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Are you preparing activities ahead of time? But still, you are not feeling fully prepared when it’s time to start the day with the little ones? → Do you feel like your lesson planning is just colorful patches here and there? Rather than a finished, harmonious quilt?
Kindiedays' early childhood professionals and Angela Watson combined their thoughts. How to do clever and effective planning for early childhood education?
Overcome the problems with our creative, effective, and concrete solutions!
1. How to organize and save activity ideas?
PROBLEM:
I collect so many great ideas, but then I’m not sure how to use them and when. → I have all those colorful patches but they are different shapes and sizes and do not go together.
SOLUTION:
- Have a good organizational system (Google drive, Pinterest...)
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Keep the ideas organized by topic or unit, and then all you have to do is go through that folder before planning each unit and decide what to actually use
2. How to reduce the amount of useless activities?
PROBLEM:
I have wayyyy too many options for activities. There are so many free resources available online these days. → There are so many colors and fabrics and styles and I cannot decide what kind of quilt I would like to make!
SOLUTION:
- Get rid of the things that are lower quality (eg. learning goals are not aligned with your curriculum)
- If you’re afraid you might want to use the resources one day, put them in a folder and name it “not using”. Then they’re out of your way
- Quality, not quantity! Make it your goal to do fewer things, so you can do the things that remain even better
- Keep only the best resources. Then you don’t have to waste time going through the things that aren’t that useful with your group of children
- Create a collection of open-ended and versatile activities. These you can use flexibly with many lessons and themes
Read more about our high-quality → Kindiedays Lesson Plans
3. Planning the lessons in detail
PROBLEM:
I am stuck on this hamster wheel - I never know what we are doing the next day in the classroom. → Every day I just pick some piece of fabric from the pile and start sewing without a clear sewing pattern in my mind.
SOLUTION:
- Decide a specific theme for each day that remains the same eg.
- Monday: science
- Tuesday: maths
- Wednesday: arts
- Thursday: physical exercise
- Friday: free play
- Make a visible timetable on the wall! Put the timetable in a place that it is visible for the parents too, then they know what their children have been up to!
- Break down what you’ll be doing each day. Here is an example for a week with a Halloween theme:
- Monday: science → Baking pumpkin pie
- Tuesday: maths → Spider web counting activity
- Wednesday: arts → Paint pumpkins (orange apple prints)
- Thursday: physical exercise → Spider web yarn maze
- Friday: free play → Roleplay clothes available
- Plan all 5 days in advance. Most of the planning work should be done before Monday morning
- Planning with a co-worker would be amazing, so do that if possible
- Organize regular planning meetings once a week
Check out our → Kindiedays Lesson Plan template
4. How to plan the daily lesson plans?
PROBLEM:
Despite having a plan for the week, I often end up forgetting to do something each day! → Even though I have the 'big picture' sewing pattern in my head I tend to forget some pieces from the middle of the quilt..!
SOLUTION:
- Write the core elements of the lesson down
- Keep the "core plan" aside and check it during the lesson if needed
- List 3-7 bullet points in the "core plan": preparations, a warm-up activity, instruction, etc. (Pose this question to kids. Use this book to instruct on this skill. Have them do this activity. Release them to do this other activity on their own, and so on.) Each element is clearly stated with a bullet point.
Check out our → Kindiedays Lesson Plan template
Angela Watson is a teacher with a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction and has 11 years of classroom experience. Angela also runs the Truth for Teachers podcast to 'speak life, encouragement, and truth into the minds and hearts of educators'.
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