When it comes to creating a space that fosters comfort and creativity we feel that less is more. Our teams works very hard to provide our children with a neat, simple and neutral space with little distraction. On the other hand, we do try to incoperate new and interesting elements into our space to spark thinking including mirrors, water and light and items from nature. Our activties and tools are displayed in an athestically pleasing way in order to teach the children how to respect and honour the beauty that surrounds them.
We look forward to filling our boards with documenatation of the children's learning through project work.
Thanks for taking a look!
We look forward to filling our boards with documenatation of the children's learning through project work.
Thanks for taking a look!
I find this very inspiring! I am in year one of ELKP at John Sweeney and we are struggling with space and cluttered classrooms. Your room looks very organized and quite minimal. Do you have a storage room or a lot of stuff tucked away in cupboards?
ReplyDeleteMegan
Hi Megan,
DeleteMy apologies for just getting back to you. I am so new to BLOGGER that I didn't even realize you had sent a message! How are things going over at John Sweeny?
To answer your questions yes we have a storage room but I do not have much stuff. Since I have never taught kindergarten in the past I did not have a huge collection of anything, really. If you're anything like my colleague-who has taught JK/SK for many years now-she had LOTS to purge when she began the new program. Since we're not teaching units she found that she really didn't need half the stuff she owned. As you go on to understand the program more deeply you'll find that
a) you don't need all that "stuff"
b) you'll need to collect materials quickly as you are trying to capitalize on their interests. I can't even tell you how many times I have had to make a dash somewhere obscure after work to get something for the next day!
We follow the philosophy that a soothing environment creates a better atmosphere for learning :)
Anyhow, hope this helps!