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As a Kindergarten team, one of our biggest challenges of beginning a school year will be finding ways to connect with our students after the virtual/COVID-19 school year of 2020/2021. Our goal is to not only meet their academic needs, but the overwhelming emotional needs that will be much different this year than in years past. We spend the first six weeks of school getting to know one-another, learning how to use our bodies safely, and building rapport and trusting relationships, both verbally and with appropriate physical touch. In order to achieve the connection that is necessary for a successful Teacher-Kindergartner relationship, we are going to need some help from the community to find creative ways to provide our students with physical connection and comfort that was lost during the pandemic. Since we will be limited in the way we physically hug them, hold their hands, give hi-fives, and wipe tears, we decided that having a soothing and comforting object to represent us would be the next best thing. Each of our Kindergarten classrooms has an animal mascot (dolphin, butterfly, marmot, and wolf) and we want to supply our students with a stuffed animal of their classroom’s mascot. It is not only developmentally appropriate to have a “stuffie” to hold for social-emotional comfort, but it is something that can visually connect us all together. Our students will have the same object as their peers, teachers, and paras. This can also serve as a puppet to talk through if students are struggling with communicating with their own voices or if they would have an easier time talking to the teacher’s puppet rather than the teacher.
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