Hello 2s/3s families!
As we slide into the depths of the fall semester, we hope everyone everyone has been doing well in establishing a routine that works for your family. In our classroom, we make an effort to maintain a predictable routine (while remaining flexible) for the children. Yes it sounds like an oxymoron but when you work with a dozen 2-3 year olds, things are unpredictable at times.
Library
Our classroom library is literally the “bread and butter” of our classroom. The children are especially fond of the book A Soup Opera by Jim Gill and Chicken Soup With Rice by Maurice Sendak and sung by Carole King. We like to switch the books out of our library weekly but these 2 books will stay on our shelves for a while. In order to keep things novel, sometimes we read the book and other times we will listen and sing along to the book. Sometimes we will do them at group time but many times the children will request it on their own. Reading the same book over and over may seem boring to us as adults but that’s because we aren’t “emergent readers.” Repetition is a key ingredient in emergent literacy and it’s our job as high quality early childhood educators to foster that. Are there any books your child(ren) request over and over again at home? If so, please share. We’d love to hear about it.
Here is a link to both of the books if you’d like to take a listen at home!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9VvlI6sHJw
Sensory Table
The sensory table is also a major hub in our classroom. We strategically include materials in which the children can strengthen fine motor and coordination skills. Cups, bowls, small pitchers, juice containters, funnels, basters, ladels and spoons all serve that purpose. Skills such as scooping, transfering, pouring, squeezing are all pre-cursers to more advanced fine motor skills such as writing and tying shoes. As an emergent expreience for the classroom we had “soup” in our sensory table. We placed play food vegetables and colored water along with bowls, spoons and ladels in the table. We had conversations about the different vegetables and the different types of soups could be made in the table. The conversation possibilities are infinite at the sensory table!
Social Emotional
Something we are always striving for in our classroom is building healthy social-emotional skills. We have started practicting simple breathing and stretching techniques at our group times. We also use this as an opportunity to talk about how these things are a big part of taking care of ourselves- one of our 3 center-wide expectations! We all take a couple minutes to breathe and/or stretch our bodies with intention. The children are 2-3 years old so we keep it simple and purposely repetitive as we know children learn best by repetition.
Having solid social emotional skills is something children will carry with them for the rest of their lives. I came across this article about emotional regulation and it really hit a cord with me. As teachers/parents/caregivers we tend to do it backwards. We want X to happen before Y because “that’s the way its suppose to be.” The reality is that when children are dysregualted NOTHING productive is going to happen. So our job as teachers/caregivers is to validate and connect FIRST, then after that we move on to trying to accomplish the desired behavior. Kat and I have discussed this article during our collaboration time and plan on discussing this with our students at our first student meeting so we are all on the same page. I have included a link to the article for you to read in it’s entirety but also included the bullet points of the “how” to get you started. Lets us know what you think!
Regulation as the Foundation for Learning (communityplaythings.com)
| Strategies for Co-Regulation · pay attention to your own regulation · minimize your own language · avoid asking questions to the child · describe what the student might be feeling or thinking · use ‘thumbs up’ and ‘thumbs down’ for making choices · wait to understand “what’s happening” until afterwards · use calming, regulating sensory inputs · sit with each other · offer a snack or bathroom break · stand up, stretch, or walk around · reflect on the scenario after regulation occurs · use humor · focus on the positives, like the effort the student has exerted |
Classroom Reminders
- As the weather changes, make sure your child has appropriate extra clothing at school.
- Avoid that diaper/wipes fee! Please make sure to bring in diapers and wipes as needed
- Take a minute to check out our “Center Wide Expectations- according to 2s/3s” display in the hallway. This has been the inspiration for us to create our classroom social story we talked about at Parent Night. Stay tuned!
Thanks for reading,
-Nadine & Kat and the 2s/3s staff
