responsibility
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Using chores to build responsibility
Starting a chore routine comes with so many questions – What chores are appropriate? Should I offer a reward for completing them? If so, what? It’s a little overwhelming, because we all want to get it right. Truthfully, it’ll take a bit to figure out, and there will be constant adjusting as your child ages. Here’s a list that I’ve shared previously about some chores that are developmentally appropriate for preschoolers: At home– Gathering dirty laundry– Folding t-shirts and towels– Matching clean socks– Feeding pets– Dusting– Cleaning up play spaces– Cleaning up small messes with a handheld vacuum– Use a damp mop or Swiffer on the floors– Making their own…
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Teaching Children to Respect Materials and Belongings
Accidents happen in the preschool classroom all day long – preschoolers just aren’t very coordinated. But we can reduce some of those accidents if we teach our students to treat classroom materials with care and respect. First and foremost, children have to see their teachers modeling how to treat materials with respect. When children see us helping with clean up time, they are more likely to participate. When you return materials to the correct location, the children will start to do this too. Children pick up on your cues and begin to internalize them as expectations. Another great strategy to use when teaching children to respect materials is self-talk. This…
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Friday Freebie – Life Skills
Happy Friday! I hope that some of you are going to get to enjoy a nice long weekend! I’ve spent a lot of time this week talking about responsibility and planning ahead, and these life skills posters from Amy Marshall Are the perfect way to introduce some of these concepts to your students. These would be a great way to introduce social studies vocabulary and start a discussion about each character trait. Go download your set and have a great weekend!
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Books about responsibility
I’ve been sharing more of my favorite children’s books lately, and these posts have been something that I’ve really enjoyed putting together. I’m planning on continuing these posts throughout this year, and I can’t wait to round them all up at the end of 2017 and look at all the great books we’ve talked about! All links are Amazon affiliates. Since I shared an idea for classroom jobs yesterday, I thought I’d put together some books about responsibility, here are some of my favorites: Do I have to? By Nancy Loewen Just a Mess by Mercer Mayer Don’t Forget! By Anastasia Suen I Wanna Iguana by Karen Kaufman Orloff Not…
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Classroom Responsibilities
On Monday I shared some of my favorite tools for getting all of my routines and procedures back in place after the holidays. I look at this time of year as a perfect opportunity for starting fresh. In addition to getting back to routines that may have gotten a little relaxed over the last month or so, I also like to introduce some new responsibilities. At this point of the year I’ve built relationships with the children, they know my rules and they’re getting back into the regular routines. Because the children have worked through all of this already, I take this opportunity to add more of a challenge. One…
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Age appropriate chores for children
I saw this list years ago and have been looking for it ever since, I finally stumbled across it again today and knew that I just had to share. When I taught toddlers and preschoolers I was constantly surprising parents by telling them what their children did during the day at school. These simple chores teach responsibility, but more importantly, they are self help skills that build fine motor skills, coordination, attention, and listening skills. This awesome list is from The Montessori Notebook, so make sure to spend some time exploring the other wonderful ideas on their blog after you print this list to share with your families! If you’re…
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Using chores to build responsibility
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Teaching responsibility with a class pet
A class pet is a perfect way to help teach responsibility – the children not only have to remember to do all of the tasks associated with taking care of the pet, but they also have to be cautious when handling the pet. Unfortunately, it’s not exactly easy to have a class pet these days, there are health and safety regulations, allergies, and insurance issues to worry about. Even if you can’t have a class pet, there are other ways to encourage responsibility in the classroom, here are some ideas: Have a stuffed animal pet like Julie from A First for Everything Grow plant people like the Red Headed Hostess…
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Using chores to build responsibility
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Classroom jobs that preschoolers can do independently
I love the idea behind classroom jobs – children are responsible for taking care of the classroom, therefore taking ownership for their room while learning responsibility. In theory it’s wonderful, in practice it tends to be chaos that takes more time than it’s worth. I would start classroom jobs every year, and after a couple of weeks they would slowly fade away. This was usually because the children weren’t able to actually do their jobs on their own, and I didn’t have the time to follow each student around and make sure that they completed their responsibilities. Now I work with teachers, and I have a really hard time recommending…
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Using chores to build responsibility
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How to get your preschoolers to clean up after themselves
Children don’t clean up after themselves, they’re impulsive and as soon as they decide that they are done with one activity they move on to the next. It’s our job to teach them to clean up their materials so that they don’t get lost or broken, so that others can find them when they want them, and so that we don’t have to walk around them all day. There are many different strategies for getting children to clean up after themselves, but the following three tips have worked the best for me; Let them see you cleaning up. Children value the actions of adults, they mimic what we do in…
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Making chores fun and easy
Yesterday I shared a list of chores that preschoolers can do at home and in the classroom to build confidence, motor skills, and responsibility. Today I’ve got some great ideas for making sure that children want to do their chores. First, I suggest incorporating the responsibilities into your daily routine. When children complete their chores as a part of a regular routine, they are more likely to complete them without whining or complaining. This is because they know what is expected of them, and their chores become a responsibility and not a task they have to complete before they have fun. It is also fun to have your children or…
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Using chores to build responsibility
