Before the holidays, I was struggling a little with my pre-k classes. I couldn’t switch my brain from the public library storytime format, where you have 45 minutes to an hour to sing, use bubbles, read stories, and do a craft. And the parents are there to help with any complicated gluing or cutting for the craft. My class periods are 30 minutes, and I realized after a while that with pre-k I really get more like 20-25 minutes. It takes them a while to do transitions, so they’re not at the library when the bell rings and need about 5 minutes to clean up and line up at the end of class. But by November I’d finally sort of caught on to planning units over a month’s time with them. Some weeks we just do stories, some weeks we play a game or do a craft, etc.
Archive: January 31, 2009