Your role in classroom/child care setting: As a caregiver/teacher you are responsible for planning learning experiences for young children which will offer them opportunities to construct knowledge about health, safety and nutrition concepts. Following your ongoing observations of the children and their learning styles, intentional planning requires you to match the lesson plans for individual needs within the group. (Consider all the practice you had in ECE 135 Observing and Recording class you completed!) Remember that this work yields an incredible amount of information about the population you are working with. On the top of page 38 in your text there is a definition of CURRICULUM. Be sure to check this out!

How young children learn: Young children construct knowledge continuously using all their experiences to help them understand themselves, other people, and the world around them. You are part of their experience, so consider the impact your behavior has on teaching them about health, safety and nutrition. Children are active learners, so consider what methods will match them best! What type of activity can you use to catch their interest? What might they want to repeat again and again reinforcing their initial activity?

Planning for learning opportunities: Health, safety and nutrition concepts can be very complex. You

will need to clearly understand the ideas yourself before offering learning opportunities to the children. When you are choosing concepts, remember that one concept may have (probably has) many smaller components. Don’t try to teach the whole idea at one time! In your textbook at the end of each chapter there is a section entitled Building Curriculum. This can help you get started choosing concepts you want to plan to teach. Consider what you can build into the existing classroom routine or activities. If you can connect a new idea to an existing one that will help the concept be incorporated into their knowledge. (Think of Piaget’s accommodation and equilibrium ideas.)

Assessment

Submit Lesson Plans - Observation and Planning

Using the provided Lesson Planning Format write 5 Lesson Plans for each of the following areas (a total of 15 Lesson Plans)

• Safety Topic
• Health Topic
• Nutrition Topic

Submit Lesson Plans - Implementation

Implement one Lesson Plan from each of the topics to a group of at least 3 children ages 3-8 years old.

• Saftey Topic Implementation
• Health Topic Implementation
• Nutrition Topic Implementation

Format for your planning: On BlackBoard on the left side of the screen is a section entitled ECE Resources. Click on that section to find the required lesson plan format and the rubric with which your work will be evaluated.