The best investment

One of the best investments that I made at the beginning of the year was an inexpensive self-inking date stamper. All good early childhood teachers know the importance of dating absolutely everything children produce - but I got sick of writing the date on 50 art works everyday.

Now I just change the date every morning, and it's ready to quickly stamp any drawing, painting, scribble. Even my littlest ones who can't hold a pencil steady are able to date their own work.

More than once sometimes, just for the fun of it :)


I got mine from Office Works for about $18. I got the idea from a blog I read ages ago, but have no memory of which blog it was - sorry I can't give credit where it is due!

Intentional Teaching

"I like that everything you do has a purpose, it's never just to pass time." A friend told me, on the first week she started to work in my class.

I was excited to hear that they are aware of this- it's something that I work hard on every day. I aim to have everything I do, every activity I set up, every toy the children play with, every transition I  run to have a reason and purpose behind it. Of course sometimes it runs better than others but mostly I think about each and every aspect of our room and day.

Designs for Living and Learning is a great book for anyone wanting inspiration about

setting up an early child hood environment intentionally.

This, I think, is the essence of a play based curriculum. To the untrained eye it can look chaotic, but I know that each piece in the home corner is there for a reason. I know that even lunch time can be a learning opportunity. I know every conversation I have can be used to learn more about my children and in turn encourage them to learn more about their world. It's all about how you set up the room, how you interact with children and how you build on what they know.

Feast or Famine

I believe that art should be a way of exploring a concept through a tactile experience, rather than creating a predetermined finished product (e.g. If I was doing a project on transport I would provide toy cars to paint with rather than tell children to colour in a photo copy of a car).

But what about art with a theme around food. This is where I got to a road block of sorts. What is the ethical considerations about using food in art?

I always feel a little uncomfortable using food in art - I feel like we are wasting food and I want to teach my class about limiting waste and being careful with the resources we have been blessed with. We live in a society that has an abundance of food - but many children around the world do not have as much as we do.

When we made lemonade I was happy to 'recycle' the juiced lemon halves by making prints with them.

But when I see people cut up apples for the sole purpose of making prints with children I feel uneasy.

I liked the concept of these prints from The Imagination Tree using broccoli - but instead I would set out the broccoli stalk (after I cut off the florents to eat) to paint with.

One prac I did was at a centre that didn't make play dough for the kids because it used flour (a food) but I think that that is taking the idea too far.

But am I having double standards? Or am I over thinking it?

What do you think? Is there are limit to how you can use food in early childhood education? or does the fact we live in an affluent society mean we can use food freely (as long as it has a purpose)?

Chopping without Knives

I am a huge believer that even young children can be taught how to safely use knives (something they did a lot of in the Montessori classes I visited on the weekend). But a cooking experience with 20 children is not a good place to introduce the concept of using knives, so I was excited to come across this gadget at the supermarket.

All you have to do is push the handle down and the blades chop the vegetables without any sharp edges being exposed to the children.

The result wasn't the finest of cuts, mainly because many young children don't have the strength to push the handle down as hard as is needed.
But it does make some very yummy tabouli without any injury.
The recipe I used was pretty loose, but there are lots of things for children to smell, touch, taste and explore as we mixed it together.

Tabouli

2 bunches of parsley, chopped
1 bunch of mint, chopped
1 punnet of cherry tomatoes, chopped
1 lemon, juiced
1/2 cup couscous, made according to packet instructions

Once everything is prepared, mix them together and enjoy with some pita/Lebanese bread.

Sitting or Standing

I have been wondering if it is better to set up activities on tables with chairs or not.
I seem to remember hearing in one of my lectures that children engage for longer at tables where they can stand at an activity rather than sit at an activity. This would make sense because young children engage with activities in a physical way.

A lack of chairs also means that as many children who want to can engage at an activity.

But the logistics of leaving the chairs away from the tables can be tricky, especially if tables are used for a variety of activities.
Chairs can also help manage the number of children at an activity - if I only have enough material for (say) 5 children to play at once then I put five chairs out and ask other children to wait until a chair is free to play at  that table.

What do you think? Chairs or no chairs? A mix of both?

(photo credit)

Feeling Hot, Hot, Hot!

What to do when it's so hot outside you can barely breathe?


Ice play! I filled my freezer with different sized containers full of water to make ice. Then I piled them into a trough to play with. I found that 2L ice cream container sized blocks of ice lasted the longest/best.

It was so cooling on hot skin, and is a great jumping board for discussions.
And even when the ice melted ("But, Erin, where did the ice go???") we still had ice cold water to splash in.

(photo credit)

Toddler Easels

This is what standard easels look like;

They are great, lots of uses and invaluable in the classroom. But I've found a few problems with them in my toddler class.

Some of my little ones are very little, and find it hard to reach even the bottom of the easel board. Also when my little ones get excited they tend to be physical and these types of easels are easy to knock about.

So during the Christmas break, when I was up at Mum and Dad's I got Dad to help me make 2 big easels for my class room.

I found everything I needed at the local hardware store; 4 Hinges, 8 rubber feet, 4 card table stays and 4 boards.

For the boards I used white melamine particleboard, the same thing you would use in kitchen cupboards. I liked that it had the white layer on the outside that is easy to wipe clean, is solid (won't break easily) and the best bit was it was the exact size I wanted (120mm x 60mm) so no cutting necessary.

Because I used the melamine I had to finish the edges with special tape that sealed the exposed particle board from moisture. To do this you iron the tape on and set with a roller.

We then drilled holes for the hinges and screwed them together. We used two large hinges on the top of each easel.

(I totally look like a super cool handy-girl!)

I put rubber feet in the bottom to help stop it sliding.

We then added a card table stay on each side of each easel. This was Dad's brainwave. The pieces of metal lock together when they are straight, but can bend in when you close the easels. It's like the locking mechanism you find on folding tables or ladders. Dad reasoned that this would stop the easels from suddenly snapping closed on little fingers.

Ta Da! Done.

Dad then made a wooden tray that can slide over the top and sit snuggly on little pegs we put on the side of each board.

Here the easels are in the room. The kids love them - and I do too. I use large bulldog clips to hold the paper to the easel. Even my littlest one can reach paper if we clip it lower down, and for my taller children I clip it at the top - so versatile!

I leave pencils and crayons on them all the time, and we use paint at specific times during the day.