Template for a Resource File Card
Opportunities for involving community in the curriculum are limited only by your imagination and ability to make creative use of resources. The following list provides brief narrative examples from the author’s recent experiences:
- A toddler teacher notices that her 2-year-old children seem very interested in animals but easily confuse larger farm animals, such as cows, horses, and goats. In her community, horse-drawn carriage tours are a major tourist attraction. She arranges with a local tour company for a short carriage ride around the neighborhood and a visit to the company’s barn, which has a small petting area with baby farm animals.
- Kindergarten children observe a nest being built by a bird on the playground and begin to request information about how eggs hatch. The teacher contacts the state university extension service. They have a program that offers to send schools a field agent who will bring an incubator and eggs to the classroom, teach the children how to monitor and turn the eggs daily until they hatch, and then reclaim the chicks.
- In a class of 3-year-olds, the teacher notices a high level of interest in rocks. She provides many activities and books about rocks and arranges a walking trip to a nearby store that specializes in minerals, stones, and rocks. The store owners answer children’s questions and allow each child to choose a small rock to bring back to the classroom.
- Children in a class of 4-year-olds who are studying different kinds of bread plant a small patch of wheat in their class garden. One of the parents from the class works as a cashier for a local grocery store. The parent approaches the operations manager of the store, who agrees to send the head baker to the classroom to demonstrate bread making.
- The director of a child care program contacts a local lumber yard that agrees to save and donate trimmings from their custom woodworking shop to the center rather than processing them through their chipper. The teachers then have a ready supply of interesting wood shapes for construction and three-dimensional art projects.
In some instances, more formal, long-term collaborations that enhance curriculum are established between schools, programs, and communities. There are many examples across America of “public-private” partnerships that represent significant investments of personnel, money, services, or equipment in early education and child-care programs (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2012). A local business may “adopt” a school to provide it with computers and technology support. A benefactor might donate or bequeath gifts for a variety of purposes, or a local charitable group may actively pursue a mission to support young children and their families. The United Way is a good example of a community organization that funds and organizes activities to “help children and youth achieve their potential.”