Whole Class Teaching

When I first started teaching children 3-4 years old, I mostly did whole class teaching. I knew better but it's funny how, in times of stress or faced with a new challenge, we regress - we go back to the old ways. That's what I did.

The plan in the picture shows what I would do with the class over the course of the week. The parents wanted to know that we weren't just playing. One of the parents had complained that she saw her daughter playing in the classroom which is what she could have been doing at home (that's a blog post for another time).

Whole class teaching was hard! Even with 2 assistants and 21 kids. The kids needed help with the lid of the glue, or to get the stick cotton wool off their fingers.

For cooking, I split the class into 2 groups. Half would stay in the classroom with the assistants while the other half went to the kitchen with me. But 10 kids is a lot to cook with.

Since then I've grouped the class into four groups of 5 or 6 in each group. It's a lot easier to manage, it's a lot more personalized and it's a lot more engaging for the children. Working with small groups means I can focus on developing each child's ideas, allowing room for individual experimentation. The product-type craft activities have been replaced with more process art type activities.

Whole class teaching time is kept to around ten minutes. I am then able to work with small groups, getting to know the children on an individual basis. It is difficult to give each child the attention they need when teaching to the whole class.

Comments

Tape Man

Some of the children put blue tape over their mouth. Usually I would have said something like, "Take the tape off your mouth. It's not for putting on your mouth." Instead I thought of Tape Man (with some pride, being from New Zealand). I thought of creativity. I thought of art. So we sat together for whole group time, some with tape on their mouth. I said, "I've got something to show you." When they first say him one of them said, "It's scary." I reassured them that it's not too scary and that he's being funny. So they started to laugh. Pretty soon there was no more tape on mouths (not that I minded if there was, it's just hard to laugh). Thank you Tape Man for reminding us that creativity begins with exploration in play.

Changing Spaces

The blocks were in tubs on the shelf in the center of the room. It was time for a change, so the blocks were put onto the shelf by the OHP, providing a more enclosed space for the children to build with the blocks. One of the children spent time building a structure. After he has finished, he was able to leave it there for a while, and later in the day he was able to put the blocks back on the shelf where he had found them. Changing spaces creates new opportunities.

Whole Group Time

There is a fabulous carpet in my classroom for the children to sit on during whole group time. It's the alphabet arranged in a grid. There are enough spaces for each child to have their own letter of the alphabet to sit on. I can assign spaces, which is what I did last year. I did that until one of the children asked if she could sit on a chair, and not the carpet, during whole class time. Why not? This led the children to write labels for their chairs. After sitting on their chairs for a few weeks most of the children decided to return to sitting on the carpet again. I'd like to start this year by not assigning children seating spots on the carpet. Hopefully we can use it as a time to problem solve any disagreements about where they want to sit. If not, I'll assign spaces. At least to start with. And then I'll see what happens after that.

NZ Teacher

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