Imaginations. We all have them. But I’m not talking about imaginations in the way you might be thinking. I’m talking about imaginations in terms of the stories we tell ourselves. Whenever something happens in our lives, we process that information based on our past experiences….trauma we never processed, bad experiences we’ve had, and even good…
Around the age of 4, many children begin to exhibit behaviors, such as gun play or superhero play, which enable them to feel a sense of power or control. Teachers often feel unsure of the best way to handle this type of play. Traditional approaches of banning the play or allowing the play with limits…
Note: This is an opinion piece only whose goal is to start a conversation. I am not a medical professional nor a COVID Researcher. Recently I’ve been asked numerous questions about practices within ECE classrooms and the COVID-19 pandemic. Questions have included some of the following: Should we let children play together or separate them?…
Check out my newest feature, the 5-Minute Professor, in which I answer questions about teaching and parenting young children. Read the transcript or watch the full video below! Hi. I’m Dr. Jenni Jacobs, Founder of The Learning Professor. Welcome to the 5-Minute Professor where I answer your questions about early childhood. One of the questions…
Of all the topics about preschool literacy that I teach, the most hotly debated among teachers is that of tracing. A simple google search on preschool writing or curriculum ideas will no doubt result in some form of tracing. In fact, even some handwriting curricula encourage the practice. Whenever I introduce the idea of no…
Recently I’ve joined several parenting (mom) Facebook groups online to get a sense of some of the topics that parents are struggling with. It’s supposed to be a place of support, where mothers can ask questions without fear of judgment. I have found it is quite far from that. I think I naively assumed that…
A friend of mine has a 7 month old infant in a group care setting. She came over with him the other day and told me that the day care had asked her not to hold him so much on the weekends because she was spoiling him. Apparently he was expecting the teachers to hold…
We’ve all heard of teaching to the test, and we all know that this strategy has no long-term success for children’s learning. Instead, I suggest “teaching to the brain”….using what we know about how the brain develops to influence what we do in our classrooms. During the first five years of life, the brain develops…
You never want to get on a plane where the pilot learned to fly from worksheets. ~ Todd Whitaker I was teaching a class recently, and I noticed a common theme…as much as teachers have heard that worksheets are not appropriate they just seem to have a hard time letting go of them. I think…
Math is one of my favorite areas to plan for in the preschool classroom. Sometimes teachers get so focused on the counting sequence that they forget about the other types of math activities that are just as, or even more, important! Number sense is just one area of math development that should be an important…
