West Richmond Preschool

Social responsibility- a term that has now become quite common in the field of education and has the potential to lose its meaning if we are not careful. As an early childhood educator, I have always placed great importance on the need to develop this way of thinking in young children. It is for this reason that we engage in activities that benefit others, such as volunteering at our local food bank, adopting an owl, or raising money for Variety Club. With the recent catastrophe in the Philippines, my mind was suddenly thrown into its own typhoon. I found myself asking questions around social responsibility and what it really means. What does it mean to me? What does it mean to my preschoolers? How far does it extend into the world around us? Can four year old children grasp these deep and complex concepts? What can they understand about their world? How can we teach them about being socially responsible to: ones self; ones family; ones community; ones province; ones country; ones worl...

And our box adventures continue... I have been meaning to bring boxes outside to the sandbox for a very, very long time but just never got around to actually doing it. So, when we brought the boxes back into class this week, I suddenly realized that this is a perfect opportunity to bring them outside. The children worked on them more in class-they coloured and used long strips of masking tape. Very long strips of masking tape! They loved unrolling the tape and often worked together with one person holding the roll and the other unwinding the strip.The box play was involved; cooperative and generally peaceful (with a few exceptions stemming from artistic differences or ownership). A grey but dry day, we headed out, boxes in arms, to the sandbox. I wasn't really sure how they would use them. I thought they might turn them into castles or some type of building. In fact, they did not use them for this purpose but rather used them more as tools-diggers, shovels, rakes. They worked a...

I was stopped dead in my tracks while prancing down the street the other day. There, in front of my eyes, was a most wonderful sight. A gigantic pile of cardboard boxes. Empty. Beautiful. All shapes and sizes. Unmarked. Not dog eared. Clean. Unscathed. And, free- as in available to use ( it happened to be in front of my friend's store as they unpacked their holiday shipment) and as in no cost ( always appealing to preschool teachers!). So, piled high on my arms, I left with many many many boxes to bring to school. My mind swirling with ideas. Boxes....what can we do with boxes? Or rather what can't we do with boxes? Or what can boxes do? Sure I had thoughts. Decorating. Puppets. Art work. Building. But I was interested what the children would do with them. Getting better each day at leaving my own visions to rest on the sidelines, I put the boxes out on the carpet without direction or words. Oh yes,  beside the boxes were a few rolls of masking tape. A couple of childre...

I felt like a child on Christmas morning! I was so excited to share the farm and all its offerings with our Dixon buddies. A couple of weeks ago I met with Ian Lai, Director of the Richmond Schoolyard Society ( http://www.kidsinthegarden.org) to design the day. Kevin (the Dixon teacher), Ian and I had worked together last year so we had an idea of what we wanted to explore with the students; we also wanted to keep it fresh and do some different activities. We created a general outline of the day, knowing that depending on the students interests, some activities may be shortened or lengthened. Two weeks ago, as I wrote on our blog, we collected our Red Fife wheat seeds and each student estimated their weight. This exercise provided a unique learning opportunity to discuss food production. It was apparent that many children had never thought about where flour came from- they thought it just appeared at the grocery store. A discussion ensued about the thought, energy and commitment it t...