July 11th: Animals and Telescopes

 


Animals are a hit with kids. When I told each group today, we would be talking about animals in our story and game they all got really excited. I noticed this helped the kids focus more on each of the stories I read. For the younger groups I read a counting animal safari book that I had them actively participate in. So, on each page they held up the number of fingers for the number of animals present then as a group we would say the type of animal present. The kids seemed to love this and would usually progress to enthusiastically shouting out the animal. The level of engagement with the animal themed stories was impressive especially for the younger kids. Additionally, I loved seeing that excitement on their faces because they were invested in the theme/topic. So, I made a mental note to start creating list of topics that interest kids to reference throughout my career. 

After the story we moved onto our telescope craft. I introduced the craft by asking the children what kinds of objects were used to help people see things like safari animals better. This prompt helped build the focus and anticipation for the craft/craft instructions. I was very thankful to have Ms. Karen B help me hand out the crafts with each group and aid in the construction process with the morning session. It really helped cut back on the mess and hassle that the craft inevitability caused- especially in the afternoon when she had to facilitate checkout in the bookmobile. This was a solid lesson to think about potential meds factors for crafts in the future as sometimes they are messier than you think. So, the day also involved constant cleanup and picking up newspapers off the floor.

All that said, it was a really great day despite the extra messes because the kids were a lot more invested in the stories read.


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