Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Four Critical Pre-School Classroom Skills

Career Center - by Carie Bishop

If you’re enrolled in an early childhood education or K-9 program, America’s children need you to help provide a solid foundation in learning and communication skills. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, jobs for pre-school and kindergarten teachers will grow by 23 percent during the 2006-2016 decade, with schools adding 143,000 new positions.  Licensing and certification requirements vary by state, so check with the department at your college or university to determine whether you’re on track.

Once in the classroom, pre-school and elementary teachers design, develop, and implement interactive study and play programs that help young children build vocabulary, reasoning, and basic mathematics skills. In a 2008 report, the Harvard University Graduate School of Education listed critical classroom components in successful teaching. They include:

Fostering the Right Climate
Teachers are responsible in providing a positive learning environment. There is no room for ongoing negativity expressed by the teacher or through child interactions that are typified by aggression or hostility. Teachers should be accountable for monitoring and redirecting inappropriate behavior.

Flexibility and Responsiveness
Teachers should always remain open to modifying their curriculum in response to students’ ongoing emotional and academic needs. Activities should be developed to maximize learning opportunities.

Using Feedback
Students learn from strong teacher modeling. How you speak and  conduct yourself  during challenges throughout the semester will influence your charges. Teachers need to be sensitive to students’ participation–or their lack of it.

Maintaining Classroom Productivity and Progress
Time is an invaluable resource. Teachers should organize activities around learning, creating daily routines that students can rely upon for stability and making maximum progress. Avoid rote or dull repetition for its own sake. Clear-cut teacher communications with students about how to complete the routine are essential to learning.

The Harvard Letter is a bi-monthly newsletter published by Harvard University Graduate School of Education. Recent topics include identifying 21st-Century teaching skills, educating teenage immigrants, and building vocabularies for pre-kindergarten students.

Source
The Harvard Letter
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics