Join-
Planting this fall for springtime blooms
Blog Post |
I’m planning a fall gardening activity now, before school starts, and the first step is to mark my calendar to buy spring flowering bulbs before the end of September. Seasonal changes vary across the many climates in…
-
Showing the science: using children's work to document your program
Blog Post |
Digital photography changed the way I do science with my students. I reflect more on what has happened and what is being left out as I look over the photos, in moments after school, at home on the computer. I have this…
-
Citizen science: collaborative projects for teachers and their class
Blog Post |
I was excited to see a Monarch butterfly land on the Butterfly Bush in the yard (I hesitate to call it a garden). Click on the photo for more Early Years pics. Does that mean that the Milkweed plant may yet…
-
Transitioning to kindergarten: hearing from children who have been there
Blog Post |
Some elementary schools on a “year-round” or “modified calendar” are about to begin a new school year on Monday, and many others begin in September. Children from my “fours” classes are among the new kindergarten…
-
When does science become significant?
Blog Post |
Math and Science in Preschool: Policies and Practice, a National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) Preschool Policy Brief, says that teachers usually do not plan and support science and math learning in pre…
-
Blog Post |
From The Early Years photo cache (click the pic for more). The summer science activities for my children that I remember as working best (that is, holding their interest and not requiring an enormous amount of time…
-
"I had a carrot for breakfast"
Blog Post |
From The Early Years photo cache (click the pic for more). “I had a carrot for breakfast.” No, not me, this was a young child, a participant in the Early Sprouts program. Young children’s connection between…
-
Blog Post |
What was your favorite color when you were five? Many young girls like pink, a stereotypically female color. Do girls who love pink ever grow up to be women who do work that historically has more often…
-
Blog Post |
Read “Safety First” by Sarah Pounders and you can reassure your director and students’ parents that you are informed about how to avoid potential health hazards in eating food from a school garden. Did you guess that…
-
Raise your hand if you're a scientist!
Blog Post |
I received the greatest compliment while sitting at the lunch table with a mixed age group of my students who are enrolled in the end-of-school-year camp. The children were playing a conversation-starter game they…
-
Rocks: collecting and classifying
Blog Post |
On the playground two sisters collected rocks and set them on a bench where they grouped them by size. When I asked, “What kind of rock is that?” one said, “A triangle” referring to its outer shape. They also had a…
-
Blog Post |
Although I credit my early childhood exposure to orchard, field, woods, and creek as the foundation for my understanding of the natural world, I would despair if I thought that same understanding is lost to children who…
-
Preschool play as assessment tool
Blog Post |
Preschool play can reflect young children’s knowledge about the natural world and the human interaction experiences they’ve had. I get to observe and learn what the children express through play when we finish our…
-
Blog Post |
From the Early Years photo cache (click the pic for more). What percentage of children ever get to see a tadpole grow into a frog? Reading about tadpoles amazing metamorphosis into adult frogs is less amazing than…
-
Standards and guidelines are great resources for lesson planning
Blog Post |
Wanting to use best teaching practices and develop my students’ science thinking to the best of their capability, I look at what governments and curriculum developers think should be happening in an early childhood…
476 Results