let the children taste, touch, open, sniff, and explore that apple.  Add plastic knives to the mix. They can find the seeds inside.  Help the make applesauce or do apple stamping.  (Do you know that there is a paint that is edible? )  These hands of experiences help make connections for the child.  If the teacher is smart, she will have journals for the children to then write/draw about the apples if they want.  When the child draws in his journal and the teacher asks him to label the apple, the child will now say, “How do you spell apple.”  BINGO!  Relevant opportunity to introduce the letter A. 

The problem with this scenario, or so it seems, is that the teachers are worried about the child who doesn’t want to write/draw in his journal.  If he doesn’t write, how will he ever learn the letter A?  That’s where I have get involved.  My job is to help them understand that language and literacy skills  happen all day long in every part of the classroom.   They just need to look for the opportunities that are interesting and relevant, and use those times to teach.  It’s a new way of thinking. 

The other piece to DAP is how it pertains to behavior management.  What is it with teachers and time out? Busy children are happy children.  If we expect them to sit while we count out 4 seeds, one child at a time, there will be problems.  Someone is going to get bored and start flinging the seeds.  At that point the teacher is going to have to “teach” the seed flinger that he needs to be polite.  Which means the others have to wait and watch as one child gets reprimanded.  And as if that wasn’t awkward enough, someone else is probably going to act out and put a seed up her nose, which is now going to force the other seed counters to wait while the teacher panics and tries to get the lodged seed out of said child’s nose.  It’s a  vicious cycle, I tell you!   

Once the teacher understands that waiting for every child to count seeds is both unnecessary and boring, she will change her plan, (maybe add a egg carton with numbers in the spots and challenge the children to a seed counting game they can play during center time) and then children will be busy, and then no one flings seeds, although I can’t guarantee that no one will try to shove a seed up her nose.  Noses are like magnets for tiny round things. 

I guess you can see how that this is going to be a busy year for me.  It’s okay, I love the challenge and know that the results are worth the effort.   I’ll keep you posted.

October 3

October 3,

Dear Diary,

In the book Spreading the  News:  Sharing Early Childhood Education,  Margie Carter and Deb Curtis talk about bringing the parents inside the classroom through photos and documentation. 

Genius!  Why didn't I think of that?  This could solve my problem. 

If the teachers document the learning, then the parents can see where the pre-writing and pre-reading skills come from.  If the documentation is done correctly, maybe the parents can see the actual GROWTH of language.  For example, if the threes start the language and literacy documentation, then the parents will really see the changes during the fours year. 

Maybe we should start this in the two's?  

Why only language and literacy growth?  Let's show growth in all of the domains. 

Hmmm, If I asked the teachers to begin doing all the domains, they would walk out.  I would have a mutiny on my hands. 

Baby steps, Deej,  baby steps.

October 2

October 2

Dear Mom,

I can’t say that I’m having a good day.  It started off with my pregnant cook calling out for the week.  I really don’t mind cooking, but I am spreading myself too thin, and can feel it. What I need to be doing is spending time in the classroom.  Here’s what happened.

This last month was wonderful.  At least that's what I thought.  The teachers have been sharing stories of things going on in their rooms, so I assumed that they were on board.   

So, when some of the moms in Deirdre’s class asked for a conference, I was a bit surprised. It was then that I learned that Deirdre had told the parents “we aren’t doing letter of the week or letter pages this year”, but didn’t tell them what we were doing in place of letter pages.  She also told the parents that she isn’t using a curriculum this year, and that she was going to teach the children only what they wanted to learn.  Well, this explanation didn’t sit too well with my moms (can you blame them?) and they are panic stricken that their children will leave the fours room as illiterate hobos.  (My paraphrasing, but still…)

I understand that in this age of accountability, we are responsible for identifying specific goals and documenting growth in our children.  I also understand that letter sheets and projects appear to “prove” that something productive happened in the classroom.  But I also know and believe that it is the experience, not the capstone project,  that is most meaningful for children. Albert Einstein said it best: “The only thing that interfered with my learning was my education.”

What I can’t understand is why teachers and parents cannot make the shift from didactic teaching to the discovery zone?  Is it because they are scared of losing control of the children?  I don’t think so.    I once thought they maybe were scared to grow, that they didn’t want to change their ways.  But nowadays I believe that they just need some help.

You know when two year olds have an altercation; the teachers say to them, “use your words and tell her how you feel.”?  I always thought that was funny (as well as misleading), since two year olds don’t have a huge repertoire of feelings with which to refer.  However, when teachers learned to say, “tell her that you are mad (sad, angry, whatever),” they were giving the children the actual tools to use.   Once the teachers learned what to say to their children, the children learned what to do, and communication between two year olds became more productive.  Maybe what I need to do is give my teachers the tools, and help them feel comfortable using them, rather than just telling them “use your words.” 

September 7

SEPTEMBER 7

Dear Diary,

I heard a child crying in the hall this afternoon, and watched as Jacquie, the threes teacher (who should be teaching 5th grade in a military school), scolded Aaron for talking.  Really?  Talking? This little sweetheart of a boy is so shy, and he cries on a dime.  Finally he gets a  little courage to speak, and because “we don’t talk as we walk down the hall”, he gets in trouble.  What is wrong with this picture?  When I asked Aaron what happened, Jacquie spoke up, and started to tell me how “we are having a little problem keeping our bubbles in our mouth.” 

I asked her co-teacher Jennifer  to take the children back to their class and walked with Jacquie to my office to discuss this.  There are just some things I won’t stand for and stopping children from talking when there is no reason is one of them. I remember another  little guy crying during circle time in her class last week, too. 

Jacquie told me that the children here needed this kind of discipline (and the parents liked it, too), because she needed to get them ready for big school. Apparently this community has very high standards for their kindergarteners, and she is just trying to get them ready.  I chose not to explain that this was inappropriate for kindergarteners, too.  She is really just misinformed and needs some guidance.  I know I can help her get there, I just gotta figure out how.   I just told her that we were a place where children were able to be themselves, and if she felt like the talking was getting out of control she could suggest whispering.  I reminded her that social skills are formed during these years, and children need the opportunity to freely communicate with one another in order to practice these skills.  

 Can’t learn to walk if you’re strapped in a stroller.

November 10

November 10

Dear Staff, 

As we discussed during our summer professional development days, we are re-thinking how we celebrate each holiday.  Our plan for this Thanksgiving is for the children to contribute to their own FAMILY meal.  That means that you are cooking enough of your item for each child to take home on Wednesday.  Here is the food list and some suggestions.

Infants:  Only smiles 

Toddlers and Twos:  Mashed Potatoes.  The children can scrub the potatoes for a few days, and after they have boiled and cooled off, put them in the big ziplocks with butter for the mashing.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

Threes: Cranberries and Applesauce.  This is a variation of my mom’s recipe. After preparing the whole cranberries, let them cool. Fill a big bowl with applesauce.  Into each quart size ziplock scoop a 2:1 ratio of cranberries to applesauce, and let the children mix it all together.

Fours:  Desserts!  After the mini pie shells are cooked, the children can add their desired fillings by spooning it into ziplocks, sealing the bags, and then snipping the corner, so they can pipe the mixture into each tart.  We are giving you at least 6 tarts per child, so there are plenty of treats.

No, I don’t work for the ziplock company. 

PLEASE SHARE THE CAMERA!  I would love to see the pictures of the children preparing the food, and would love to hear about their experiences.  If you are too busy to document, please run the tape recorder during the times that the cooking centers are open.  This way you can go back and listen to what was going on in the room. I can’t wait!

November 18

In case you missed yesterday's blog (and I highly recommend you go back and check it out!) I am posting bits and snippets from my book Monday Memo, due to come out soon.  Enjoy!


November  18   
Dear Staff, 

In Deirdre and Grant’s class, Abby and Sean were talking about the day they were born.  The conversation went something like this:

Abby:  I was born on a Tuesday from my mom.

Sean:  I was born on a Tuesday, too!

Abby: Oh, well, I was born on a Tuesday at the ‘Hopsital’.

Sean:  I was there too.

Abby:  No you weren’t. I don’t remember you there.

I love these conversations!  We learn so much about children when we take the time to listen.  In this case, we are being reminded that, yes,  young children are very concrete, but also that they are always looking for connections.  How do we connect?  We were both born on a Tuesday.  Really?  Prove it...

It never ceases to amaze me that these guys say it the way they see it.  I wish we could do that…

October 21

For the next few weeks I will be offering little excerpts from my book Monday Memo, due to come out sometime soon!  The book is a series of letters written by a preschool director.

October 21

Dear Teachers,

Last week at the Burlington Community Preschool Directors meeting we had a discussion about discipline and classroom management.  One of the directors reported that she made some changes in her program and has almost no discipline issues.  We all asked her secret.  She told us that she no longer had free play.  The children went from one teacher directed group activity to the next, and the children are “so busy they have no time to fight with each other.”

I almost flung a grape at her.  What was she thinking?  NO free time?  

Well, I’m pretty sure you can imagine what happened next.  The other directors started to take notes, wanting to try this when they got back to their schools.  A few of us, however, nipped that in the bud by sharing what recent research suggests.  We told them how creative free time increased cognitive thinking, and the how increased stress leads to the increase of cortisol to the brain, limiting the learning.  We spoke of substantial portion of the day and the value of unscheduled time.

I reminded them that children need time to play together in order to have some “problem solving opportunities,” like learning to share or taking turns at being the mommy.  They benefit if these experiences happen in preschool, since the teacher can offer support where needed.  By excluding free time, we exclude these experiences.

I couldn’t wait to come back here and write this letter to you all.  I am so proud of our team.  You guys “get” this, and are working hard to scale down your daily schedules in order to increase the children's free time.  Consider this memo one big group hug.