The All-Day Kindergarten and Pre-K Curriculum

A Dynamic-Themes Approach

Doris Pronin Fromberg

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781136638985
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Grounded in theory and research, The All-Day Kindergarten and Pre-K Curriculum provides an activity-based and classroom-proven curriculum for educators to consider as they plan and interact with pre-k and kindergarten children. Allowing young children the opportunities to become independent, caring, critical thinkers who feel comfortable asking questions and exploring possible solutions, the Dynamic Themes Curriculum offers children the skills they need for responsible citizenship and academic progress. This book describes a culturally-sensitive pre-k and kindergarten curriculum in the context of literacy, technology, mathematics, social studies, science, the arts, and play, and also discusses:

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• How to use the seven integrated conditions for learning to meet and exceed content learning standards

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• How to organize for differentiated instruction and to integrate multiple forms of assessment

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• How to teach literacy tools and skills in fresh ways

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• How to work with families, colleagues, and community

Building off of author Doris Fromberg's groundbreaking earlier work, The All-Day Kindergarten and Pre-K Curriculum presents a practical curriculum centering on how young children develop meanings. This is a fantastic resource for pre-and in-service early childhood teachers, administrators, and scholars.

PART I

The Setting

The chapters in this section provide a context for young children’s education in the all-day kindergarten and pre-kindergarten. Chapter 1 describes the center-based setting and how a few children move within it. Chapter 2 shares ways in which professional teachers maintain a civilized environment. Chapter 3 provides a framework of integrated procedures that can help youngsters build meaningful connections between ideas. The many activities throughout the book include these procedures. Chapter 4 highlights the distinctive physical basis that serves as an essential foundation on which young children build much of their learning.

1

AN ALL-DAY KINDERGARTEN
AND PRE-KINDERGARTEN

Introduction

Think about a classroom as an artificial environment, a box in which as many as 25 pre-kindergarten or kindergarten children and their teacher dwell during a 5- to 6-hour school day. In this environment, the simplistic image of a teacher as a stand-up entertainer who changes focus every few minutes cannot compete with the adrenalin pumps of constantly changing television images and computer games. This book discusses ways to consider why, what, and how it makes sense for teachers to deal with the complex ways in which young children can make sense of a complex world. It also deals with how they can learn many of the concepts, facts, skills, and attitudes needed in order to become intelligent citizens.

Therefore, let us begin by looking at two children between 48 and 72 months of age, first from the children’s perspective and then from the teacher’s. We will then consider what learning in an all-day pre-kindergarten and kindergarten looks and feels like, particularly as teacher and child interact. These relative views will be elaborated throughout the book, for they provide the best means of imparting a deeper understanding of what an all-day experience can be. [Procedural note: As you read, note that whenever there is mention of a pre-kindergarten child, the activity might also include kindergarten children. When there is mention of a kindergarten child, few younger children might be capable of the activity. The mention of children or youngsters alone suggests that both groups might be capable of the activity.]

The 4- and 5-Year-Old

The Child’s View

Imagine yourself to be a 4- or 5-year-old, beginning school. You were born 48 or 63 months ago and have spent your time at home or in preschool and child care with some of the following people: your mother, father, older sister, babysitters, grandparents, and teachers. You find toys and pictures in the supermarket. You have waited a very long time as your mother shopped or held her place in line in a city office.

You try to capture birds with your jacket and bring a bowl of milk to the stray cat near your house. You were hit by a swing in the park, and your teenage babysitter tried to stop you from telling your mother this when she was resting after work. New flowers in spring thrill you. Puddles are an invitation for splashing through.

You watch the older children trying to burn ants off a worm’s back. You recall that “One time my father drank so much and he was drunk and he fell asleep in the living room with all his clothes on” (Anonymous, 1978, p. 16). You believe that “It’s a long time before you die. Everything has to die. People go around and dig and find skulls, and they say, This is the skull of a man. We saw skulls at the museum. There was a huge dinosaur skull . . . You turn into dust when you die” (Nalim, 1978, p. 20).

When thunder or gunshots waken you at night, you feel your heart beat faster as you race to your parents’ bed. Getting hugs from them is one good thing about thunder and gunshots. Jerry told you that he heard gunshots on Wednesday and his brother told him to duck.

You go to your neighbor’s apartment to see if he can play ball with you, but he tells you he cannot come over because he cannot bear to part with his best friend, who is visiting. You ask your grandfather to play with you because you feel so lonely and there’s nothing to do. It feels good when he tells you what a great checkers player you have become.

You feel puzzled to see your older sister’s face contort with disgust when she takes the spoon you have handled. More often, she wants to take what you have long before you want to give it to her.

You will miss your friend Stanley if his family moves away. He taught you to count to 100 and shared your horror when the baby doll’s paint came off in the water. You play card games together, and he taught you how to stack the deck in his favor. You talk about favorite television shows together and race to your grandmother’s side because the commercial tells you to tell your mother to go right out and buy it. You can sing every commercial you hear and ride a tricycle or a two-wheeler. You ask your father why your living-room floor is covered with linoleum while Eileen’s has a soft carpet.

You feel guilty when you eat more candy than your mother said you could have. You don’t understand why your mother not wanting to send the dentist on vacation is a reason not to eat candy. You watch the older children sneaking cigarettes in the park while their heavy schoolbooks sit on the ground. You cannot understand why they tell you not to pick up the shiny crack vials in the schoolyard. Everybody wonders why you keep collecting round red pebbles and shiny colored glass in a shoebox.

You have been delighted by Curious George, the peddler and the monkeys, and other storybook characters; you can look repeatedly at the pictures in the monster book (Where the Wild Things Are), Cars, and The Trek. You point to each word in the comic book, one at a time, without actually reading. The big kids on the block “play school” with you and showed you that c-a-t spelled cat as you copied their writing. They are shocked that you connected c-a-t, for cat, with r-a-t for rat and m-a-t for mat. Everybody said that you would learn to read when you go to the big school. You wonder if your teacher will be a smiling person.

The Teacher’s View

As a teacher, you have considered that each child has had many experiences, some different from others, and that each child needs a different amount of time to satisfy his or her need for repetition in order to gain mastery—whether the task is tying shoelaces, riding a bicycle, pouring liquids, writing a name, comparing quantities, putting together a puzzle, or learning to care about friends. You have seen young children who readily repeated skills again and again and felt satisfied in doing so. They have devoted their entire attention to solving a problem. As you have walked with young children, you have seen, heard, and appreciated what might otherwise have been a lost world of novelties. You have caught a glimpse of the connections they made that sometimes felt poetic.

Your work has made you aware that young children learn most effectively when they can have physical contact with concrete materials that they can compare and imagery that represents contrasts. The children’s direct involvement is the basis for their motivation. When you have been able to provide such direct involvement, you have been able to help them build on the strengths of their experiences. The children’s ways of working have been an effective vehicle for carrying out the school’s intellectual and socio-emotional purposes.

Young children’s ways of learning and the teacher’s ways of teaching are largely social, affective, aesthetic, and physical. Yet schools are the single institution charged with the major task of intellectual development. For all-day early education, the issue is not either intellect or socialization. The issue is helping young children achieve intellectual and personal success by using experiential means, through concrete and imaginative activities that are largely physical, aesthetic, affective, and social. The bulk of this book is devoted to elaborating and representing this issue through varied ways of working with children during an extended school day.

The most caring teacher can hurt children unless she or he is skilled in translating the human fund of knowledge into activities in which children can feel competent (Dewey, 1933). Researchers who study the human brain point to the importance of positive emotion in helping thinking to take place (Damasio 2003). Wedding what is taught with how it is taught is more important than either ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Part I: The Setting
• Part II: Content: Connecting Experiences with Dynamic-Themes
• Part III: Learning Tools, Skills, and Ways to Represent Experiences
• Part IV: Planning, Assessment, and Community Connections
• Endnotes and Related Children’s Books
• References
• Index