Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Preschool Is a Ditto-free Zone

Dittos (copies made on a copier) are not to be used in preschool.
For this measurement activity, children made their own worksheets!
Starting with a blank piece of paper, each child either drew a picture or wrote the word for the item selected for measuring. Then he/she determined the length of each item using nonstandard units of measurement; for this activity they used unifix cubes. Finally, the length of each item was recorded on the page.



The result was that each child had his/her own unique worksheet! All without a ditto.
Just think - it all began with a blank piece of paper.



Sunday, February 6, 2011

Morning Message Time Encourages Authentic Writing

My last post explained how our preschool teachers at Highland Elementary use the Morning Message, a component of the High/Scope curriculum. The curriculum also encourages providing authentic writing opportunities during the Morning Message - a time for our students to compose their own messages and share those messages with others. Teachers support all "writing" efforts (scribbling, pictures, random letters, invented spelling) as your child learns that oral language can be written; written language can be read.


For further information about your child's literacy development in reading and writing, please refer to English/Language Arts Standard 3: Demonstrates General Skills and Strategies of the Reading Process in your parent guide Building a Strong Foundation for School Success: The Kentucky Early Childhood Standards.