For some reason today I was remembering one of my favorite spoken word poems, “Miracle Worker” by the wonderful Taylor Mali. Especially this one bit: Once in a restaurant, when the waiter asked me if I wanted anything else, and I said, “No, thank you, just the check, please,” and he said, “How about a […]
Tag Archives: education
“Explore the World” Learning About Children and Creativity from Richard P. Feynman I’ve learned a great deal about teaching creative thinking to young children from a man who wasn’t an artist, but a scientist. Richard P. Feynman was one of the greatest physicists of our time. He was well known for his work in quantum […]
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 […]
A few of my schools offer day care for school aged children on their days off. Since last week was Spring Break for many nearby towns, I had a chance to reconnect with some of my former students. The most amazing experience was at one center, where I walked into the pre-K room to see […]
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 other day, while singing “Old MacDonald” with a class of three-year-olds, I found myself wondering how many times I’ve sung this song. Must be in the thousands, I thought. Well, I just did some calculations. Multiply approximately ten times a day, three or four days a week, times say fifty weeks a year, for (excuse […]
A wonderful thing about teaching toddlers through pre-K at one school is that I get to watch a speeded-up version of child development, like time-lapse photography, whenever I teach. The toddlers sit and stare at me, my picture book, my keyboard, and my puppets with wide eyes. Very few can clap on the beat or […]
How amazing are preschoolers? They may not have the knowledge that we do, butmaybe their flexible thinking processes could teach us a thing or two… (from ScienceDaily.com) Preschoolers can outsmart college students at figuring out gizmos Date: March 6, 2014 Preschoolers can be smarter than college students at figurin g out how unusual toys and […]
Music (and Science) For Young Children 