10 Lessons the Arts Teach

A must-read about the benefits of teaching the arts to children:

National Art Education Association 10 Lessons Handout
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press. Available from NAEA Publications.

No-Bake Peanut Butter Cookies

Can I make a peanut butter cookie without baking it?

What is a mixture?

Can I follow directions and measure things correctly?

These simple cookies are fun to make together and require no baking time. A bonus blend of math and science too!
Making No-Bake Peanut Butter Cookies

Employment Update

I got my dream job. I am now employed in the field of Early Childhood Education! I am officially a full-time lead preschool teacher, starting in January 2010.

I'm anxious to go to dinner with the boss tonight and meet some of my fellow co-workers. Not only are we getting treated to dinner but we are going to have a brainstorming session. It's a chance to find out details of what to expect with this brand new preschool facility, being built as I type this! I'm excited to be part of this from the very beginning, from planning curriculum to classroom furnishings and supplies. I should have many new updates, adventures, and activities to share in the future.

Fishful Thinking

Pepperidge Farm & Goldfish introduce a parenting resource to help us instill positive thinking in our children.

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Numeral Identification

Area Tested: Numeral Identification

Recognition of numbers - your child is asked to identify the numbers 0-5 on a piece of paper that are in random order.

Activities to strengthen numeral identification:

1. Make flash cards and once the numeral is identified, count out the same number of objects

2. After counting a group of objects, write the numeral

3. Observe the calendar or clock

4. Write the numbers down on cards then shuffle and order them

5. Invent domino games

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Counting

Area tested: Counting

Counting of blocks - your child is asked to count blocks (6). We are checking for number recognition associated with the value.

Activities to strengthen counting:

1. Count objects, hands-on

2. Kitchen helper

3. Fingerplays

4. Count by listening to the sound of items dropped into a can and saying the numbers out loud

5. Count down to an exciting event in the child's life

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Self Portrait

Area Tested: Self Portrait

Self portrait - your child is asked to draw a self-portrait and we use a rubric to score the drawing. (I wish I had that rubric, just curious!)

Activities to strengthen drawing:

1. This one is about the materials you provide. Provide an array of colors, lots of paper, and a mirror too! It's much easier to draw a self-portrait after you've studied your features in a mirror.

2. Sing body parts songs & play body part location games

3. Study pictures of others, expressing appreciation for differences

4. Small manipulatives to strengthen hand muscles

5. Positive self-image

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Name Writing

Area Tested: Name Writing

Name writing - Your child is asked to print his/her name on a blank piece of paper. We check for hand dominance, pencil grip, formation of letters and directionality.

Activities to strengthen name writing:

1. Practice, practice, practice! You can create your own handwriting work sheets here:

Handwriting Worksheet Maker

2. Opportunity- find reasons for your child to sign their name like on a card to grandma or at the top of their paper child's menu at the restaurant

3. Purchase or print out lined handwriting practice paper and make it easily accessible

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Oral Language

Area Tested: Oral Language

Verbal skills - grammatical check - your child is asked to look at a picture within the book and tell what is happening on the page. We are listening for sentence structure and clarity while making association to what the picture may be about (does your child communicate in complete sentences and train of thought, etc.)

Activities to strengthen verbal skills:

1. Sings songs

2. Use full sentences, require responses in full sentences

Mom: "Would you like some more milk?"

Child: "Yes I'd like more milk please."

As compared to

Mom: "More milk?"

Child: "Yeah."

3. Go on a "picture walk" through a book. Have your child predict what will happen in the story by looking at the pictures before reading.

4. Let your child talk on the phone and practice the back and forth skills of conversation

5. Encourage language with a tape recorder

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Concepts About Print

Area Tested: Concepts About Print

Concepts of Print - your child is asked a series of questions about a book

Where is the front of a book? Where is the back of a book? Where would you begin reading? (locating the beginning of a sentence) Point to the first word in the sentence. Where would you stop reading? (locating the end of a sentence) Once you finish this page, where would you go next?

Activities to strengthen concepts of print:

1. Read, read, read! Ask questions about what you are reading.

2. Exposure to all kinds of print - books, magazines, comics, newspapers, print is everywhere!

3. Ask your child to re-tell a story they've heard several times

4. Predict what will happen in a story by looking at the pictures first

5. Point to each word as you read it aloud

To read further on assessing the concepts of print, see

Assessing the Student's Concepts about Print

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Following Directions

Area Tested: Following Directions

Following directions - your child listens to two step and three step directions and then is to perform the task(s).

Activities to strengthen following directions:

1. Play board games together

2. Obstacle course

3. After you've given a few directions at once, have the child verbally repeat them back to you

4. Order and sequencing, for example being able to tell you what happened in the beginning, middle, and end of a story

5. Write action words on several notecards. Shuffle them up and select a few, read them to your child and see if they can perform them in order.

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Initial Sounds

Area Tested: Initial Sounds

Initial sound association - a word is said by the person assessing your child and he/she is to give the initial sound or letter that the word begins with; example - baby "buh" or b.

Activities to strengthen initial sound association:

1. Practice showing pictures and asking "What letter or sound does this begin with?"

2. Make a letter collage featuring the printed letter in the center of the page surrounded by magazine cut outs of other things that have that letter/sound

3. Alphabet "I Spy"... I spy something that begins with a letter B "buh"

4. Clap the syllables to familiar objects

5. Think of a word for each letter of the alphabet, giving cues as needed

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Letter Name and Sound

Area Tested: Letter Name and Sound

Letter recognition and letter sound association - your child is asked to recognize specific letters of the alphabet and the associated sounds from a sheet of paper.

Activities to strengthen letter recognition and letter sound association:

1. That's a (insert letter). Can you find another (letter) on this page?

2. What else starts with (letter)?

3. Can you show me the (letter)?

4. How many (letter)s can we find on this page?

5. Books of course!

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin Jr. and Michael Sampson

Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten by Joseph Slate

Alphabet Soup by Scott Gustafson

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Environmental Print

Area Tested: Environmental Print

Environmental print recognition - basic signs are shown to your child and he/she is to identify each. For example: McDonald's, the cover of a box of crayons, a stop sign, men's restroom, women's restroom

Environmental print is the print seen in our
immediate surroundings and used in our everyday
lives. Environmental print is also the print found in
the natural environment of the child, or the child’s
immediate ecology (Kirkland, Aldridge, & Kuby, 1991).

Activities to strengthen environmental print recognition:

1. Identifying ads in magazines

2. Show child packaging in store and have them tell you what's inside

3. When going into a store, point out how many times you see the store name or logo

4. Point out relevant street signs on a neighborhood walk

5. Make a book of environmental print your child can already read and have them read it back to you. For example, logos, popular store signs, street signs, brand names.

When children can "read" environmental print, it shows the ability to recognize frequently occuring signs, symbols, and words in the environment. It boosts confidence. Yes, I can read some words already!

Kindergarten Screening Tools - Naming Colors

Area Tested: Naming Colors

Color recognition - the basic colors are held up to your child one at a time and your child is simply asked to identify the name of each band of color.
red yellow blue green purple brown black orange

Activities to strengthen color recognition:

1. I Spy (a red..., a yellow..., etc.)

2. Car Color Game - while riding in the car, have a hunt for cars of a certain color

3. Sort, match, count colored items (popcorn kernels, pom poms, buttons, etc.)

4. Color 8 sections of a paper plate and 8 clothespins with the colors. Have your child match and clip the clothespins to the plate.

5. Books that reinforce color recognition -

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle

Color Dance by Ann Jonas

Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh

Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni

Kindergarten Readiness and Kindergarten Screening Tools

Have you ever wondered "What is it exactly that kindergarten teachers will want my child to know?"

Is it a concern of yours that your child shows kindergarten readiness?

Over the next two weeks I'm going to spend time listing the kindergarten screening tools used by the public school C is attending. This should give you a general idea what we are working towards with our preschoolers, and I'll give you some activities you can do to strengthen each area.

Bubble Painting

Add food coloring OR liquid watercolor OR tempera paint drops to bubble solution and blow bubbles over a piece of paper. The bubbles POP! and leave behind colorful traces of circles and spatter.

*Variation: Use a straw to blow into a container of bubbles and let them bubble up and over the top, onto a sheet of paper.

*Variation: Use a straw and blow into the bubble solution to form a mountain of bubbles and lower a piece of paper down onto the bubbles.

First Day - a poem for mothers of kindergarteners

I left my last baby at kindergarten today. It's a bittersweet moment for me as it also marks the end of my time as a stay-at-home-mom. I want to share this poem for those of you saying a tearful good-bye to preschoolers and embarking on a new journey with your kindergartener!

First Day

Every one has a "First Day"

when they feel sad and all alone.

It can be so scary

when you're out on your own.

Take my hankie, dry your tears.

You'll find lots of things to do

and you'll probably make new friends.

I promise we'll be together

when the school day ends.

Here comes the teacher,

blow your nose and be brave.

Come on now wipe your eyes,

this is no way to behave.

"Well, good morning teacher.

We really must beg your pardon.

No, MOMMY doesn't always act this way.

But it's my first day of....KINDERGARTEN!"

Homemade Bubble Wand

Tape several straws together. That's it! Make hundreds of tiny bubbles or blow slowly to create a foamy tube of bubbles. Since we used bendy straws, C thought it would be funny to bend the ends and send bubbles in all directions.

Snake Pose or Cobra Pose

A child's breathing & relaxing technique. Also called the 'cobra pose' in yoga, though minus the silly snake sound!

1. Lie quietly on tummy.

2. Push up on arms.

3. Take a deep breath in.

4. Release hissssss of air like a snake and slowly settle back down.

This will flex the spine and neck. Flexible kids can also try bending their knees and bringing their feet to their head. Repeat several times for effect.

10 Leaf Activities

1. Arrange them on clear contact paper and seal with another sheet to make a placemat or window hanging

2. Leaf rubbings

3. Spread glue on paper and sprinkle on crushed leaves for a mosaic look

4. Cover leaves with light fabric (muslin works well) and pound with a hammer

5. Gather a collection of leaves and create a leaf monster or creature

6. Paint on one side of the leaf with watercolor and press on paper to leave a print

7. Paint the vein side with fabric paint and press onto a t-shirt

8. Catch leaves as they fall out of the tree

9. Gather two of each leaf and set up a matching game

10. Sing a leaf song

WELCOME AUTUMN

To the tune "London Bridge"

Autumn leaves are falling down, falling down, falling down,

autumn leaves are falling down,

welcome autumn.

Sweep the leaves and put them here, put them put here, put them here,

Sweep the leaves and put them here,

welcome autumn.

Jump right in and have some fun, have some fun, have some fun,

Jump right in and have some fun,

welcome autumn.