playing= coping

How many times have you had "that child" who clings to mom, who fights to hold on to her, and when mom is finally out of his grasp, who cries by the door?  You know the one I am talking about.  The one who hangs out at your elbow all day, just fighting away the sniffles?  No, he doesn't care how nice you are, how friendly, how reassuring.  He doesn't want to play.  He doesn't want to hear a story. He wants to GO HOME! It is a frustrating thing, sometimes for teachers.

99% of the time, with a little encouragement, with a little adult interaction, the child will eventually find their way over to an area of interest, play, and forget about home.  The child will have fun, but what is really happening here?  The child is coping.   (The 1% that is not included in this is the one child I ever had who didn't play after an entire day, no matter how much I encouraged.  The next day started the same way, I asked him "if you could do anything you wanted what would you do?"  He answered "go home."  "What if you couldn't go home but could do anything else?" "Cry," he answered.  I told him, firmly but lovingly, that he could cry if he needed to but we, he and I were going to play.  I gave him a list of three things that his mom said he liked to do at home that we could "play together" and said he had to choose one.  He chose drawing, and after a bit stopped crying, and never had a day like that afterward. Some children have to be taught how to cope).  There are a million important things that play "does" for children, but sometimes the most important is that it enables them to cope, and to cope with something that is (for them) very traumatic.  Many of these children have never been with this many children at once, some have never been in the care of someone they haven't know for their entire lives, and the ones that have get to have a "babysitter" in their own home.  It is a tough, tough milestone; but they are hardwired to cope by playing.

Other times play- coping takes a different form.  Sometimes children use play to make scary things that are upsetting to them okay.  For instance the other day a child passing from one side of the room picked up our telephone and screamed into it "OKAY! I ALREADY PAID THE FREAKING BILL!!"  Slammed the phone down and moved on to play in the art area.  Of course we all know there are far more scary things than this that some children are trying to cope with around the world, but this is a small example.

Other times, they are coping with disappointments, rules, or change.  Today one of the children explained to her "baby" why they couldn't go out.  "I'm sorry Charlie, but it is raining out so we can't walk to the post office.  Don't cry we can go another day.  I know you are sad, but we will go another day."

Of course these are verbal examples of children coping, but just imagine how much they are coping with that is NOT verbalized.

Yes, when children play they learn, grow, develop, and cope.  Such a little thing can be so important.

Incredible, Indulgent Sensory Activities

Here are a few fantastic smelling sensory activities that both you and your children are bound to adore!

This first idea is from a Bev Bos conference, and is absolutely fantastic!  Set out a few heavy duty mortars and pestles with various delicious smelling things to smash or grind up.  Today we used coffee beans, dried rose petals (which should be easily found after Valentines Day), whole cloves, whole hazelnuts, and cinnamon sticks.



In general I let them use as much as they want, but today I had to ration the cinnamon sticks a bit so that everyone could have a couple (since there were only a few left).  Without fail every single child does this activity whenever it is presented.  It is quite popular with the children and the parents as well.  The parents always comment on how great the room smells after the kids have been working on such a project.                                

After they are done smashing or grinding up all of their treasures I bag it up and label it "a special scent made by Susan" or whatever that child's name is.  Some parents have put it in a cup or a dish and left it somewhere in the house as potpourri.

During the holidays this year I put somethings that they smashed up (cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, whole nutmeg, all spice berries, star anise, and other "holiday smells") in little tiny white paper bags, folded them over and put a string through two holes punched in the top and had the children give them to their parents as car air fresheners.

 It was a cute and easy Christmas Present for them to give their parents and I had a lot of positive feedback about them.    There are a lot of other things you can give them to grind or smash- including cocoa beans, lavender, fresh or dried herbs, and much more! It seems so simple, but the really adore it and it smells fantastic.

When we were done with the coffee beans I added some coffee beans to the beans in one of our sensory bins!  Again, the smell was delicious! This bin contains a visually mesmerizing assortments of beans and dried vegetables some of which include pinto beans, black beans, kidney beans, white lima beans, split peas, yellow split peas, red lentils, black eyed peas, giant fava beans, indian corn, and coffee beans!  The kids love running their hands through it and I have often spotted adults who can't help themselves from doing the same!  They also love the sound of the beans running through the mill, or being poured in the wooden or metal containers we have.  For more sensory bin ideas that include coffee beans check out this post by Teacher Tom or this post by Mary Lea (aka Pink and Green Mama).

The next idea came from the the Ooey Gooey Tooey Book by Lisa Murphy aka the Ooey Gooey Lady.  For years I have put Oatmeal in the sensory bin, but had never thought to add cinnamon (even though I EAT it in my oatmeal on a regular basis).  In any instance I put two large containers of oatmeal in the bin and added a half a cup of cinnamon, a half a cup of salt, and a little nutmeg because I had some and love the smell.  Thus far it has had rave reviews.

They have enjoyed playing in it and smelling it, and one poor little fellow even ate some.  Today, (of their own designs), they got the clip board and "wrote down"  the ingredients for oatmeal cake and then "baked it,"  putting a little literacy in the mix.  The first day I put it out, I caught some of them putting their faces almost down in it to better take in the smell!

Another hit recently was putting babies with soap, water, and sponges in the sensory bin for "baths."  Any soap can be used, but to infuse your room with a pleasant smell baby shampoo is nice to use or Lavender baby shampoo (by Johnson and Johnson) like we used today.  It smells absolutely beautiful.

Some other things that might be useful include cups (especially ones with spouts) to pour water over the babies and rinse them off, and little hand towels for them to wrap their babies in when they are done bathing (these were after thoughts, so I will use them next time).




If you liked these sensory ideas, here are some links to other posts:

5 more sensory bin ideas
Ooblick


  

2 Simple (and cheap!) Ideas to Spruce Up Dramatic Play

The "dramatic play" area in our room is among the most popular, (this is not to imply that dramatic play only happens in this area, only that it is the area where you find babies, dress up clothes, the iron, the kitchen, and more), and it is especially so this year. We have a class of nearly all girls this year, (eight girls and four boys), and in general girls are more likely to spend sustained amounts of time in this area;  I have one boy in paticular this year who loves this area and plays there everyday, and boys do like to play in this area but usually (with one or two exceptions) it is the girls who spend hours and hours in this area.  This being said, I am always looking for little things to switch in and out of the area to grab their attention and to open up their little imaginations.

1.  Recently I purchased some Mardi Gras masks from the Dollar Tree and the kids have had an absolute blast with them.

two girls all decked out for the (masquerade) ball

Don a flapper style dress and a mask and you can fly like a bird!

I am not sure what the purpose of this outfit was, but it's is cute!

Some of the boys wore the masks and tied blankets around their shoulders to be super heros!

2.  There is no end to the number of ways that kids can use a basket! I think this one was like 5 dollars

I love that they preferred to use the basket as a table to the actual table!

Sleigh ride! Yes, they were singing Jingle Bells!

Here the basket is being used as an "escape-"  a place of her own away from the others...

and here we have a "turtle!"

10 Ideas for Valentine's Day

Since I do not spend an inordinate amount of time on Holidays (some Holidays we only really celebrate the day of), I thought that I would write an entry on things we do and have done in the past for Valentines Day for any one who is scrounging around for ideas.

I don't really like the traditional Valentine's Day parties that involve a lot of sweets and a lot of commercialism (although what more can you ask of a holiday that was practically invented by commercialism then, well, commercialism).  Instead we spend the day celebrating friendship and celebrating the things that they love.

1:  Most everyone probably already does this but I let them sort the Valentines they bring in into their friends Valentine's Day "mailboxes,"  (some years mailboxes have been boxes, some years decorated bags, and my very first year we made hearts laced together all around the edges, except for the top that they would slide the Valentines into).  As most 4 year old preschool classes, they can all read each others names, and so have a great time delivering mail by themselves.

2:  Letter Delivery
In the past I have equipped them with miniature mailboxes, "letter bags" and baskets, envelopes and cheap Valentines day stationary in the "dramatic play" center (although truthfully any number of "centers" involve dramatic play, and this activity never stays quarantined to that area).  They love making "love letters," Valentines, and pictures for their friends and playing mailman/ women to deliver the precious cargo.  I should mention that every year the class invariably starts using the shopping cart to more effectively taxi their mail.

3: Valentine's Ice
This past week we have been experimenting with ice in our sensory area and will continue to do this on Monday, adding a little bit of a Valentine's sentiment to it to satisfy their interest in the Holiday.  They have had fun the last few days extracting toys from ice that we have let freeze both in the freezer and outdoors.  So for Valentines day We will experiment with both extractable and non extractable objects.
The non-extractable pan is made by filling a large pan half way with water and letting it freeze while making colored ice shapes (in this case I am using circles and hearts), once both are frozen I put the shapes on top of the sheet of ice and put it back in the freezer, meanwhile I put I pitcher of water in the freezer.  When the water in the pitcher starts to form a thin layer of ice on the top, I break through the ice and pour the water in with the shapes on the sheet of ice.  When the water is about a third of the way to the top of the shapes I stop and put it back in the freezer.  Once that water freezes (it will be higher than you poured it because, remember, water is one of the few substances that expands when frozen), I add more water so that it nearly touches the top of the shapes.  Once that freezes the shapes are either submerged or just level with the surface of the water.  I prefer them to stick out of the top just a little bit so they can feel the shapes.

For the extractable bin I have some beads, blocks spelling LOVE and some Valentines cookie cutters.  For this, just add water and freeze.
When they play in the ice they use hammers and screwdrivers from their tool set, metal spoons, and some rationed rock salt to extract (or try to extract) objects.

4.  Play "A Tisket a Tasket,"
And yes, I actually use a green and yellow basket that I save from Easter! Although, in a pinch I have just tied a green and yellow ribbon around the handle.  There are instructions for this game here after the song- to spare myself writing it all out; we actually use a letter instead of a handkerchief like these instructions suggested in this document.

5.  Lipstick kisses
This is actually an idea from Lisa Murphy's book the OOey Gooey Handbook.  Buy some cheap lipstick, sometimes they have some at dollar stores or Big Lots or other such stores- preferably enough for each child to have one, but if not, set up q-tips prepared with lipstick on both ends before hand.  Let kids put lipstick on themselves (make sure to have a big mirror or some hand mirrors around), and them let them smooch the paper! Clean up is easy with baby wipes.

6. Loving Sentiment Cards
For this activity I have a large paper heart with each child's name on it.  On each heart I write one thing that I really like about that child (Bev loves to paint, Sam always works really hard to finish puzzles, Sally always greets teachers with a smile), and have all the other teachers in the room do the same.  Then the children are offered opportunities to tell a teacher something they really like about their friends (sometimes it's things like love her shoes, sometimes I like when he plays with me, he's funny, or I just love him), In years past I had them say something about each of their friends, other times I just let them say something about whoever they want to (or no one if they don't want to at all), at the end of the day I send it home for them to look at with their parents.  All of the kids in preschool are pretty close, almost like a little family, so every child always ends up with quite a few loving (and sometimes comical) sentiments left on their heart.

7.  Valentines Brunch

Instead of having parents bring sweets which gives kids sudden bursts of non constructive energy and then causes them to crash and be grumpy and moody the rest of the day, I have parents bring in ingredients for our brunch... cinnamon raisin bread, eggs, juice, syrup,  and fresh or frozen strawberries that I add a tiny bit of sugar to (the school provides milk and celery and carrot sticks because they are part of the would have been lunch that is no longer served because we are having an 11:30 brunch in it's stead).

8.  Put a little love in the air
For Valentine's Day I create a CD from music that I already have at home:  A collection of love songs from Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Billie Holiday, and others.  I love the love songs of that era, and they like to bubble along with the music all day.

9.  Put a little love song in their heart
We sing some fun love songs through out the month of February or whenever they are requested there after (and sometimes make a CD for the parents of the kids featuring these songs, but I can't tell you if we are doing it this year because parents read this blog).  Some of these songs include "Skinamirinky "  from the Elephant Show
"I love you" from Barney
"L is for the way you look at me"- jazz love song
"Two little bugs"- by Shari Louis
"A Frog went a courtin'"
They love all these songs- of course you could do any number of catchy love songs with them and they would love them equally, these are just some suggestions.

10.  Write about love
Many, many times a week, a month, a year, the children get to dictate stories or similar things to teachers in my room and we write them down.  For Valentine's day I love to ask them "what is love?" and write whatever they say.  You get some hilarious answers and some tear- jerkers too.   I will never get my first year teaching that a little boy told me "love is my baby brother"- his baby brother had been born only weeks earlier.   I usually keep a copy for their portfolio and send a copy home.


(For another, more structured, idea you could make heart shaped stained glass which you can find instructions to here).

ice, failure, spiders, and pests

Do you ever have times when the "lesson" you planned for a paticular day completely flops?  It doesn't happen to me very often, but whenever it does I am always surprised that something ALWAYS emerges from that failure.
Today, I had planned a big ice activity (I will spare all of the details until this project is successful).   We put containers with water outside and I asked for a hypothesis about what would happen.  There were two answers:  1. The water would evaporate  and 2.  It would turn into ice.  However, when we checked it an hour and a half later NOTHING had happened, (although the children astutely observed that the water got really cold).  The reason?  The temperature outside was 33 degrees.  SERIOUSLY?  33 DEGREES?  I was frustrated.  Why didn't it freeze, Miss Elizabeth?  Well, it seems it is not quite cold enough outside.  It feels cold to us!  Yes, it is cold but it needs to be a little colder, 32 degrees, to freeze, and I just checked the thermometer and it is 33 degrees.  Do you think we should leave it overnight and see if it freezes?  YES!!
Surprisingly, they weren't frustrated by this, and didn't seem to mind waiting until tomorrow.

We went back inside and play resumed as usual.  I set to work hanging clothes line across the ceiling to hang pictures up on.  Apparently, according to "the regs" I have too much art on the walls- only "20% of the wall can have paper on it,"  so as a solution, and so that we can still have children's art work in the room,  I am hanging some on the ceiling.

*instructions for the art on the front row can be found here, and for the back row here.

What are you doing, Miss Elizabeth?  Hanging some rope.  For what? To hang paintings.  Why? To decorate our room and display your art work.  Can we decorate our room? If you want to.  What do you need? Yarn.

So I gave them some yarn, and they started "decorating" the area where the blocks are kept.  It started out as just strands of yarn here and there, but eventually they decided to make a "spider web."  

As you can see they worked very diligently, both boys and girls together.  

We left it up for the entirety of the day.  They enjoyed adding to it and crawling under and over the strings.  

The spider web did its job and captured a pest!

A little spider even slept in the web during nap time.  (You can see the blue cot in the corner of this photo).  

The spider also got our table.  The kids thought it was interesting that the table was round, but the spider web was square because of the legs.  

All and all it was a good day.  They also played limbo and jump rope with the string.  So I guess the moral of the story not to fear when my plans don't work out, the children will always find something else to learn from.  

Thinking in and out of the box (day I)

Before starting this blog I want to make sure to give credit to Teacher Tom.  It is from his blog that I had the idea for this activity, although, as you can see, he did it on boxing day (December 26) making it twice as cool as doing it in January. 


Previous to Thursday, I collected several boxes, cardboard toilet paper and paper towel tubes, and some other odds and ends. There seemed to be no limit for the possibilities of the boxes.  

Two pairs of children made side by side houses in the dishwasher boxes, adding a smaller box to the front of each "house" for more space.  In the left house was inhabited by a girl and a boy, but the girl stayed in and the boy brought her anything she asked for in the "house" and kept other children from going in.  The pair of girls who inhabited the left side were very active; they went straight to work improving their home. 

Other children had very different designs for their boxes. 

One boy pushed this box up calling it a "skyscraper" but then changing mind, calling it the "leaning tower of pizza" instead when it was accidentally propped up on another box. 

He next realized that he could move the box and use it for a basketball hoop.

Other boys wasted no time in joining the game.  

Meanwhile, other children busied themselves coloring on various types of cardboard and styrofoam.  They loved the "squeeky" sound of markers on styrofoam, and the "bumping" sound of markers on corregated cardboard. 

Little Opal colored all of the really big letters on this box. While she colored she kept saying "not O, not O, not O."  I later heard her tell her friends she was going to color O's pink and all the other letters blue- there weren't any O's though.  

Many of the colored pieces of styrofoam were especially pretty.  

While the rest of the class was coloring, Tommy up-ended one of the "house" boxes, and decided he wanted to go down the top of the chimney (box) like Santa.

"Guys! Can someone help me get in this chimney?  I can't get in it."  No one came to help, so he made a new plan.

"Miss Elizabeth, I made steps and a railing to get into the box!" Unfortunately, they fell before he ever made it to the box and a few girls....

Figured out that you could just lift up the bottom of the box and climb under.  They claimed the "chimney" as a new place to color. (Whoever said boys were better at spacial problem solving than girls?)

 The boxes underwent several different arrangements and uses.  

One group found a way to to hold on to markers and toys that kept rolling away and getting lost under boxes and other materials.  

Another child took advantage of an empty box to "read a book" that she made out of a piece of folded cardboard. 

The children could have played at this activity for hours more than they did (which is why we did it again on Friday).  To help clean up they came up with the idea of sorting the smaller pieces into boxes- styrofoam, tubes, and small boxes- an excellent system.

I will upload pictures and write about the boxes on Friday soon!

We Need a Little Christmas

I like to calmly and gently ease out of the Christmas Season at school. I mean, technically, Christmas isn't over until Epiphany which is the second Sunday after Christmas.  Not to mention, at school, we get to deal with all the hype of Christmas, all the excitement and craziness; So it's nice to get a chance to enjoy the calm of Christmas when it has actually (and finally) come.  
I never take the Christmas tree up in our class until one of the children ask either why the tree is still up or if they can take their ornaments home now.  We just took the tree down Monday at school, which is more than I can say for my house. (As a side note we don't start reading Christmas books, unless they are requested, before Thanksgiving, or doing Christmas activities.  Of course Christmas songs, like all songs are never off limits). 
The other benefit of not rushing to tell them Christmas is over and taking down everything that remotely reminds them of Christmas is that I get left over flowers from my church, so there for ripping out my recording of sleigh ride and presenting them with Poinsettias to do with as they pleased yesterday morning was not even slightly out of place to them.  


The advantage of this project is that it requires no money, little preparation, little planning, oh, and the kids GO NUTS for it.  The downside is that it is incredibly messy.  Prepare for dirt everywhere. 

The first order of business for them was dumping everything out and/ or ripping off the stems.

A few of the girls gathered the flowers into blossoms and asked me to tape them together into "wedding flowers" (see below).

 

"Miss Elizabeth, why is this dirt stuck in here?"  "What do you think?"  "This stringy stuff."  "Do you know what it's called?" "No." "Let's ask your friends."  "Hey guys Miss Elizabeth doesn't know what this stringy stuff is."  "It's a weed!"  "They're the roots!" "Yeah roots!" "Look I got it out"

"Wedding flower dancing."  I wish I could show you this whole picture, their faces are priceless. 

 My favorite part of the three hours of digging, getting married, emptying pots and filling pots, and ripping roots and flowers, was this:  They put the flowers back in the dirt.  One clever child concluded "they won't stay standing up because we ripped the roots and they will die." Awesome! Maybe there is hope for them not destroying the classroom plants after all!