Monday, June 28, 2010

...figure it out...

In the classroom.

So I work at a daycare for a certain University in Philadelphia. In August I will have been there for 2 years. It's amazing how short and long 2 years can feel. The majority of my time there has been spent with the pre-school age, one classroom in particular. Recently, however, due to an injury to the lead teacher I filled in for one of the other pre-school classrooms.

Boy did I have it good in my original classroom. I had no idea what I was in for, and I had the "good" teacher left in the classroom to work with. I was in there for a little over a month and left at the end of May to float around the other classrooms.

Now, the reason for writing this is that I am back in this classroom for 2 weeks while the teacher who was injured just a month ago is now on vacation. I have immediately been thrown back into the ridiculous that is this room. Don't get me wrong I have nothing against the people who work in there. they are extremely nice and have good intentions for the children, but my God you have tons of books to read to them do you really have to read the same book to them all week?

The age range is 3-5 year old. so you have kids just out of a toddler room and kids getting ready to go to kindergarten. Repetition to that extent is going to get you nowhere. The kids are bored. you cannot expect them o paint a single piece of paper for 30 minutes so don't be shocked when they are done in 5. It is so frustrating. Plus drawing the same thing for a week or more is unnecessary. They only need to draw sea creatures for one day. Unless for some odd reason you need a crap load of sea creatures then maybe it could take 2 days. I saw the same thing happen in May with insects. They were drawing insects for a week straight!

It is just so frustrating to see such simple things go so wrong. It is pre-school for Christ sake not rocket science. I mean really you think it would be common sense to know how to entertain and teach a 3, 4 or 5 year old, but no you have to go and make it all kinds of complicated and string out this lesson and make it so the kids aren't going to get anything from it. They are never going to remember everything you say and that is fine! They are kids! Remember that. Please.

...and this is why I now want to become a lead teacher.

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