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Our classroom started off as a 5th-grade classroom the first week of the school year! The kids were at different schools, with different teachers, and came to me the second week of school. I spent the weekend transforming the class into a TK classroom, but some of the hand-me-downs have seen better days. The new materials will excite this group even more than they are already excited about coming to school. While we have some building materials, students are mostly using them for exploratory play. The building centers in this project will allow students to reason using engineering principles to create vehicles, build bridges and homes. With our proximity to Silicon Valley, STEM knowledge and experience will be crucial for their future work. It's never too early to help them understand the engineering principles at work in how they build. Because many have not had preschool experience, quite a few of the students need work on their fine motor skills. The sand and craft trays will allow for sensory tracing to help with correct letter formation, and the magnetic fishing activities will also help with fine motor skills while practicing their letter recognition skills. Geoboards are a fun way for students to strengthen their fine motor skills as well as learn the shapes by creating them. I also enjoy seeing the creative work that students produce on the geoboards when given a chance to just create. Some of the centers I've created have not lasted through multiple rotations. The classroom laminating machine will help with the durability of the centers, which include PlayDoh mats for letter formation, matching puzzles for capital and lowercase letters, and counting/patterns with sorting bears. The wide range of activities made possible with this project will allow for more focused small group work.
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