If your teaching style were a movie genre (don’t worry, this isn’t a Buzzfeed quiz), what would it be? Maybe Comedy? I once knew a trigonometry teacher who somehow combined math with an ongoing stand-up routine – every year he’d dust off his headdress and be Chief Socatowa (Something about sines and cosines? Luckily I […]
Category Archives: Stories
Yes, this book is wonderful for helping young children develop critical thinking skills, but the BEST thing about it is that it’s a very funny story and children love it. “Where’s My Mom?” sounds like the title of a very sad book about a lost and anxious little one. I don’t like those kinds of […]
Why you should use ASL with young children More and more schools and early childhood learning centers are teaching some ASL (American Sign Language) to their (hearing) students. It seems counterintuitive, to say the least. Young children are still learning their own language – receptive, oral and written. Isn’t that enough? Why burden them with […]
Early childhood friends, many of us are neglecting one of the best, biggest, most powerful resources available – the library. It’s greater than all the websites, Tweets, and (dare I say it?) Pinterest ideas put together. Here’s why. Picture books. Social media can show us all the fantastic picture books out there about poetry, math, chicks, […]
The popularity of Karma Wilson’s “Bear” series of picture books is richly deserved. Charming characters, rhythmic text, and easy-to-follow, often repetitive storylines make these books perfect for reading aloud to young children. As a music teacher, I’m always on the lookout for stories which are easily “musicalized” – either with sound effects like stomping or […]
12 Tips for Making Read-Alouds Come Alive! When is a story not a story? When it’s sitting on a shelf, of course. But that’s not the whole answer. A story isn’t a real story until it’s read with thought, energy, skill, and imagination. Like Pinocchio, it will stay “wooden” (or paper) without a little magic to […]
In my music enrichment classes for young children, I often read stories to which I add repeated, sung phrases or “sound effects” children can join in on. I find this adds: 1. Engagement as children focus in on the story and listen for the auditory cues for “their part,” […]
