The world of Early Childhood Education

Who is Angélica Dass? Angelica Dass is a photographer who currently lives in Madrid, Spain. She is originally from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She started the project Humanea "The beauty of human skin in every color. Watch the TED talk to know more about her photography project. Project Humanea The Humanea is a good project to start as well in your class. Let children mix colors till they find their own skin color to paint with. They will discover that its not just black or white, we all have  different colors. Later they can make their own portrait on it and it will be a wonderful wall collage when you would put all the portraits together like the pictures from Angelica.  This project learns the children also to look behind the color of ones skin. What story is behind the skin. Who is this person? Is he local, migrant, has disabilities or not, .. We do not know much but we still judge by the tone of the skin color. Show children we are the same but we are also so uni

Who is Jan Blake? She is an inspiring storyteller and performer. Born in Manchester, she is specialized in stories from Africa, the Caribbean, and Arabia. The most stories I have seen of here are with a live lessons. She includes here audience, she sings, makes rhythms, there is repetition what makes that you can follow the stories and remember them better to retell.  Story telling in schools  Learning trough stories, Jan Blake can help you with that. She leads projects in school to assist. Read on her blog more about the Project "bedtime stories" . You can learn children many thing trough story telling it is a real asset for their learning process. It is good to learn new vocabulary through repetition and participation. Story telling also helps you as a teacher to achieve different contexts. 

Green school Bali  I have had an inspiring session of a woman called Beth, primary teacher from Barcelona and she shared her amazing experiences full of passion about Green School. She visited green school when she was in Bali for holidays. She liked it so much, she went for a second visit. There are more than one types of visits available to the school. Because of her enthusiasm I just want to see it with my own eyes.  Green School Bali opened in September 2008. It is literally a school in a three in the middle of the wilderness. No cars are seen, it seems like they access the school by food or bikes.  There are 4 school like this in the world Bali New Zealand South Africa Tulum Visit Green school   There are different types of visit possible  Guide tours   Admission interview and tour  Group tours  Private tours  TED talk John Hardy: My green school dream  This man made a school to provide a future for his children. He grew up in Cana

Chimamada Ngozi Adichie She is women from Nigeria where she grew up. Later she moved to the United states.  She is the author of "Purple Hibiscus", "Half of a Yellow Sun", "The Thing Around Your Neck", "Americanah", and "We Should All Be Feminists". Her work has been translates in many languages.  The danger of a single story She is an inspiring women who lets you understand how important stories are, but different stories. They come in different forms films, books, music theater, ... The danger of a "single story" is that you hear over and over again the same story in a different way. In time these single stories will be seen as reality but they are only stereotypes, where there is a truth but where many information is missing.  Like she says in her Ted talk "A student told me it was such a shame that Nigerian man where physical abusers like the father character in my novel. I told him I just read a novel

Who is Tamara Chubarovsky and what is great about her story telling?  Tamara Chubarovsky offers didactic and therapeutic resources. It supports children's learning process in language, based on respect, creativity and play. Stories with rhymes and movement. Resources that allow you to improve your voice and communication skills. One video example in Spanish and two in English watch more video's on her you-tube channel . My own experience  When I was doing my trainee in "Collegio San Juan Bosco". My teacher Lollie showed me Tamara's work and I loved it. It was amazing to see see how the children were listening and repeating what she was doing. This story telling even helps them with their fine motor skills.

One of the key points is the well being of children. When they do not feel emotional well, they will not gain a high level of development. It doesn't mean that children can not feel hurt, sad, angry, .. the key point is to talk about these feelings. A lot of children can not even name what they are feeling that's why it is important to support them so they learn to express themselves. What is SEL?  Social emotional learning (SEL)   "Is the process through which children and adults understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions." SEL Competencies Social awareness  Self awareness relationship skills  Self management  responsible decision making  How to support SEL education It is important to focus on the strengths and talents of your children. Make sure with misbehavior that there are fair consequences. Most imp

Why do we need 21st Century skills? Everything is changing children need more individual support every day we get more cultures in our school what is great, it makes our classrooms richer. Because of that we notice that we need skills as being more creative, problem-solving, critical thinking, flexible but that's not only in education, it is necessary in different jobs, situations. I noticed that we need these skills’ more than ever when I was a trainee in BSB. Children from everywhere in the world come to this school. What means their background is diverse e.g. Here the children come to school from a younger age than in other countries what makes that some children haven’t been in school before so they are on different level or they are not speaking the language yet. So you need to be creative to help and make the children feel comfortable. You will continuous need problem solving thinking. Every year will be different you cannot expect what you did last year with the

"Letterdromen met Do" - Harriët Van Reek -  Story telling with art  In groups of 2 or 3 children. They get 5 pictures from artists, painters, … They will look carefully to all the pictures and discuss what each of them see, think, … feel and come up with a story. They can place the pictures in any order they want. Later the children will tell their story to the group. In this way you can make art more negotiable. This exercise will stimulate their creativity. Why would you work with glove puppets?  welcome to the wondrous world of imagination. The glove puppet! The glove puppet is not a thing to look at but a creature that comes to life. Because when it comes to life, the magic is created, the stories are released, there is contact and you are taken into the world of the other. We bring the doll to life and make sure he can make his own magic, over and over again. You can reach children in a complete different way, you can surprise them. Their imagination

We all want to give our toddlers the best experiences. Although it is not always easy to take them to the reality and make it interesting and interactive for them if you would like to go to a museum as for example the nature museum of Brussels. I wanted to share my thoughts about how to make it interesting and how I would prepare my class for a visit like this. How to prepare when you go on a visit out of your school?  Make a conversation or tell the children a story about a visit to the museum. Brainstorm afterwards; questions like what do we need to do when we go to a museum? What do you think to see when we go on our own trip to the museum? Has a museum rules what could the rules be? Can we make lot's of noses? Why, why not? , .. etc With brainstorming it is important that the answers come from the children their thoughts. This make the children more engaged. Work towards the visit of the museum. Ask parents to join you to the museum so you can work with small grou

Listen to the story of Captain Jack This is a story that my mom used to tell to me when I was little and now I wanted to share it will all of you Its is a very special story and even some magic happens. Click on the picture and enjoy the story. Did you like the story? Make your own boat and make some magic. Let the children tell you the story. How do I make a boat?  Follow step-by-step

We are spending a lot of time at home, let's be creative. Follow my guide and make your own amazing dolls. Woolly doll  Take a bunch of wires of 15-20 cm. Tie it together in the middle. Put  the ends together and then tie the head. A second set of wire about 15-20 cm are the arms. Put  the arms in between and you tie the bundles together by wrapping a wire crosswise around it. Now bind hands and feet and cut the ends off. Now your woolly doll is ready  Napkin doll Fun and easy, materials that we always have at home. 

BOARD GAME “SUPER” HERO  Make your own fun board game and play together. Board games is beneficial in several development areas. You learn to play together, wait turns, recognizing the number on the dice... When I created this board game I took the needs and interests of the children into account. Explanation game Goal collect as many as possible diamond cards. Who has the most wins. How? When you land on one of the 4 diamonds on the board. On those cards are written words like e.g. kind, caring, patience, brave, rescue, courage, … words that describe how “super” heroes are. Read the word and the card is yours. When You pass by start you get also a diamond card. When you land on the police, Mega Mindy, firefighter, superman, Spider-man or the doctor  you can choose to take a black, green or ABC card. When you answer is correct you can collect an extra diamond cards. What does the other cards mean?  Black shadow cards: They need to recognize the shape. E.g.

Stay inside and keep busy. In these times of the lock down  I started to do things that I didn't do for a while. I had a bag full of tin cans of baby food and other things. I painted them all and decorated them with a napkin technique that my mom taught  me when I was little. Some of the cans I decorated to use later in my class as visual storage tins (shells, stones, stick, corks, ..) I made also some for in the kitchen as storage for herbs, flower etc also great for the children in their home corner.  What do you need?  Paint (acrylic)  Vanish  Brush  Napkins  Scissors How do you start?  You can work on every material that you want. On wood, tins, tiles, roof tiles, flower pots, ... choose the napkins. Paint the object of your choise in a color that is close to the napkin then you will have the best result. Important point a napkin has more layers then one they have 3 till sometimes 5; it is important that you take all of them off till you have only top lay

Cooking at home  Now that we spend so much time at home with our children, it's an ideal moment to cook together. Lets make a delicious pick-nick to spend in our own garden. Help yourself with those step-by-step guides and maybe you will be surprised about the cooking skills of your child.  Skewer with fruit  Melon, banana, strawberry, grapes and apple. Lets make a colorful caterpillars on a stick. Vegetables  Fresh vegetables cut into strips and florets.Wash the vegetables under running water. Peel the carrots. Cut the cucumber, sweet pepper and carrot into strips and the cauliflower into florets. Cut the mini tomatoes into two.. Cheese and tomato Cut a large cheese block into small blocks.  Cut cherry tomatoes in half. Then first prick half a tomato, then a cube of cheese and again half a tomato on the pricker.  Potato salad Cut the potatoes into cubes. Cut the pickles into thin slices. Mix the diced potatoes with the pickles and green be

What can you discover in Technoplis?  It is a place full of science and technology.  There are different rooms for example there is a place for the younger children where they can develop amazing roll play in the Pizzeria, supermarket, bank, garage, ... a huge building area and so much more to discover. There is lab where they can join experiments, a place to discover more about sounds and music and so on. Interested to know what else,  you will need to visit Technopolis. I will show you some experiments I joined there that are perfect to do in your classroom and even at home.  Experiment making worms  You want to know how this magic works? Try it for yourself. What do you need: 1 small cup, 1 large cup, 1 small bowl, spatula, transparent stirring rod, 1 small plastic container lid, 1 syringe, scales and weighing dish for each person. Ingredients: colourings, spray bottle with algin, calcium chloride, water jug. Time for magic: put on a lab coat and gloves and read belo

Why is ART important in your classroom?  Art includes so much. It is all about experimenting and not the goal of making 25 the same "art" works. You learn children to appreciate each others works. Art is not only about paintings no! It about there talents and every unique person has talent. It is as well recognizing childrens work in the building area, etc ...  How did I introduce art in my classroom?  I started the week with the book "Grote kunst voor kleine kenners: museumschatten" also the book "Kunst met taart" is great to use. These are two books  in Dutch but they are user friendly for every language because it is more about the images. The images speaks for them self. In the first book "Grote kunst voor kleine kenners" gives you a lot of  possibilities. Big art peaces are edited in a fun way that appeals to children, a fantastical way to apply art in kindergarten and make it discussable. It is a large A2 format book that is impres

What does FABLAB stand for?    It stands for "Fabrication laboratory". Technology is increasing! In Thomas More University of Applied Sciences you have a Fablab . The Fablab is accessible to all students. You see more and more laser cutters 3D printers coming into the schools and cheaper accessible programs to work with. But what can you do with it? Meaningful learning  Meaningful education increases children's motivation and therefore their ability to learn and remember what they learned. I like to work with wooden materials, because it is more natural. As I'm a very creative person I love to create my own materials for my class. This give me the possibility to follow the interests and needs of my children. What can you do with a 3D printer? The 3D printer gives you the possibility to print details of objects that are difficult to see with the bare eye. E.g. insects printed out enlarged or when you work around  the body you can show how their insi

Who is Cubetto?  Cubetto is a wonderful wooden robot for boys and girls age 3 and up. Cubetto makes programming accessible to children before they can read or write. I love Cubetto because of its natural look and is user friendly. Using hand-on blocks to write their first programs.  The Cubbetto play-set includes two small books. One is the "instruction guide" and the other "Cubetto's first day" with some instruction including the world map.  How does Cubetto work?  You can only talk to Cubetto with the command panel. You have four different blocks: green: forward, red: rotating right, yellow: rotating left. Blue: repeat function. What does repeat function mean. If you want to give the same set of directions more than once, put that sequence in the function line. Now you can use the blue block in the queue every time you want to repeat that sequence. There are different maps of Cubetto they all include a story book. Go together wi