NEWS FROM THE CLASSROOM

The Rewards of Reflective Practice

News from the Preschool classroom

January 17, 2022

This week in the Beluga classroom I spent some time cleaning out chair pockets.  Using chair pockets in preschool is something I haven’t done before this year, but, because our COVID protocols at the beginning of the year called for each child to have their own supplies, and because we needed the space that our mailboxes were taking up for something else, we decided to give them a try to see if they would work for helping us manage children’s supplies and belongings in the classroom.  I have mixed feelings about how they have worked out, but that is not really the point of this blog.  As I cleaned, I found, among lots of other interesting things, a plethora of coloring pages, in various stages of completion.

Now to be fair, I have always loved coloring.  I grew up in Seattle, where (in the days before there was cable television) I spent many, many rainy hours drawing and coloring, and I still love the smell of new crayons and the delight of a new coloring book.  Lately though, I have felt quiet doubts creeping into my thoughts about the place of coloring pages in our early kindergarten classroom.  While I do think that they have their occasional uses, even in early childhood settings, I have also watched some children turn to them as a first choice rather than a last resort, when they are looking for something to do.  They become a too-easy choice when there are so many other learning opportunities available.

Coloring pages do offer a couple of plusses or benefits, the first of which would be that coloring pages can help to promote fine motor development and eye-hand coordination. That’s important, right? Another would be that coloring can be relaxing for a child and can provide a few minutes of quiet play. That’s certainly beneficial in the fast-paced world we live in.  What else?  Well, to be honest, I sit here struggling to come up with more reasons.  And now as I think about it, when I was a child, they called coloring a pastime because it did just that – pass the time.  Is that what I want for my classroom – just passing time? Definitely not.

So why do I share this?  Why do I publicly share this realization of something which I have recognized as a shortcoming in my classroom – something we’ve been doing which I have realized is not “best practice”? Well, this is what educators refer to as “reflective practice” – something which all teachers are trained to do, but sadly, many do not always engage in.  One thing (among many) that I love about PNA, is that there is no question that reflective practice is THE way to teach – to be constantly looking for ways to improve what we are doing in the classroom in our effort to reach each student.  This is how we strive to be our best selves as teachers and also strive to fulfill our mission to inspire our students to be exceptional learners and independent thinkers.

So, what became of the coloring pages this week?  Well, though I was tempted, we didn’t throw them all in the recycling, but we didn’t print any more of them either.  Instead, we tried something a little bit different in an effort to transition the students away from them and generate a little more creativity.  Miss Cassy printed all kinds of little characters with which the children were familiar, and we had the idea that they might like to cut them out to make their own scenes on construction paper, which they could then embellish with markers, crayons, sparkles… whatever they wanted.  And guess what? Something very interesting happened!

Our plan turned out to be a dismal failure! Almost no one wanted to make the “fun” scenes we had envisioned. And yet, in an instant, it also became an unbelievable success! One of the children had a brilliant idea and said, “Mrs. Smith, can we make puppets?”. ABSOLUTELY!! So, we immediately changed course and got out the popsicle sticks!  Suddenly ALL the children were crazy with excitement about puppets and puppet shows!  This child-led activity has led to us watching puppet shows on YouTube and having lots of discussions about literary elements such as setting, plot, and characters, and also things like proper audience behavior. It has been unbelievably exciting to see the children’s enthusiasm!  We have made lots and lots of puppets and have had the first of what will surely be many puppet shows, as we continue to explore telling stories with different kinds of puppets.

This has been an a-ha moment for us as we have been lately been contemplating a change from the way we have taught preschool in the past to a way which is more in line with PNA’s project-based learning approach. This simple experience with puppets has given us an insight into how we can begin to integrate project-based learning (which is typically used in grades 1 and up), with the child-led, play-based learning which has been the foundation of our pedagogy in our early kindergarten classroom.

To be clear, this was NOT what the teachers had planned to do.  This was BETTER than what the teachers had planned!  This could happen because the teacher was willing to reflect on what was happening in the class and had the courage to say, “I think we need to change and do a little better”.  This happened because the assistant teacher was inspired to provide some different and interesting materials.  But mostly it happened because we allowed the imagination and creativity of the children to lead the way to some great learning and a whole lot of fun!

 

 

 

 

 

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