Integrating Developmental Principles and Beliefs
In considering our opening vignette, you may have wondered how an open-ended, comprehensive play-based curriculum could be compatible with planning and scheduling for a teacher-directed supplemental literacy program. Curricular activities may be conceptually organized by developmental domains or by academic content areas, but the planning process for any curriculum should prioritize and integrate developmentally appropriate principles and strategies.
For example, you can plan a literacy activity that focuses on identifying beginning word sounds as small-group or one-on-one interactions at the beginning or end of a large block of free-choice time rather than as a whole-group lesson. This way, childrens play is not interrupted; you maximize opportunities for interpersonal interactions and control the time and frequency of these activities for the capabilities of each individual child. Likewise, a curriculum or program that requires a whole-group “circle time” for 3-year-olds should challenge you to plan a format for such a time that is interactive, enjoyable, meaningful, and no longer than the children can reasonably be expected to manage.
As the teacher, your thoughtful approach to planning will be based on your observations, record keeping, and interactions with the children, ensuring that:
- Themes and topics of study support program goals and curriculum objectives but curriculum is not “one-size fits all,” so that children have ongoing opportunities for activities and experiences that support their individual interests and developmental characteristics
- Teacher-directed and child-initiated activities are balanced
- The curriculum is flexible and adaptable to accommodate learning opportunities that arise unexpectedly
- Children can offer questions and ideas that are incorporated in planning of future activities
- The environment and curriculum reflect and honor the real lives of the children and their families
- Planning balances active and quiet times and individual, small-group, and whole-group interactions
- Exploratory play is supported as an important mode of learning
Effective planning integrates the key themes of this book: (1) understanding the theoretical and/or philosophical foundation of the curriculum; (2) knowledge of human growth and development; (3) coordinating integration of the roles you, as the teacher, families, and communities assume as curriculum informants; (4) identification of curriculum content that supports childrens needs and interests; and (5) choosing and enacting developmentally appropriate teaching and assessment strategies.
Table 2.7 in Chapter 2 provides a simple format for organizing your essential ideas and beliefs so that you can compare them with ideas represented in various curricula you may be interested in or asked to use. In planning, you apply these ideas as an action plan (Nilsen, 2010). For example, Mary, a kindergarten teacher in South Carolina, knows that one of the physical science standards relates to exploring matter, “Standard K.P.4: The student will demonstrate an understanding of the observable properties of matter.” The indicator for this standard (K.P.4A.1) reads: “Analyze and interpret data to compare the qualitative properties of objects (such as size, shape, color, texture, weight, flexibility, attraction to magnets, or ability to sink or float) and classify objects based on similar properties” (South Carolina Department of Education, 2014, p. 10). She knows that this standard can be addressed through explicit teaching about the concept, but her constructivist belief that children learn science concepts through exploration of the environment and materials leads to intentional planning for that learning to occur naturally.
Table 6.1 represents what her broad plan for a given week might include to support open-ended inquiry about the observable properties of water. Shell build the activities around the use of a water table.
| Table 6.1: Water Table Activities | ||
|---|---|---|
| Prompts and Facilitation Strategies | Materials | |
| Monday | Generate and record ideas about why objects sink or float in water; examine a variety of materials for experimentation; chart childrens predictions | Paper clips; marbles; recycled styrofoam packing peanuts trays and soda/water bottles; paper plates; bottle caps; wood scraps; aluminum foil; paper cups; play dough; small rocks and sticks; string; rubber bands; tooth picks; plastic straws |
| Tuesday | Discuss ideas about how children could make a boat that will float in water; construct and test in the water table; record observations; photograph or videotape the water table as a work in progress | |
| Wednesday | ||
| Thursday | ||
| Friday | Construct a diagram (sink/float/both) with the children to organize observations made over the week; compare with their original predictions; begin a book with images or drawings of the boats and transcription of childrens tentative answers to the question of why a boat floats; generate new questions about sinking and floating to continue inquiry | |