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Essay on the importance of play in early childhood education
Importance of play based learning in early childhood education
The importance of play in early childhood programs
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Christy, As you explained in your post teaching measurement unit in Preschool is hands on and play way. To encourage learning through play stage (Charlesworth and Lind, 20101) in the classroom I would have sand and water play with accessories like cups and scoopers, measuring cups in the kitchen, blocks, and yardsticks to measure blocks and towers they build, coins, unfix cubes and strings to measure the length of paintbrush, paper or paint containers. I also would have measured around the project to allow children measure random measurable things in the classroom. To teach comparison, one of the interesting picture book I would use is a Big bug and Little bugs. The author of the book is Paul Stickland. This book has comparison words.
Leong was featured in the May 2003 issue of the NAEYC’s Young Children. The article explores the conflict between children's play and meeting academic standards; more frequently, teachers are forced to limit playtime in order to teach essential skills to students; however because of limited imaginary play, increased academic demands of young children, and more realistic toys, children are almost unable to imagine. Although play has been proven to benefit children’s cognitive and social development, administrators do not consider it to be an important aspect of young children’s education. Because of this, preschool and kindergarten teachers are put in a challenging predicament; in order to compensate for children’s lack of play, teachers would need to prioritize play development at the level in which they prioritize phonics awareness and fine motor skills development. Although it is difficult to do, it is not impossible to incorporate play into the curriculum. Teachers can facilitate mature play by providing multi purpose props, encouraging children to create their own props, and allowing time for children to plan their roles and scenarios for dramatic play. In addition to play helping children develop foundational skills and concepts necessary to master math and reading, it has been shown to increase classroom cooperation, the effectiveness of instructional time, and the number of friendships developed in the
For this particular lesson I wanted to create a short activity. That focus on size and identify the differences in the dimensions. To be specific small, medium and large to be exact I will have them order objects on their own. Ill have a bag filled with different sized shapes I will then continue by asking the students about the sizes and what they notice the difforance
Seefeldt, C., & Wasik, A. (n.d.a). Education.com - print. Education.com - print. Retrieved May 6, 2014, from http://www.education.com/print/behavioral-expectations-preschool-classroom/
As most preschoolers like clay modeling and building blocks, teachers can use them too. Make models of sphere or box. Instruct preschoolers to make a similar one in size, shape and color. Let them take their own time. Once they have finished the work show them a bit more complicated model and repeat the above activity. The same technique can be used with building blocks too.
The Child Development Center of College of San Mateo provides early care and educational programs for children between the ages of 3 to 5 years old. Children are divided into classrooms with a “master” teacher, a “regular” teacher, and two or three “associate” teachers. Klara attended Classroom, “A,” a stimulating and well-resourced classroom. Klara was observed for two hours on Monday from 9 am to 11 am and for two hours on Wednesday from 9 am to 11 am. During these two hours, classroom activities consisted of “free time,” “story time,” and an outside “play time.” A “master” teacher, a “regular” teacher, and two “associate” teachers were present during observations. Additionally, a total of eighteen children were in attendance during the observed days.
In order to create an activity where students can compare and contrast two books, the books must have at least one thing in common. This could be having the same author, characters, themes, cultures, or plots. Comparing and contrasting has many benefits for students. Comparing and contrasting can strengthen a student’s ability to remember, help create higher-order thinking skills, and enhance a student’s comprehension skills. (Silver, 2010)
Child Observation Record (COR) is the checklist that evaluates children’s learning in the five content areas. Each day, teachers observe children at play in natural and authentic situations and then take notes about children’s behavior. These records are gathered to help teachers evaluate children’s development and plan activities to help individual children and even the whole classroom make progress. For teachers, the Preschool Program Quality Assessment (PQA) is used to evaluate whether the whole High Scope program and the staffs are using the most effective classroom and program management
The HighScope Preschool Curriculum includes defined teaching practices that enable adults to create effective early childhood programs. These practices are discussed in detail in HighScope training and publications. Three topics are particularly important for teachers who want to strengthen their programs — adult-child interaction, classroom layout and materials, and the daily routine.
The resources that support my curriculum plan are described in these articles. The first article that I chose to read is The Power of Play. The article focuses on the importance of how children can learn and grow through playand self-directed play as well as how play is vital to young children’s development.According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), play is a vitally important part of child development and is essential for every child’s health and well-being. Play provides a wide range of benefits, including socio-emotional health, physical health, social learning, improvement of problem solving skills, and improved self-regulation. Self-directed play also, creates success in creativity, problem solving, and decision making skills.
...ctive. Play is an essential learning tool and one that must not be ignored within the classroom. It is a catalyst to help children develop socially, emotionally, physically and cognitively. It is not only an important part of a child’s development as a pupil but also a child’s development as an individual.
Equipment and materials used in the classroom are vital tools used for learning inside of the classroom. Materials in a classroom are the smaller items such as books, puzzles, games and toys. These items are moved in and out of the classroom as needed to help children learn, explore and grow. Items are moved in and out of centers purposely by the teacher to allow children an opportunity to learn. An example of this could be the addition of a fire fighter outfit along with fire trucks...
Research provided in the literature was done mostly with primary school aged children and completed using different areas of the curriculum. The research placed interactive whiteboards in a classroom with a projector and computer with the location being that of a typical whiteboard in the front of the classroom. The interactive whiteboards provide the opportunity to provide the curriculum to the student while interacting with the material and the teacher. Additional research from the literature was completed with pre-service teachers in Australia. They were pre-service primary education teachers studying the area of science education.
Before diving into my research, I reflected on the knowledge I already knew regarding play and play based learning. From experience, I know that play is an enjoyable activity for children, and even some adults. I know that there are different ways one can play. For example, playing with others is known as cooperative play and playing alone is considered solitary play. There are different types of play. For example, there is dress up or pretend games, which is considered dramatic, play and there is playing with building blocks which is constructive play. After my reflection I realized that I was more knowledgeable on the action of playing rather then the benefits of it.
The class I visited is comprised of 24 five and six year old children, a lead teacher and a ‘Para-Pro” who assists the teacher and provides support and guidance for the children. Within the classroom itself, there are 6 tables organized in the center of the room in a grid formation. Children have their own workspace at a shared table. Around the perimeter of the room are ‘centers’ where each day, the children work on tasks such as listening, story development, gross and fine motor skills, math, reading and other important skills that are needed to develop socially and academically. In several places on the walls, there are displays or ‘brag boards’ where children can post their work that they feel best represents their efforts. The walls are brightly decorated and are filled with pictures, letters, numbers and other basic elementary school information. It is energizing and interesting without being chaotic or overstimulating.
Resnick, M. (2006). Computer as Paintbrush : Technology , Play , and the Creative Society An Example : Alexandra ’ s Marble Machine. (D. G. Singer, R. M. Golinkoff, & K. Hirsh-Pasek, Eds.)Play Learning How play motivates and enhances childrens cognitive and socialemotional growth, 1-16. Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://web.media.mit.edu/~mres/papers/playlearn-handout.pdf