Relationships are central to our work as early childhood educators. Our days are structured around building and maintaining relationships with children, with other teachers, and with families. Lately we have also been thinking about our relationship with the community of Stowe. In some ways we do strive to make MVS feel like a secluded oasis for children; we maintain our own community values and practices, minimize technological intrusions, and give children space, time, and environments for learning. But this oasis has many concrete connections to the broader community. Our children's parents go to work every day and make the town tick in a variety of ways, we purchase locally-sourced food to make snacks and lunches, and our older classes roam around the community on foot and on the bus. And we are so grateful for the community establishments that enrich their education, including ECHO, the Rec Path, and the Stowe Free Library.
For more guidance on our school's role in the community, we can look to Loris Malaguzzi, founder of the Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education (previously discussed here). Malaguzzi's theory of "education as relationship" starts, of course, with the immediate relationships between children and teachers, teachers and families, and within peer groups of children. But his philosophy of education also situates teachers as facilitators of relationships between children and materials as well as ideas: "[Our goal is always] to put everything together, to try to widen the power of our intelligence through the possibilities of relationship... . Children start to understand when they put things into relationship. And the joy of children is to put together things which are apparently far away!" (as quoted in Edwards, 1995). Teachers who ensure that every child's participation is recognized and valued support a learning process that is enriched because the learning is done together; each child becomes a protagonist in the classroom "community of mind." Ultimately, "The goal, therefore, is interdependence rather than independence, and the child who can think 'with others' rather than 'for himself or herself' is the one who best exemplifies the gift bestowed by education as relationship" (Edwards, 1995).
It is easy to see how this democratic education method for young children could be extended to democratic participation in their communities, both during their early years and as they grow older. We can all choose to be protagonists in our communities, addressing community challenges by working for change and contributing our voices to the democratic process. At MVS we will be looking for more ways to do just that.
Thanks for reading!
Megan
News and Reminders
We will have a meeting at 6pm on Wednesday, March 7 to discuss how we could contribute to the National School Walkout on March 14. All parents and teachers welcome to join; we would love to hear your thoughts.
Classroom Updates
Infant I
Peer social skills have been blooming this week, from mealtime "conversations" to excited play on the floor to active, collaborative play between our older children. Our children all clearly love each other and being together, and their play becomes even more interesting and complex when it involves other children. We are also seeing social behaviors pass from one child to the next; A and H have been shaking their heads and waving their arms at each other for a while, and now the older L is doing it too. In the meantime, the younger L has taken a great interest in T and W, gazing at them and chatting with them when they are on the floor together. We also welcomed a new child and were so impressed with her adaptability and good cheer during her first couple of days with us. A final highlight was some warm outside time in the sun– we finally went mittenless and thoroughly enjoyed it!
Infant II
We had a nice week with a smaller class. We were able to have more one on one interactions with the children, which both teachers and children enjoyed. Bubbles, playdough, and the feathers were a hit this week. Each of those activities involved a focus on different colors. We also enjoyed the warm temperatures and having to wear less gear. We loved both the sun and rain because the rain gave us puddles to splash in! Both Hannah and I are excited to be hearing so much language from the children recently. They like to say everyone's names and like to repeat what we say. This week we have also seen a lot of pushing, but we are working with the children on being clear about their needs and using their words to communicate with each other.
Toddlers
What an active week we had in the Toddler room! We have been thrilled with the milder temperatures and have been taking full advantage of the sunshine. We have loved finding mud everywhere we looked and have also really enjoyed making mud dishes to pretend to eat–mud cake is a consistent favorite. We have continued to enjoy our focus on music and movement throughout the day. We especially like to sing as we get ready to go outside: "The Farmer in the Dell, " "If You're Happy and You Know It," and "Where is Thumbkin" have been extremely popular. This week we have also been focusing on fine motor skills. To this end, we have introduced painting with clothespins that are holding pom-poms. The children really enjoyed holding the pins with their fingers and painting n paper with them. Matching shapes in puzzles has been another big interest with students concentrating hard on finding exactly where certain pieces go–so much brain power!
Preschool I
To extend our experiences with freezing and melting, we've provided lots of ice and water in our sensory table. It's exciting to witness the foundations of inquiry, or asking open-ended questions to guide self-directed learning, being formed in the minds of the children. One such question would be, "Where did the ice go?" Another question would be, "Why did the ice cubes get smaller?" Formalizing experimentation is years away, but the basic skills of observing and forming questions can be nurtured even in infancy. If you want to work on this at home, here are the steps:
1) Go on a walk with your child and give them an empty yogurt tub. Make a "collection" in the bucket; rocks, sticks, anything goes.
2)Add water to the "collection." If it's cold enough, leave it outside, or stick it in your freezer. Say, "Let's check on our collection after nap time. What do you think will happen?" Accept the predictions as they are.
3) Once the collection is frozen, invite your child to figure out how to get the treasures out. We've tried melting with water, chipping with plastic knives, or tapping with rocks.
4) Talk about what you notice: "Wow, the ice cube is big and heavy! Do you think it's cold? Really cold or only a little bit cold? Hey, there's more water now... where did that come from?"
Happy ice treasure hunting! See you Monday!
Preschool II
We started the week with snow, finished the week with snow, and had everything else in between–sunny warm Wednesday and some muddy days. As the seasons change, we talked about and looked for signs of spring. As the snow receded we found toys that had been buried and noticed animal tracks around the apple tree. Maybe turkeys and rabbits were finding food that had been under the snow all winter? This week's books included a few new versions of The Little Red Hen, including one where the great-great-grandson of the Little Red Hen works with his friends to follow a recipe and together they share a delicious strawberry shortcake. In another version, the Red Hen shared her pizza and her friends, who didn't help make it, did help her clean up and do the dishes. This week we also had two great days at the SES playground with our friends from PreK. We finished the week with a short walk to Camp Fire Forest where some friends worked on the stick fort while others saw the new snow as an opportunity for another day of sledding and sliding before spring melts the snow away.
PreK
Sorry we are missing an update from PreK this week! The children are adapting well to Jen's absence and will be spending their days with Tori and Sarah W. Jen will be back on March 14.
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