My name is Tammy and
until recently I taught at an urban elementary school. I am now teaching at a
private college in the education department. I teach early childhood curriculum
and instruction and methods courses. It is very exciting to work with
pre-service teachers. I knew one day I would work on the college level. After years
of teaching at the elementary level and working with such inspirational teachers,
my hope was to bring our collective knowledge and expertise to future teachers.
As a 2nd grade
teacher I always had high academic expectations for my students. Although I
ensured that my teaching was developmentally appropriate, I encouraged my
students to think critically. I focused on essential questions that focused
beyond the knowledge level and focused on the evaluative and analysis level of
Blooms. Now, I have the same expectations for my pre-service teachers. In
teaching them to think critically, they will in turn teach their students.
I am now interested in
fostering critical thinking through play in early childhood. What are your
thoughts about this concept? Do you think it is possible to develop critical
thinking skills while playing?
“It is possible to store
the mind with a million facts and still be entirely uneducated” - Alec Bourne
Hi Tammy,
ReplyDeleteI am answering your question with a practical experience. I have a shape sound box in my toddler class. It has triangle, square and circle and if children drop them in the hole it makes a sizzling sound but no child nor any teacher knows that if its blown with the mouth it can actually whistle. Guess what? This past month, one sweet 18 month old girl developed interest in this toy ,put it in her mouth and blew a whistle, she did that to our pegs that came with a board and whistled. All other children are now imitating her and everyone want to have the toy. It amazes me that no one has ever discovered this in the class until this session. Even though she can't talk she must have thought about something before the action. Critical thinking can be taught through play and we have to start when children are young.
You make an excellent point! She had to think about something before she acted upon it! Which means she probably learned through experience to explore objects in her environment.
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