Stories and ideas from an early childhood professor and mommy. Give them a read and then share your feedback!
As a teacher educator, I spend a great deal of time in early childhood and elementary classrooms observing student teachers. Not only do I enjoy seeing the students who worked so hard to master their craft succeed in the classroom, but I also enjoy spending time with children. They have such a pure and truly honest view of the world.
Continue reading “Maybe we should all listen to Kindergarteners…”
While out to dinner last night my husband and I saw 2 different preschool-age children out to dinner with their parents. One was given a portable DVD player to watch and the other was given an iPad to play games on while at the table. Both were immediate – not responses to either child misbehaving or getting restless. What are your thoughts on this?
Parent PhD’s Infant/Toddler Series focuses on understanding and learning how to appropriately respond to infants and toddlers. The series serves many purposes and populations. Continue reading “Parent PhD’s “Infant/Toddler Series””
Book Talks and Author Studies are wonderful ways to explore and learn about children’s literature. I highly recommend doing them with the children you teach. They are also excellent additions to teacher education classes. I started doing these activities with my undergraduate students for two reasons:
1. I wanted my students to discover as many children’s books as possible and learn about different authors and genres of books.
2. I had done both with children in the past and found them so enjoyable, that I thought young adults should have some fun too.
Continue reading “The Value of Book Talks and Author Studies”
Aside from being a teacher, I have also been involved in the arts throughout my life. At one point in my 20’s I took an improv class at a the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in New York City. I realized quickly that the work of an improv actor is very similar to the work of teacher. You have to think on your feet and respond to whatever is happening in front of you. And you never know what is coming next… Continue reading “Improv and Literacy Development”
Dare I say it…I have a potty trained child. Miss H turned 2 in June and has been showing all of the signs that she is ready: Baby Center Potty Training Readiness. She’s had a potty in each bathroom since she was 18 months, and she sits on it every morning and night. We did this in order to get her used to it for when we did start to seriously train, and also to see if she could/would use it. She peed a few times on it, but she wasn’t truly ready to train until she hit 2. I also made a point to bring her as an infant into the bathroom with me when I went so she could see it. She always watched and we’d talk about what I was doing. I highly recommend brining children beginning in infancy into the bathroom with you to see what you are doing. Talk to them about it and respond to their gestures and later, questions.
Continue reading “What I learned while potty training my child”
I love reading to children of all ages, especially with the 0-5 crowd. Their interaction, involvement and interest changes so much from infancy to toddlerhood to preschool. What is even more fun is to go beyond the book and “retell” the story using manipulatives. It’s actually a requirement for my early childhood preservice teachers to create and perform a retell for their peers of a children’s book. That is one of my favorite class days! Many even go beyond just one and create numerous retells to share in their fieldwork classrooms with the children.
Along with being an early childhood educator, I’m also a mommy to a 2 year old girl. Miss H and I began to explore library storytimes this summer. We are lucky enough to live within 2 miles of 3 libraries, so we decided to try them all. At two of the libraries we attended the ages 2-5 storytime, and at one we attended the birth-2 1/2 storytime.