Guest Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Hi, not posted anything on here before so hope I ve done it right! I teach in an Early Years Unit with Reception and Nursery. This is my third school teaching in FS and things are quite different. At present we are setting up an activity in each of the areas of the room and the children are to only do this in each of the areas for the whole week! We have a wealth of resources on the shelves in each area but are not allowing the children to take anything off or to add to the activity with any of them. Im finding this different as in my past schools we have encouraged the children to use the resources to develop activities of their own or to enhance the activities in the areas. E.g if we have boats in the water that week the children are not to take anything from the shelves at all and only play with the boats that week. I need advise- do you think that the way we do it is OK or should we make changes? The children are beggining to wander and not work in the areas at all but the opinion of my colleagues is still to not allow them anything from the shelves. I would really appreciate your feedback! Thanks
AnonyMouse_79 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Hi Claire and welcome I think you are right to want to change things, this is very directed and very boring! The children are telling you that they want to change things and all though you do not want a free for all you also do not want to stiffle their independence and motivation. Good luck.
AnonyMouse_6593 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 I teach in reception and agree with Susan. How can the children become independent learners if they are spoon fed their activities?? I think you need to stick with your instinct and how you worked at your other schools. Maybe you could suggest to the FS co-ordinator (if thats not you!) that you would all benefit from going to see how other units work, thats what we have done as we had some staff who were quite old fashioned in thier views on how chn should be learning in early years, once they saw how other schools ran their FS units they were willing to take onboard the nessessary changes.
AnonyMouse_4544 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 I agree its certainly not catering for Child initiated learning. Even if the staff compromised and said the boats stay today but what would you like tomorrow it would be a start?
Guest Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Thanks, cant belive you ve replied so quickly! There is no FS co-ordinator so maybe thats part of the problem too. Going to see other schools is a great idea and I will certainly suggest that to everyone. How do you run and manage this in your schools? (So that a free for all doesnt occur?!) Do you still ask the children to focus on doing a certain thing with the equipment? Thanks
AnonyMouse_4544 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Hi Claire and welcome you might be interested in reading SueR's article it has inspired a number of us to be brave and go down the same route with our planning http://www.foundation-stage.info/newfsf/ar...Article_191.php I think you can expect a bit of a free for all initially until there are established rules. Our rule is nothing new can be accessed until everything is put away. Good Luck
Guest Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Thanks, will definately give that website a look. Thanks for all of your help
AnonyMouse_6593 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 As Marion said the children will get everything out to start with but you just need to train them, it won't take long once they get used to the rules (mind you if you've read my reward system thread mine seem to have forgotten the rules at the mo so its not all plain sailing!!) In my reception class we have the areas spread out across 2 rooms so for example if i ask my children to set up a maths activity in the maths zone they know they can get anything out of the boxes, trays, bags in the maths zone and they tidy it away before they chose another activity, or if they want to set up in the creative zone they know they can use paint, playdough, glue and sticking etc but they have to negotiate with their peers (as the space is pretty limited) which they are getting good at now! Good Luck Catherine x
AnonyMouse_4495 Posted January 28, 2007 Posted January 28, 2007 Hi and welcome to the forum from me too! I think that reading Sue's blog will help you and the other staff in changing the current way of working (if you decide to do so) You can search the forum for lots of threads on this, with the results looking something like this Have fun looking and let us know how it goes!
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