Exploration, Discovery, and Science in Pre-k Play!

S.T.E.M. is the money word in Pre-k these days.  How do we implement more of it?  How do we ensure that our littlest learners are receiving Science, Technology, Engineering and Math in a day of play?

EASY.....

Just let them play....

Children, especially small children, are naturally drawn to science, technology,engineering and math.  The issue, more often than not, is that WE fail to realize that is what THEY are doing...

Big advances come from small beginnings.

This is so true with our smallest students.  The world is ripe with discovery and when an observant and willing teacher is ready to answer questions, spur thought, and capture wonder, the world is a limitless educator.

​In this week's study we have taken to the outdoors and gathered, observed, hypothesized, and questioned our surroundings.  

The result?

​S.T.E.M. through play....just as it was meant to be.

What lays an egg?

We hypothesized about what kind of animal (or insect) laid these eggs.

Last week we studied, "Animals of the Savannah," using our Mother Goose Time curriculum.  With the heat coming on full blast it was a perfect time to discuss animals that live in hot, dusty, sandy terrains.  
We observed camels, lions, zebras, and elephants while we played in the sand, added water to see what would happen and how the sand absorbed it readily.  

We reviewed the letters E, Z, L, C and S (sand), their sounds and we practiced finding the letters at the beginning, middle, and end of the words and books.

This week, we again took to the outdoors with one question.

"What do you see?"

The results were instant.  (Small beginnings....major progress...)

"EGGS!!" squealed two children almost simultaneously.  They were standing atop of our swing set fort searching the leaves and all the children excitedly joined them.

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This led to more questions... "How do insects get their eggs to stick to a leaf?" "What kind of bug did that?" "What will it be when it hatches?" "What if it is a spider egg?!"

The great thing about children is that one answer is never enough.  There is always another, "Why?" or "How?"  These are called "Teachable moments."  My favorite kind of moments of the day...

We discussed eggs, animals and insects that laid eggs and the vocabulary word, "Oviparous."  We discovered that "oviarous" creatures all have the same thing in common, they lay eggs.

That spawned more questions...

"Are puppies "obipus" (yes I know the spelling is wrong :)) Ms. Donna?"

"No...puppies, kitties, and people are "mammals" because they have live babies, not eggs." 

"Oooohhhhh!!!" 

You can literally see their little brains churning as they raced around grabbing toy animals and bugs while asking if they were mammals or "obipus!"

Once it was time to return indoors the play continued with our dough.  They made dough leaves and eggs.  They counted the eggs, hatched the eggs, and added and subtracted the eggs (no papers required).

​This is math and science at play!

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We decided we needed an egg song so we looked up our Mother Goose Time Dancing Beats videos on Youtube and learned this song and dance!

​We continued the egg education with one of our favorite books, "Chicken's Aren't The Only Ones!"

We followed that up with some views of chickens actually hatching from eggs....and more questions!

Then the emergent reading grew naturally...

"Ms. Donna, how do you spell "egg?""  

"E....G....G..."

I wrote it on the chalkboard and they practiced on paper.  We furthered the learning with a letter "E" review, phonemic awareness, and more writing practice.  

It sounds like this took up an entire day.....

Really, it has taken up several days.  They want to know more and I am happy to make that happen through play.

I wish you well and I hope you get to play today!

​-L