It has been over a year and I think most of us are thinking and surely hoping the topic 'Covid-19' would be over by now, but all countries are not that lucky yet. It is still on our newspapers daily. Therefore, it is good to double check how the children are doing and how they are processing all this in their heads. These tips from UNICEF help children to feel more comfortable:

ASK AND LISTEN

Encourage children to talk, so you can find out what they know. Listen with full attention and let the children know that they can talk to you anytime. Eg. drawing might help with talking. Do not minimize the children’s concerns. If the children are very young, there is no need to introduce new fears – just remind about good hygiene habits.

Let children learn despite Covid-19 - Kindiedays Blended Learning

TELL THE TRUTH IN A CHILD-FRIENDLY WAY

Children have a right to truthful information, but adults also have a responsibility to avoid distress. Use age-appropriate language and be sensitive to the level of anxiety. If you can’t answer their questions, don’t guess. Use it as an opportunity to explore the answers together from trusted sources like UNICEF or WHO.

SHOW GOOD HYGIENE PRACTICES

Teach children how to wash hands properly with warm water and soap. Tell also how to cover a cough or sneeze with their elbow. Ask to tell you immediately if she/he feels sick. Show good example by wearing a mask and using hand disinfect.

OFFER PLAY & ROUTINES

Give children opportunities to play and relax, for example outdoors. Keep regular routines if possible, especially before bedtime, or help create new safe routines in a new environment. If your child feels unwell, explain that they have to stay in quarantine because it is safer. Reassure that you know it is hard or boring at times, but that following the rules will help keep everyone healthy.

Support learning with Kindiedays Lesson Plans

As the Curriculum is one of the most essential factors in quality early childhood education, it is never out of topic. Let's dig deeper with the help of US National Association for the Education of Young Children and Finnish National Agency for Education!

What is a curriculum?

According to USA National Association for the Education of Young Children:

Children learn more when there is a well-planned and implemented curriculum, therefore it is important for every school and early childhood education center to have its curriculum in written form.

The curriculum consists of the knowledge, skills, abilities, and understandings children are to learn, plus all the plans through which those gains will occur.

Implementing a curriculum always yields outcomes of some kind—but which outcomes those are and how a program achieves them are critical.

The curriculum helps young children achieve goals that are developmentally and educationally important.

→ Download a broad set of lesson plans aligned with the Finnish Curriculum

The curriculum does this through learning experiences (including play, small group, large group, interest centers, and routines) that reflect child development in general and the interests and skills of these children in particular. Furthermore, about the sequences in which children acquire specific concepts, skills, and abilities, building on prior experiences.

Teachers use the curriculum and their knowledge of children’s interests in planning relevant, engaging learning experiences; and they keep the curriculum in mind in their interactions with children throughout the day.

- National Association for the Education of Young Children

In this way they ensure that children’s learning experiences—in both adult-guided and child-guided —are consistent with the center’s goals for children and connected within an organized framework.

At the same time, developmentally appropriate practice means teachers have flexibility—and the expertise to exercise that flexibility effectively—in how they plan and implement curricular activties in their classrooms.

In Finland, the National core curriculum is every teacher's guidebook. Learn more how the curriculum guides early childhood education in Finland.

→ Apply Finnish national core curriculum in your teaching with Kindiedays

The Finnish ECEC curriculum has three tiers, it consists of:

1. The National Core Curriculum for ECEC
2. Local (city) ECEC curricula
3. Children’s individual ECEC plans

→ Download Child's individual curriculum template

The good news is: children don't need expensive toys to play and learn. In fact, you probably have all the things you need to create a fun and engaging game!

Here is an idea to help get you started with Do-It-Yourself toys. Have fun!

Rainbow mobile – DIY toy for all ages

Why: Develops hand-eye coordination, motor skills and stimulates visual skills.

You need:

• Colourful ribbons or pieces of fabric
• A rubber band or a ring
• Scissors

Instructions: Take the colourful ribbons or fabrics and cut long stripes out of them. Tie each one on the rubber band / ring. Ta-daa! Your rainbow mobile is ready!

How to use it?

Babies & toddlers:

• Use the rainbow mobile as a capturing toy for babies. It helps to develop hand-eye coordination and stimulate visual skills when focusing eyes on the toy and trying to grab the straps. (PS. Do not let small children eat the toy!)
  
• You can also tickle the little ones with this toy! Go through the child's body by tickling softly with the rainbow mobile. Repeat the names of each body part. This promotes body awareness.
  
• Play music and let children run around with the rainbow mobiles on their wrists. When music stops also children need to stay still.
  

Preschoolers:

• Let the children make their own Rainbow Mobiles. Let each child choose the colors they want and help when using scissors.
  
• Use the rainbow mobile in movement & music sessions. Let each child have one (or more!) on their wrists or ankles. Play instrumental music in the background and let the children imagine they are mermaids under the sea or colourful butterflies flying towards the rainbow! Encourage children to move rhytmically to the music and shake, swing, wave their rainbow mobiles.
  
• Rainbow mobiles are great for relaxation with older children too. Ask all the children to lay on the floor eyes closed. Teacher or a peer can softly tickle each child's leg, arm or back with the rainbow mobile. This activity promotes body awareness and guide's children to respect one's body when being gentle to one another.
  

Happy playtime!

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In Finland, children learn through play and we don't score children!

"Preschool educators must now ensure that cognitive, social-emotional and academic curricular goals are met within the context of children's play."

Curriculum learning areas and learning objectives guide the planning of playful activities with the children. But we don’t test how well they have reached each skill or objective.

Instead, new means and methods for formative assessment are required across the whole learning process. We want to understand how children develop and guarantee the quality of children’s learning. As well as engage families and gain their confidence. 

Pedagogical documentation, portfolios, and formative assessment give children a voice and reveal their thinking

Pedagogical documentation also known as portfolio learning is an essential working approach in early childhood education and care. 

 It is a continuous process where learning objectives, observations, documents, and their interpretation in interaction create an understanding of the pedagogical activity. 

Simply, pedagogical documentation is observing children’s play, projects, discussions, ideas, and inventions via taking photos, making notes, writing down explanations as well as tricky questions, saving artwork, videoing action, recording voice…and using all the documents purposefully.                             

Pedagogical documentation produces concrete and versatile knowledge about the children’s lives, development, interests, thinking, learning, and needs. Individual observations make it possible to examine the children’s development and learning together with the children and families. 

Formative assessment of the knowledge and skills now made visible is used as a basis for planning further activities. 

The use of modern technology is a prerequisite for a professional learning process and efficient pedagogical documentation

The good news is: children don't need expensive toys to play and learn. In fact, you probably already have all the things you need to create a fun, versatile and engaging toy!

Here is an idea to help get you started with Do-It-Yourself toys.

Shapes for all ages!

Sorting out shapes helps children to learn to classify things based on for example colour and shape. Children can also learn to group objects freely or based on what adults ask.

You need:

• Construction paper in various colors
• Scissors
• Moulds (eg. cookie cutters, plastic cups, sand toys..)

Instructions:

Cut the cardboard papers in different geometric shapes. That’s it!

How to play? Many ideas!

Babies & toddlers:

1. Sort out the shapes based on shape. It helps babies to develop cognitive skills, but also their eye-hand coordination when picking up the shapes.
2. You can teach the children about colors and shapes by pointing at them and naming them. Later on, you can also ask the children to point out red or blue shapes to learn about colours – and circles and triangles to learn about shapes.
3. For promoting memory and observation skills, you can play Kim's Game with some of the shapes. See the detailed instructions for the game here!

Preschoolers:

Let the children draw and cut some shapes by themselves, for example 10 each. Ask the childen to look for moulds around the room, maybe a cup could be used for a circle or a duplo lego for a square. Help with cutting the shapes out if needed. You can use the shapes in many ways for learning, for example...

1. Ask each child to make something out of the shapes, for example arrange the shapes in a form of a face (eyes, nose, mouth...) or the first letter of the child's name. Or even better - ask the children to develop their own Shape Creatures and take pictures of them when ready, write down who they are and what they can do!
2. Make an inventory of all the shapes in the class to practice counting. Count how many stars, circles, hearts and pentagons you have!
3. Play tic-tac-toe with the shapes in pairs: each player chooses five shapes (different ones) and draws a simple grid on a paper - ta-daa and the game is on!