Now that we are into our 34th day of school we are ready to start learning centers in the afternoon. The children work in small groups (2 or 3 children) and rotate through 9 different centers during the week. Each center concentrates on a specific skill or concept I want the children to master. I wanted you to know what centers were in case the children talked about it. Let me use these pictures to explain what we do during center work.
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| In this center the children are matching upper and lower case letters and identifying what sound the letter makes. They can also work on making words, sorting the letters by characteristic (round letters, straight letters, letters with tails, letters that go below the line). The boys worked together as a team to make all of the matches. Working in a small partnership helps the children learn to negotiate, problem solve and be a great team member. |
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| In the Writing Center the children can create books, stamp stories and words, use paper punches, tape and stapler to create books, use word banks to add words to their book, play word games and so much more! The center also has extra copies of our letter printing practice paper so they can practice writing the letters they have learned. |
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| In this center the children are exploring nature and math concepts. The children can sort the leaves by characteristic (color, size, shape). They can also do leaf rubbings and study the shape, texture and parts of the leaf. |
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| Here are some of the leaf rubbings. Thank you to all of the parents who are taking nature walks with their kids and finding us wonderful items to study! The fall/autumn is really coming alive in our classroom! |
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| In this center the children are exploring the gourds. They can sort the gourds by characteristics, explore the texture and use expanded vocabulary to describe the gourds. This will help them in their writing work (using descriptive words are a critical skills children must develop to be good writers). |
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| Again, thank you to all of you awesome parents who donate to our classroom! You make it possible for us to have such a rich learning environment. When the children bring in items from home they really feel like they are part owners in the learning. They know that the parents are connected and know what is going on in class. They take pride in their classroom and invest themselves in taking care of the learning environment. Thank you for sending in the gourds, nuts, leaves, mini pumpkins, walnuts, acorns and so much more. We are putting it to good use! |
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| In the Dramatic Play center the children are exposed to math and literacy concepts. Real food boxes are used to expose children to print outside of books. Feel free to send in menus if you can get any. The children like to make and read menus! This is another example of how the children are exposed to a print rich environment throughout the learning day. Math concepts are introduced through measuring, sorting, counting items, and matching amounts. Writing is used to make "birthday lists" (which is one of their favorite things to do, they write down everyone name in the classroom and invite them all to there birthday party!). Children make shopping lists, write telephone messages, pretend text and write grocery lists on the write-on/wipe-off board. One of the most critical skills they develop in this area are social/emotional skills. They role play (yes, they play you!), explore careers, negotiate, compromise, use manners, hone social language skills, expand vocabulary, express emotions, solve problems, work as a member of a team and practice being a good citizen. |
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| Our classroom library area is officially open! This is a set center and will never change. In this center children can relax on a bean bag chair, pillow or chair and enjoy a good book. Later they will be able to listen to books on CD or Tape, play with puppets and recreate or retell familiar books using the puppets, have a book talk with a friend, enjoy a magazine (I get several children's magazines such as Ranger Rick, National Geographic Kids) or just browse for a good book to add their reading bags. I love this area and have tried to make it a special place for the kids to read. |
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| This is the Smart Board Center. These children are playing a find the rhyming words game. We use Starfall on line at this station. I have several learning games (including one where you throw a Koosh Ball at the board but I haven't shown them that one yet) for the Smart Board. We also use the board to practice writing our letters and words. Sometime I may have a short video of an author or illustrator talking about how he/she created their book. I may have a short science or math video from time to time at this center as well. Mostly the children will work on literacy skills at this station. |
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This station is the block area and it will never change. The signs they are playing with are also part of their environmental print exposure. I will introduce items to encourage them to build the setting from favorite books, explore geometric shapes and spacial reasoning, develop problem solving and logic skills, learn measurement and explore physics while creating structures.
I hope this helps you to understand a little more about center time. They spend about 15 minutes in a center before rotating. In each center I change out the activities each week to work on a new skills set. Right now I used the assessments we did last month on language and math skills to decide what skills the class needed extra work on. I also try to theme my centers (right now most manipulative's are fall themed) to keep the activities fresh and engaging.
Thanks again for all you do! As always, keep reading with your child!
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