How To Structure A Productive Learning Environment For Kids

Happy Children Playing Kids

Image by epSos.de via Flickr

My classes are dynamic places of learning because I offer clear variety of choices. I keep certain stations static and change some things with the child present, and try to involve children with making these changes as much as possible. In this way the child feels comfortable with familiarity. Very young children will develop more confidence and in control of their learning when they know where things are. Imagine if every time you entered a shop and the bread was in a different place. How would you feel?

How do I make the choices to change and when? I make observations of how the children interact with the environment. What things are they learning? What things are they interested in? Which things are they neglecting to do? Why? Who do they play with? Do they work alone, or with a friend?

What changes do I make? The furniture arrangement. Are the children able to freely walk from station to station? Do you need more or less tables for certain activities? Are some activities more for outdoors than indoors? Do you need a tap nearby? Do you need the floor space?

The class environment changes as the children’s learning progresses. In our class we changed the dress up corner into our newspaper station. We changed our museum into a radio station. We changed our newspaper station to Santa’s little helpers factory, with the giving tree as a focus. ‘We could also use the giving tree as our advent’s calendar,’ I thought. ‘We could place an ornament for each day of the month of December, and the ornament can be a piece of candy.’ I shared my ideas and observations enthusiastically with the children and asked their opinion during circle time.

For my readers who don’t know how an advent calendar works: Each day of December, before Christmas there is a name drawn, and the child gets to open one ‘door’ of the calendar, and take a present. This is a German tradition, and this is what we used because we were living in Germany.

Another aspect of changing the environment was when I integrated stations to go with the children’s needs. Free drawing, painting, and construction, lay the foundation. These are open-ended activities that I also integrated with set tasks. E.g. Story telling, writing, phonetics, art projects and presentations. Learning is a social experience and opportunities to communicate is essential.

Do you have any ideas on how to set up a classroom for a better learning environment for kids? Feel free to share. What works best for you?

By Maria Grujicic

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