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RE teaching report, with kvetching.
Feb. 4th, 2007 10:57 pmIt's been a long, long time since I did any teaching. There were mixed-age RE activities over the holiday, and then, in successive weeks, (1) I was deathly ill, (2) it wasn't my turn, (3) I was in Boston, and (4) only two kids showed up, so we postponed the lesson and just played. So I felt a little rusty when I hit the classroom this morning.
Our preschool class has been given three short nature-related curricula this year to fit in with the Religious Education program's overall focus on the Seventh Principle ("Respect for the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part"). Two of the curricula have been great: the five senses one that we did first, and our seasonal studies focused on trees. The third one, "Animal Helpers," is a problem. The title is meant in two senses: children are supposed to pick an animal spirit guide that helps them be their best self, and they are guided in lessons about environmental stewardship focused on helping animals. I don't know if the author of this curriculum knows preschoolers who are waaay more mature than ours, or what, but the program as it's written is disastrously over their heads. So each week we wind up basically throwing out the planned lesson and trying to design a different lesson based on the same themes. That's a lot of work. ( Read more... )
Our preschool class has been given three short nature-related curricula this year to fit in with the Religious Education program's overall focus on the Seventh Principle ("Respect for the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part"). Two of the curricula have been great: the five senses one that we did first, and our seasonal studies focused on trees. The third one, "Animal Helpers," is a problem. The title is meant in two senses: children are supposed to pick an animal spirit guide that helps them be their best self, and they are guided in lessons about environmental stewardship focused on helping animals. I don't know if the author of this curriculum knows preschoolers who are waaay more mature than ours, or what, but the program as it's written is disastrously over their heads. So each week we wind up basically throwing out the planned lesson and trying to design a different lesson based on the same themes. That's a lot of work. ( Read more... )
