Thursday, July 16, 2009

Kindergarten

The Alliance for Childhood has a very important paper on kindergarten available online right now.

If you are concerned about "kindergarten readiness" please read this paper.

Friday, July 3, 2009

CHIRON EAST and the Grade 3/4 Curriculum

I did all the 3-4 curriculum workshops (main lesson, math, formdrawing) as well as a Games workshop with a special math focus, eurythmy, singing, adult and child development, a workshop on Meda and children, and a workshop on Loving Authority.

My particular interest (why I spent the $$$ and pushed to get there arriving on no sleep from the trip from Ottawa!) was to attend John Grant McLouglin's math workshop. He is a prof in math education at UNB and he has a very special interest in math anxiety.

For me it boiled down to this: Keep it simple, go back to the stories and build it all from there. Keep the math as practical and in the body as possible, teach the written expression near the end of the year only if it is necessary for transitioning into public school.

He taught me a form of notation (area math) that is particularly good for children with dyslexia because rather than them getting the wrong answer you, as a teacher, and then they as students, can easily find where they got lost in a question and correct only that piece of the picture.

So I'm practicing my mental math leadership skills. We'll be using that daily and doing an awful lot of practical math activities this coming year in preparation for the following year's work with fractions.

Nature Girl made HUGE strides with her reading this year (which was my main focus) and is now reading a full grade ABOVE grade level. We're going to consciously begin deep work with spelling rules and grammar.

I'll be using the Grade 3 curriculum as it fits where she is developmentally.

I'm excited to see what the school schedule is like for next year, she's to begin french and I hope the schedule allows for her to be at school easily for french music and gym class.