Thursday's Child

Teaching very young children is a matter of getting their attention and then doing one simple thing. Today we offered a map of the whole United States and a map of just the New England States. It was a struggle to find where the New England States fit, but by the end of class most of the kids could point out the region and name one of the states.

It’s always a question as to whether they understand the concept of states and country. A lot of teachers would simply scrap the whole thing and chalk it up to too young an age, but this teacher realizes that the longer you pursue a task with little kids, the closer you will get to understanding, and the bonus is, if they understand that, they will also understand five more things.

By Christmas, I am hoping that they will understand the states IN the country idea, while they become familiar with the names of the states. Once they understand their own country, then we can pursue some of the other countries. Africa is a lot like the United States by appearance, but there they have to know that Africa is not a country, it’s 57 countries.

One of the things we’ve done before is to study a country by film, picture, and food. It’s always a treat to get an extra snack. Some people ask why bother with five year olds? The answer is that at age five, a child is steering away from paper and pencil and into his first ideas. Ideas need to be stimulated into thinking, exploring and dreaming. What better place to do that than in history and geography class.