Smiling Kids Child Development Centre

Welcome to the Kindergarten 2 Class Website

This website was made exclusively for the parents and children of the K2 class in Smiling Kids Child Development Centre! It was created for you to view updates and happenings in the class at the convenience of your home or office. In order to make this a meaningful experience, you may share the uploaded photos and information with your young ones. Additionally, there is a Dicussion Board for staff, parents and children of the centre to share their views on any issues or news regarding topics in the Early Childhood Field or anything in the sun!

♥ Teacher Cheryl

Form Teacher

Hello Parents and Children of the K2 class! I am Teacher Cheryl, and I am the form teacher of this class for the year. I graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Early Childhood Educational Studies and Leadership, Wheelock College (Singapore). I am personally interested in the Arts, especially in the area of Drama and Movement. I love to inject these elements into my lessons to make them fun and interactive. I look forward to meeting and working with all of you for the coming year.

Feel free to send any enquiries or feedback at cheryl.lee@smilingkids.com

Personal Philosophy of Education & Teaching Style

I strongly feel that Creative Drama is something that all children can benefit from as it encompasses all of the developmental areas. Incorporating this subject area enables the children to be actively engaged in solving problems and constructing their own knowledge to make sense of their environment (Isenberg & Jalongo, 2010).I believe in facilitating and building from children’s prior knowledge then gradually moving on to more challenging tasks. Children first learn about themselves and then extend that knowledge to their environment. This can be established through movement, by exploring their body shape and stillness followed by movement activities involving rhythm and various moods. This reinforces the notion of learning from the basics as children are to physically express their feelings and ideas and only using words when they are ready (McCaslin, 2006). So movement is a natural form as children know how to move and this is building on what they already know.

Therefore, adopting the constructivist approach by Piaget and Vygotsky (as cited in Isenberg & Jalongo, 2010, p. 73) where children are “active agents in their own development” is basis of my teaching style. This approach is supported by Winifred Ward’s (as cited in McCaslin, 2006, p. 304) quote “What children do is more significant to them than what they see and hear. They would rather act in a dramatization instead of sitting in the audience”.

11:05 AM

Friday, April 2, 2010

I am planning to end off my series of 6 lessons by allowing each child to construct his own bird’s nest. I intend to use recycled materials to build the nests. So if there isn’t any trouble, feel free to pass any recycled items to your child to hand it to me. Some of them may include:

- Toilet roll ends
- Used paper with different textures
- Twine, Yarn, Raffia

5:05 AM

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

In relation to Lesson 1, I have included 2 take-home activities for you to complete with your family!

How Does Water Enter the Plants?
No. of participants: Entire family
Objective: To observe how water travels up the plant.
Materials:
- 1 or 2 celery sticks
- Coloured water
- Poster paint mixed with water
- Cup that is tall enough to support celery stick
- Knife
Procedures:
1. Pour the coloured water into the cup.
2. Place the celery sticks into the cup.
3. Leave the cup and celery sticks for 4 days.
4. After 4 days, remove celery stick from the cup.
5. Use the knife to cut slightly above the bottom of the celery stick.
6. Observe the coloured stains left on the roots of the vegetable.

*Fun Fact! Water enters the plant through the xylem in the roots and up into the stem and leaves.

A Plant that Eats Meat!
No. of participants: Entire family
Objective: To expose children to carnivorous plants.
Materials:
- Carnivorous plant
- preferably Venus flytrap*
- Dead insects
- A pair of thongs
Procedures:
1. Pick up the dead insect with the pair of thongs.
2. Place it in the carnivorous plant.
3. Observe what happens.

*Venus flytraps may be purchased at flower gardens, such as Far East Flora.

7:40 PM

Monday, March 29, 2010

I introduced the theme on Nature by reading a big book, ‘The Tiny Seed’ by Eric Carle. Subsequently, each child got to plant his own green bean seeds, and experimented by placing it at different locations in the centre. The children then used pretend play as a follow- up activity. They were to imitate the process of how a plant grows. Here are the photos that were taken on that day.

'The Tiny Seed' by Eric Carle

Placing seeds with cotton wool into the cup

Water helps the seeds grow!

Children crouched down to pretend they are seeds

We are tall and strong trees!

7:46 AM

Sunday, March 28, 2010

I have created activities relating to the theme, Nature, and placed them in the Literacy and Numeracy corners.

Literacy Centre

Overall Outlook

Read and rearrange the order to plant a seed

Find the correct spelling of each picture

Puppet Stage

Numeracy Centre

Overall Outlook

Seriation: Arrange pictures to the growth of plant

Patterning: Create patterns with ‘sun, ’water’, ‘seed’, ‘seedling’ and ‘birds’

Puzzles: Fix the pieces to form a picture

Addition & Subtraction: Board game

Classification: Sort eggs according to colour, patterns and size

7:08 AM

Friday, March 26, 2010

The theme for the following 3 months is 'Nature', and I have have chosen to focus on the topic of plants. I am excited to share what I have in mind with you. This includes observing more about the physical attirbutesof leaves and even an actual bird's nest. I have included an Integrated Thematic Web consisting of the first 6 lessons.

Integrated Thematic Web

Lesson 1 – Language and Literacy: Shared Book Approach: After listening to ‘The Tiny Seed’ by Eric Carle, children are to recall and retell the story in the correct sequence.
Reading a book is a good introduction to the theme that I am starting on. The book provides information which is relevant to the activities in the subsequent lessons.

Lesson 2 – Environmental Awareness: Children are to observe and know the terms of the characteristics of a variety of leaves, such as vein patterns, edges and smell.
I decided to focus on a particular area which is leaves. Children get to observe and discover the different attributes of leaves by using their sense of smell, touch and sight.

Lesson 3 – Numeracy: Patterning: Children to continue ABAB, ABB, ABC patterns according to shapes, sizes and colours of leaves.
Children can apply their knowledge from the previous lesson into this lesson. This comes after Lesson 2 as children need to be familiar with the attributes I want them to create patterns with.

Lesson 4 – Motor Skills Development: Nature Twister: Children are to spin the board then place parts of their body on different pictures related to nature found on the mat accordingly.
I have decided to play a game related to theme. However, this game tests whether the children are able to discriminate the different pictures to the sound of the words.

Lesson 5 – Aesthetic & Creative Expression – Art & Craft ‘3D Bird’s Nest’ Children to construct a bird’s nest using different types of paper and sponges.
Children get to witness the materials the bird used to build its nest. More importantly, children learn that birds use leaves and twigs to construct its home.

Lesson 6 – Jungle Walk: Children are to work to together and cooperate to dramatize a story.
The children love dramatic play. This is my first time conducting a lesson with drama, so I planned to have it last to ensure that I am confident to let loose during the lesson.