Today I visited the Rainbow Preschool, a half-day preschool with extended care in the Laurelhurst neighborhood of NE Portland. Teachers Nicki and Amanda and their students welcomed me into their world where science activities include caring for two guinea pigs, digging and pouring sand, building with dominoes, and many opportunities to use symbols to represent actions (name cards into a cup when you take your snack, job board, and daily schedule using photos).
I was reminded of an article in the September 2008 NAEYC journal Young Children, What Do Children Learn by Trying to Produce the Domino Effect? by Kyoko Ozaki, Naoko Yamamoto, Constance Kamii.
Visiting other classrooms always invigorates me and I appreciate the welcome to investigate at Rainbow Preschool. Reading journals such as, Young Children and Science and Children is another way to find out what’s happening in other programs. The article on children using dominoes particularly interested me and I hope to add them to the science room rotation of blocks soon.
Peggy
I enjoyed reading your post. I am a teacher in a preschool 3-5 center. Earlier this year, my co-teacher and I bought a Domino Rally set. We figured that the children would really enjoy it. We were rather disappointed when the children seemed to be struggling and/or uninterested in the dominos. When I expressed my disappointment to my site-coordinator, she handed me the NAEYC article you referenced to read. Who know the concept of dominos was so complicated?
I am a substitue teacher’s aide working on my bachelor’s degree. I love to go into different early childhood rooms and see all of th edifferent ideas teachers have. I have a wonderful collection of ideas for when I have my own room.
I am also working on my bachelor’s degree to teach young children. In our preschool class the children always line up blocks and watch them fall over. I will purchase some dominos. I am sure they will enjoy them falling over.
I am so glad that I found this site. I enjoyed reading the links that are posted. As a teacher of 20 + years, its always good to find another source of information.
Gloria, I hope that you will share your 20+ years of tips, lessons, and favorite ah-ha moments with this early childhood science group! Do you have a science-themed finger play or body poem about building with blocks, or seeds and spring, that you can teach us?