Participation – (NOTE: Not IF to work, but WHERE and HOW to work). Every day every child must be given opportunities to choose what he wishes to work with within the limited choices you make available to him. The ability to select, act, reflect, and apply his learning (SARA) through the process is vital to cognitive development. Plan, Do Review, Vygotsky!

More rigid conformity to an academic routine determined only by the teacher or the curriculum comes later along the developmental journey to kindergarten and there are many ways a creative teacher can encourage a child to try new experiences or to expand his interests and take part in a variety of experiences.

 There’s Always a Herbie Blockbuilder – If a child chooses the same activity daily for weeks at a time, the teacher needs to alter the presentation of the experience to “squeeze” appropriate learning from it. This is the method of meeting need by using strength and creating relevant child-centered or personal–interest learning while still meeting the standards or objectives of your curriculum. Change the work by encouraging him to count, stack, arrange and sort the blocks to build math skills, use letter blocks to make words for literacy, build an igloo for social studies, paint them for art, and make some blocks from other materials for science. If a child only chooses to play in the Dress up Center, make sure there are non-structured* props for creative role play that can be used in a variety of ways suited to concept-building themes matching the strength expectations.

*When I say “non-structured” I mean raw, creative, open-ended materials, not Disney Princess dresses and plastic Kim Kardashian pumps!

Three Examples of Choices That Are Sometimes Hard to Grant:

Separation System – You respectfully suggest, but he and Mom choose

Behavior Bartering – “You need to get off that table NOW! Can you get down by yourself, or shall I help you?”

Authentic Art – Art projects must be completely child created or they are not art.  No teacher should ever alter a child’s original art in any way make any decision about how the creation looks. HANDS OFF!

Offering Choices, Developmentally Speaking    

Infant, Baby or Young Toddler – verbalize both your offer and his choice so you’re developing both cognitive and language skills. “Look, Baby. Here’s a teddy bear and a rattle.” When baby makes his choice, reaches, and grasps, “You picked the soft teddy bear.”

Older Toddlers – verbalize your offer and his choice and encourage him to point at his choice, repeat your words, or ask him to say words of his own. “Toddler, show me what you want to play with.” When he points, “You want the truck. Can you say, ‘truck’?”

Twos – verbalize your offer and his choice and more firmly ask for words. “Two, do you want to play in the water table or build with blocks?” If he points to the water table say, “.” This lets you asses his skills in both receptive language, in which a child shows the understanding of what is said, and expressive language, in which a child repeats or originates words or phrases. Receptive – “Do you want the truck or the puppet?” When child points to truck, say, “You want the truck?” and the child nods affirmatively. Expressive – “What do you want to play with?” When child says, “Truck”, say “Good talking. You wanted the truck.” Help Twos recall their choices later in the day to build skills of memory and expression. “Remember this morning when we were playing with those things with the wheels, those. . .” and hopefully Two says, “Trucks!”

Threes – verbalize a more general offer and gently insist on words. “Three, tell me what you want to do first today.” Threes need to give verbal answers rather than merely point or gesture, but respect the gesture and note the need (do some assessment) to verbalize so expressive skills can be worked on. Later in the day, ask Threes to verbally recall (reflection) what they worked with. Take dictation of their reflection and post it or save it in the child’s portfolio.

Fours and Fives – verbalize your offer and firmly insist on a verbal expression of choice. “Four, tell me which Center you are going to work in first and what are you going to do (make, play with) there?” When Four answers verbally, make a positive comment on his choice (“Sounds like a neat idea.”) or ask a question that encourages further learning (“How many blocks do you think that will take?”). Later in the day, Fours and Fives should be asked to verbally or representationally (through journaling or drawing) recall their actions and reflect on any learning that took place.

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