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Learning in Silos
July 27, 2009
Empathy has no script. There is no right way or wrong way to do it. It’s simply listening, holding space, withholding judgment, emotionally connecting, and communicating that incredibly healing message of ‘You’re not alone.’
-Brené Brown
In her new book, Increasing the Power of Instruction: Integration of Language, Literacy, and Math Across the Preschool Day (NAEYC), reading guru Judith Schickedanz makes a strong argument against dividing the preschool day up into segments devoted to different content areas:

"A day in the early childhood classroom can be hectic. There is so much that we could choose to do, so many skills and concepts on which to work. How can a teacher do it all? Over the past few years I have heard many preschool teachers' concerns that teaching and learning have become too fragmented by subject curriculum areas and devoid of meaningful context. There are hardly enough hours in the day to teach everything we are asked to teach. This is especially true when the instruction for one time period addresses only one content domain.

"If done well, however, increasing the integration of learning within multiple content domains and various instructional contexts can help us better manage our time and make our instruction more powerful — and learning more meaningful — for children."'



This week, one of the most popular Exchange resources, Beginnings Workshops, the 16-page curriculum guides that appear in the center of every issue of Exchange, are on sale at a 20% discount. These guides offer practical advice from the top experts in our field on a wide range of early childhood issues. Included among the Beginnings Workshops are the following ones focusing on language, literacy, math and science:
  • Language and Literacy
  • Conversations with Children and Adults
  • Storytelling
  • Bilingual Education
  • Talking
  • Building Literacy
  • Multi-Language Programs
  • Science, Using the Outdoors
  • Music and Movement
  • Creative Dramatics
  • Numbers and Math
  • Math and Numbers Part 2

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Comments (1)

Displaying 1 Comment
Joan Rocchetta · July 28, 2009
Child Care Council of Suffolk, Inc.
Commack, NY, United States


It is disconcerting to know teachers are dealing with fragmented curriculum in early learning settings. It is the very nature of high-quality early childhood programs that language, literacy, math, science and social studies are woven through-out the day. If we are to have improvement in our educational system, we need to take that integrated model and push it up into primary school rather than let the fragmentation filter down.



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