For the month of November we are talking about gratitude. Gratitude is important in our lives for many reasons: gratitude increases resilience, helps our mental health and our emotional growth. When we think about others with appreciation we are practicing empathy. Gratitude increases our self-worth and opens the door to more relationships. As teachers and parents know, PreK children are very motivated to make friends. Being outwardly grateful can help!
Here's an article about teaching gratefulness to children.
In our classroom, we have created paper "jars" to slip notes of gratitude into this month on our bulletin board. The children have embraced this project and there are already notes inside some of the jars!
Teachers model gratitude each day, we thank each other for help, we thank children ("friends") for listening, for a wonderful morning, for helping with our amazing clean up time! We even thank the trees for their beautiful gifts of leaves.
When the children express gratitude, we notice and make sure to note how we are feeling when someone is grateful.
We are singing songs such as "All I Really Need" and "Thanks a Lot", and learning "thank you" in sign language and other languages.
We are reading books such as Mo Willem's THANK YOU BOOK and We Are Grateful :Otsaliheliga by Traci Sorell and Frane Lessac.
Until Next Time
Michele and Charlene
No comments:
Post a Comment