Another RE teaching report.

[rivka]

Because of my trip to Boston, I wound up being the lead teacher two weeks in a row. Things have really gotten crazy around here (it's a long story...) so I didn't have a whole lot of time for advance prep. Fortunately, we've switched from the too-difficult "Animal Helpers" curriculum to "Celebrating Me & My World", a nicely prepackaged, age-appropriate curriculum which has a whole section that fits our environmental theme. I did a little bit of substituting (a more exciting craft, for example), but mostly it was easy to prepare for this week's class. Whew.

We continued our focus on animals' place in the interdependent web of existence. We sat in a circle on the rug for our chalice lighting. ("This is the church of the open mind, this is the church of the helping hands, this is the church of the loving heart.") I told them that we would be talking about animals, and asked if anyone had an animal living in their house. Much enthusiastic discussion of everyone's pets followed - what pets do, how we take care of them, how we play with them. I elicited points about what pets need (food, water, a place to sleep, shelter, exercise, play, love), and we noticed that kids need the same things.

We talked about how dogs move, the noises they make and the things that they do. Then we all got down on all fours and pretended to be dogs for a while. Next we made the switch to cats. The kids loved this part of the lesson and made lots of contributions. ("Kitties like to sit under the table!" "Cats like to curl up in your lap.") By popular demand, we were horses next. We galloped and whinnied around the room.

With some difficulty, I re-formed the circle. I told them that so far we'd been talking about animals that live with people and like to be around them, but that now we were going to read a book about different kinds of animals. I read them Annie and the Wild Animals, a beautiful picture book about a girl who tries to lure a wild animal to be her pet after her cat runs away. A moose, wildcat, bear, stag, and wolf are drawn to the food she leaves out, but none of them are suitable pets. Finally, her cat comes back with a surprise - she had run away to have a litter of kittens.

We talked about wild animals that we have seen outdoors - squirrels, rabbits, foxes, deer, mice. We discussed the fact that wild animals don't like to be around people, and are usually scared of us. Even though the animals in the book liked Annie's food, they wouldn't be happy living in her house. We take care of pets by giving them food and water, walking them, finding a special place for them to sleep, cuddling them, and playing with them, but the best way to take care of wild animals is to leave them alone and give them lots of space. We can help by not chasing them or scaring them. We can also help by picking up litter that people leave outside, because wild animals might eat it or hurt themselves on it.

I can't seem to resist the theme snacks. We had animal crackers, which sparked a rousing discussion of animal habits and animal noises. After snack we got a chance to pretend to be some wild animals that we'd seen on our crackers (monkey, elephant, lion, kangaroo). Then we settled around the craft table to make animal masks. Before church I had cut eyeholes in a bunch of paper plates, and I put out a huge variety of craft materials: construction paper, markers, crayons, glue, glitter, feathers, pipe cleaners, crepe paper, yarn. We set the kids loose to decorate the masks however they pleased. This was another hugely popular craft. My co-teacher and I were very busy helping kids make pipe-cleaner whiskers or get their lions' manes glued down properly.

When the parents arrived, one child's mother told me, "Carrie has been talking about water all week. Every time I turn on the faucet she reminds me to be careful not to waste any."

"That's great!" I said. "That's a really good way to help all the animals and plants."

Carrie beamed from ear to ear. And so did I.

Comments

[redbird23.livejournal.com]

How wonderful to know that what you are teaching the kids is getting through to them!

This sounds like it was a wonderful lesson too. I love the idea of galloping around and making horsey noises with a bunch of preschoolers. :)

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I know! I was absolutely thrilled.

I was a little disappointed, initially, to learn that the RE theme for this year was all environmental stuff. It wouldn't have been my first choice of what to teach. But I have so gotten into it. It's a lot of fun to strengthen their connection to, and joy in, nature.

The next couple of lessons I'm on board to tech are on air and light. That should be good sense-of-wonder stuff, all right!

[redbird23.livejournal.com]

You will surely use bubbles to teach about air, right? Preschoolers and blowing bubbles are made for each other, especially in a lesson about air!

Sorry, I got a bit excited. :)

Wow, there are lots of great possibilities - wind socks and a fan, balloons, a parachute!

Ok, I'll stop now.

Funny, but light is harder for me to think of, and it probably shouldn't be.

I'm really enjoying reading about these lessons, and your experience teaching. I can't wait to share all this with Boo, and I look forward to his RE lessons. (We visited our third UU church today. Now we have to go back to our two favorites a few times and see which one fits us the best.)

[hobbitbabe.livejournal.com]

Flashlights. Flashlights in the dark. Shining light through different coloured things to make coloured light. Rainbows (somehow?). Something that reminds them of the lesson on vision. The chalice in the dark.

Yeah, it does sound like fun.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

We could do rainbows with prisms.

You've come up with the same good suggestions as the packaged curriculum. :-) The chalice-in-the-dark idea is a great one (and not in the book), although I wonder if some of the kids would be scared before we lit it - our classroom is windowless, so it would be really dark.

The suggested craft project is making suncatchers to hang in the window by arranging snippets of colored cellophane between two sheets of clear contact paper. Doesn't that sound cool! Stained glass for three-year-olds.

As an aside: I hate "craft projects" for little kids in which the goal is to have them all look the same - you know, like "Here is the outline of a snowman. Now fill the outline in with cotton balls." And those projects are everywhere! One of the things I love about this curriculum is that most of the suggested projects offer much more scope for creativity and exploration.

Instead of cotton-ball snowmen, for example, we mixed equal parts shaving cream and white glue to make puffy white "snow" that hardened when it dried. Some of the kids used it to make snowmen or other winter scenes, and others just made something abstract - but all of the pictures turned out really cool.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

I usually think of my craft capabilities as that of pre-schoolers these days and I don't think I could get cellophane evenly between contact paper. How about posterboard outlines and colored tissue paper and glue sticks?

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I usually think of my craft capabilities as that of pre-schoolers these days and I don't think I could get cellophane evenly between contact paper.

The teacher tapes the bottom sheet of contact paper to the table, the kid arranges the cellophane pieces of cellophane on top (little bits, for a stained-glass effect, so there's no pressure to get them to lie smoothly), and then the teacher puts the top contact paper sheet on. I think we can do it, but we'll see.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

Oh, I was thinking of the kids dealing with the contact paper. This is much better.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

We'll do bubbles, and move pompoms around the table by blowing into straws, and use fans and pinwheels. And the suggested craft is making a windsock.

I can't wait to share all this with Boo, and I look forward to his RE lessons. (We visited our third UU church today. Now we have to go back to our two favorites a few times and see which one fits us the best.)

Yeah, UU services can be so variable that it really helps to go multiple times before making up your mind. Do they all have active RE programs? Ours is in the middle of a huge rebirth - when we started at the church, there were just a handful of kids who got together on Sunday morning to do crafts. Now we have six classes, the RE wing is packed with kids, and everyone gets a full developmentally appropriate curriculum on Sunday mornings. It's so much fun to be a part of that.

[redbird23.livejournal.com]

The two churches we are considering both have active RE programs with hundreds of kids involved. One of the churches seemed more kid leaning than the other, but that may have been the difference in the topic for that Sunday's sermon or some other variable. So we'll go to each a couple more times and get a better idea.

The other factor is the overall "leaning" of the churches. One has a reputation for being more intellectual and social action oriented, one has a reputation for being more spiritual (we sang several songs/hymns that mentioned God, for instance). We want more experience with the two before deciding which is more what we're looking for. (I started to say comfortable, but that is not the right word. We want to be challenged, but in the way we're looking to be challenged.)

I'm going to need a new icon.

[realsupergirl.livejournal.com]

You're in Boston? That's where I live now!

It's Eve, from Reed, BTW. You may remember me.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I remember a couple of different Eves - are you the one who once dyed her hair magenta?

(And no, I visited Boston a few weeks ago. I live in Baltimore.)

[realsupergirl.livejournal.com]

I *DID* dye my hair magenta...and green...though that was my senior year, so I think you had graduated...I was a psych major, and we had a couple close mutual friends, one of whom killed herself in 1993, and two of whom you lived with.

Did I give you enough to identify me? :)

BTW, I love the "be kind to otters" story. Fabulous.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

In my experience, themed snacks are great for that age group -- it really does help the lessons stick.

[hobbitbabe.livejournal.com]

Darn it, now I wish I'd come up with a relevant snack for my "Backwards Day", which was my best theme day for teaching hockey.

I mostly didn't do any snacks in the program I ran, but we did do them for special days (like oranges at Xmas, chocolate coins at Olympics Day, and the sugary treats provided by the police at Champions Day.) Some little kids' sports programs have parents signing up to provide drinks every practice, but I think that sends the wrong message and makes the kids less likely to drink water.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

My Girl Scout summer camp used to have "Backwards Meals" sometimes, where they'd serve dessert first, then an entree, and then soup or a salad. (It was the only time we ever had a separate first (or rather, last) course.) Individuals would get into the act by wearing their clothes backward, making a ponytail in the front part of their hair, deliberately and ceremonially violating table manners, and so on.

But there's not much you could do with that for just a snack, unless it's serving something completely incongruous for the setting - like dainty little cucumber sandwiches on doilies. :-)

Some little kids' sports programs have parents signing up to provide drinks every practice, but I think that sends the wrong message and makes the kids less likely to drink water.

Most little kids' sports programs here in the U.S. have parents sign up to bring drinks and snacks. Usually, as far as I can tell from other parents' complaints, this means sugary or highly processed junk food. Just as well that you don't have that tradition in your program!

[hobbitbabe.livejournal.com]

At Backwards Day hockey practice, I wore my sweater backwards, and had signs on the dressing-room doors in backwards printing. Then we reversed the on-ice routine from shaking hands to playing a game to drills to "warmups". And usually I managed to schedule the Backwards Day on the same day that we introduced backwards skating.