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Play is many things to many people. For most of us, it is a self-selected, self-directed activity that children carry out for pleasure. In fact, many leaders in our field, such as David Elkind, Vivian Paley, and Lilian Katz have referred to play as “children’s work” because it provides rich opportunities to learn concepts such as cause and effect (“If you hit a tower of blocks, it will fall down.”) and time relationships (“I will play dress-up with you after…

Try these songs, games, and strategies to help children get to know each other as a new school year begins. Learn one another’s names Sing songs that incorporate children’s names as a fun way for everyone to get to know one another. Try the chant “Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?” or other songs that use children’s names. Children will join in, have a blast with the silly rhymes, and learn one another’s names all at the same…

Think about the overall goals you have for the children in your care. What qualities or characteristics would you like to see in these children next year? What about 10 years from now? We can support children’s growth and their character development of positive characteristics by providing a strong foundation through guidance. This article will focus on how guidance (positive discipline) supports children and facilitates long-term success, while punishment (negative discipline) is hurtful and can have long-lasting effects. Twenty-one strategies…

Child care providers can play a pivotal role in helping young children learn how to read. This collection of tips will help you incorporate reading into your programs. Read More: Reading Rockets

1. Learn from others. Listen to more experienced mentors. Observe how they handle disruptive situations. Watch how they diffuse a tense situation. 2. Expect great things to happen. Be excited about your work each day. A child’s first teacher is often the one he or she remembers the most. You could be that person in the life of the children you teach.Read More: Early Childhood News  

Rich early writing experiences can help lay the foundation for preschooler’s later reading success.  To help your students develop their writing skills, it’s important to make writing materials readily available around the classroom and provide writing opportunities for your students throughout the day.  Regardless of if your students are still scribbling or beginning to form words and letters, here are three ways you can inspire them to write:  Display Words and Writing Charts Around the Classroom Word walls are a…

The What Works Clearinghouse reviewed the research on two practices used in center-based settings with 3- to 5-year-old preK children, as well as a number of specific curricula. Positive results are shown for (1) Phonological awareness training and (2) Interactive and dialogic reading.Read More: Reading Rockets 

Burton White of the Harvard Preschool Project said, "If play is the best way children learn, then why not make all their work their play." Math is one of those areas.Read More: Early Childhood News 

According to the National Institute for Literacy (2001), phonemic awareness is the ability to think about and work with individual sounds in spoken languages. Before children learn to read, they need to be aware of how sounds work. Teachers should integrate phonemic awareness instruction in the curriculum to help children learn to read and spell. The instruction can start with having children categorize the first phonemes — the smallest functional unit of speech — in words and then progress to…

You can build parents’ confidence in being their child’s reading partner at home by teaching them how to read aloud expressively and ask their child open-ended and child-friendly questions. It’s best to never assume that families already know how to help children read at home. The graphic below provides you with some examples you can give parents of how they can help their child learn to read. Read More: Kaplan Early Learning