Sending the Curriculum Home
Inventive teachers also employ practical strategies to directly extend children’s curriculum activities from school to home. Academic homework is inappropriate for young children. But you could, for example, create a “traveling suitcase” or book bag (Gestwicki, 2004) with items that a child might not have at home but that the family would enjoy using together, such as a favorite book and puppet or puzzle. You might also provide paper, markers, and envelopes for a drawing and note to put in the classroom mailbox for a friend. You can ask parents if it would be appropriate to make a special call to children at home as an incentive for learning their phone number, or send a postcard when they can tell you their address. You might send home a photograph of the child at school, with paper and a pen for the parents to record how the child describes what he or she was doing.