Firefighters

We were inspired to learn about firefighters because we had the chance to tour a fire station this week.  I wanted them to have a rich understanding of the nature of job.

Monday –

Today was about, not firefighting, but FIRE.  I wanted Lauren to have a respect for the seriousness and danger of fire.  I wanted to show Lauren why firefighters are necessary.  I wanted to give Lauren a sense of history of the evolution of firefighting.

1.       Videos:  I looked for videos relating to firefighters on Netflix and found several.  I chose “Barney: Let's Go to the Fire House” because it was generalized, a good introduction that both could like.  I let them watch this in place of Sesame Street.

2.       Allie:  Had a lesson with Allie.  “Hot and Cold”  I took some stones and I put some in the freezer overnight and I put some in the microwave (not too long).  I gave them to her one at a time, and I told her “This is hot”  “This is cold” etc.  I helped her sort which is hot/cold.

3.       Allie:  Gave Allie a “Touch and Feel” flashcard with a firetruck.

4.       Vocabulary with Lauren:  Firetruck, Firefighter, Fire Hydrant, Smoke Detector.   A note:  Lauren adores flashcards.  I make them myself using cardstock and a free template on Microsoft word.  The reason she LOVES flash cards is the technique we use…

a.       Introduction:  On the first day, I go through the cards and talk about each picture.  I tend to like to include at least one word which is familiar to help her feel successful from the start.  I ask her to repeat the words to help with pronounciation

b.      I use the Montessori 3 Part technique for new vocabulary.         

                                                               i.      Place two cards down, ask her, ie “Which one is smoke detector”

                                                             ii.      Place all cards down, ask her, ie “Which one is smoke detector”  She gets to keep the cards when she gets it right

                                                            iii.      THEN, perhaps after a few days, ask her “What is this”  This gives her a very good chance to hear the vocabulary many times.

5.       Spanish – I printed four cards with the same grammer and different vocabulary.  We discussed it and then used the 3-part technique to learn it.

a.       “Los bomberos estan ayudando”

b.      “Los bomberos estan caminando”

c.       “Los bomberos estan durmiendo”

d.      “Los bomberos estan corriendo"

6.       Main Lesson – Fire.  

a.       I talked to her, I told her how fire is a special and unique type of phenomenon.  I told her how fire spreads very fast.  We talked about what color it is.  I told her that sometimes, fire can spread so fast that it can be very dangerous.

b.      We looked at a video of a house on fire, we watched the entire sequence of it getting bigger and the firefighters coming to put it out.  I specifically avoided talking about firefighters because I wanted to concentrate on the fire itself.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJYRsmqayFo

c.       I told her how a long time ago, fires could grow very, very fast.  I told her that we are lucky that today, firefighters are able to use a lot of good equipment and training to put out fires.  I told her how once there was a very famous fire, The Great Chicago Fire.  We looked at youtube videos of that.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Q3wwRAGiw (I skipped to the pictures)

7.       Craft – I presented two foam pieces to be the house, a printout of a firefighter and tissue paper.  We used the tissue paper to make it look like there was a fire at the house and blue tissue paper to look like water from the hose.

Tuesday –

Today, I wanted to concentrate on the training of the firefighters.  Different than what is taught in schools, I like to focus on the fact that firefighting is a job that people do and that any person comes to learn to do from training.  I want her to look at a firefighter and see a person, not a job.  Looking at the training was super fun and alluded to a bigger concept in life

1.        We took our scheduled  tour of the fire station. 

2.       We reviewed our vocabulary and Spanish.

3.       Main Lesson – Firefighter training.  We talked about it.  We watched some videos

a.       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eb1hm66F6k

b.      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P19dfFZjLDQ

c.       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZpr-ru9OV4

d.      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pjFPxc00nI

4.       Fireman Math! – I printed out some cute firetrucks and I used word problems to help teach Lauren math!  I would tell a story, about there being a fire and 1 or 2 firetrucks coming.  Then, I would put the “+” sign down and tell the second half of the story, about more firetrucks coming.  Then I would put the “=” sign and I would ask Lauren, how many fire trucks total.  She LOVED this!!  Some stories were about parades.

5.       Activity – Mock Training.  Put some water bottles on the table outside and had Lauren try to aim the hose and knock them down. 

Wednesday –

Today we talked about firefighters and fire trucks.  We talked about why firefighters are considered real life heros.  We talked about sirens. 

1.        Review flash cards and Spanish.

2.       Firetruck Math again, we just enjoyed it J

3.       Egg Carton Craft – crafts are great for reinforcing vocabulary and helping to encourage further imagining and contemplating what we are talking about.  I found this craft idea online.

1.       Activity – What is that sound?  I used youtube to play different sounds and including sirens several times.  We talked about the purpose of sirens.

4.       Allie craft – printed a picture of a firetruck and had Allie fingerpaint it with red.

5.       We bought a Melissa and Doug firetruck set.  We just played with it and imagined scenarios.  I put it on their toy shelf to return to as the mind desires.

6.       Watched “All About Big Red Engines” on Netflix.  Lauren also discovered “Fireman Sam”

Thursday -

Was tired, did no lesson

Friday - 

Fire safety at home

1.        Review flashcards and Spanish

2.       Main Lesson – talked about fire safety around the home. 

a.       Talked about what to do if there is a fire

b.      Counted all the smoke detectors

c.       Tested the smoke detectors

d.      Took a look at the fire extinguisher and talked about what it is (uses a chemical, not water), where we keep it (in kitchen because most likely to have a fire) how to use it (looked at the instructions and noticed how easy they were to read), the meter showed it was full, the color is red because people know that means fire.

Saturday, we went to the Hall of Flame Museum.  Lauren LOVED looking at the pictures of historical fires.  She loved looking at some of the old fire engines starting from the 1700’s and how they were horse draw.  We noticed the buckets they used instead of hoses.  Mostly, we loved the children’s area, we got to talk about the fire pole and dress up!  J

Months of the Year

I picked this topic because I noticed that another almost three year old knew her birthday.  Lauren knew her birthday is in August, but not that it was the 23^rd.  It is my philosophy to never approach the kids with something to master without understanding the nature of it.  I really like to think of teaching your child as if you were teaching an alien.  You would never tell an alien, hey, memorize these month words and here are some cartoonish pictures to ease the monotony of your memorization.   The most important part would be to explain the nature of months, memorizing the names is secondary importance.  However, in a practical sense of having the month names memorized, I have discovered that an understanding of the subject really lends itself to better memorization.  Also, there is a really wonderful benefit to me, a lover of philosophical thinking, it gives me the chance to research it and analyze it myself!  I was tickled that just hours ago, Lauren was on the phone and her Godfather said, “Hey, your birthday is coming up soon!”  And Lauren started laughing and said, “No silly, my birthday is in August, and it’s June!”

I hope how simple it was to teach this isn’t disappointing; but here it is!

Tuesday

My introduction conversation:

If I wanted to tell someone what your birthday is, what would I say?   I would say, August 23^rd.  August is the name of the month and 23^rd is the day in the month.  We use months to help us know what day of the year it is.  It takes the Earth one year,  that is 365 days, to go around the sun.  There 365 days and 365 nights.  Your birthday is the 235^th day of the year.  Many, many years ago, lots of people decided to make it easier to remember what day of the year it was by making up something called months.  So instead of saying, this is the 235^th day of the year, they say, this is August 23. It is just easier, and people liked it better.  Months have about 30 days, it is so much easier to count to 30 than 365.  (We read our kids storybooks and let them watch TV shows that have much more complicated storylines than this!  Introducing concepts respectful to their lack of prior knowledge in a logical, story-like way creates a very rich palette for the goal of this week’s lessons; which is to understand months and dates.)

There are twelve months.  Why do you think we have twelve months?  (This just helps her think, and realize that she doesn’t know why)  Well, there’s no real reason that we have twelve months.  In fact, many, many, many years ago (reinforces the concept of “year”), our calendar only had 10 months, but then, we added two months because e of two very important people.  Those people were soooo important, that people added two months to the calendar using their name.  One man’s name was Julius, can you guess which month we named after Julius?  The other is Augustus, can you guess what month is named after Augustus? (The fact that there is a good chance she could guess August will help her self confidence and make her enjoy the lesson more) Wouldn’t that be amazing if a lot of people thought you were soooo cool that they decided to name a whole month after you???  Maybe that month would be called Laurentember.  And Allie’s month could be Allietober.  And Mommy’s month could be Momurary!   (I am not expecting Lauren would fully and richly know this history, but I feel like it helps  draw more attention to the thinking about the names of the months.  However, true facts will help  set the course for later learning.)

Put sun on floor.  Tape the months to the floor around the sun.  

Have Lauren hold the Earth and walk around the sun, listening to these song.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5enDRrWyXaw , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEOhuuKtFYU , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrVjQSaTQc4   We revisited these songs many times in the next few days J

Talk about the months….do you know what month your birthday is?  August, let’s walk to August.  Ok, what month is Allie’s birthday in?  May, let’s find May.  My birthday is in July, it’s right next to your month.  Daddy’s birthday is in December.

Now, I have introduced months to Lauren in a respectful , intellectual way.  This approach is exhilarating to her, she incorporates this information and applies these analytical thinking skills in all her thinking!!  She loves it!!

Wednesday

We listened to the youtube videos again.  We see how far we can go remembering the songs.  In passing, we pointed out that people commonly use pictures to describe the months, ie Santa for December, and why that is.   

I am incorporating reading into our lesson.  We are focusing on sightword method of reading right now.  I put the names of the months on the table and we organized the ones with the same letter together.  Then, I would name a month and ask Lauren to guess which written word was that month.  She can use the first letter to pick the right month often.  Repeating the vocabulary over and over is so important.  Don’t do it in a dry way;  songs, books, talking about it, art projects, field trips.  Just incorporating the new vocabulary in a big deal.

We are also incorporating math.  We have followed a path of Montessori in learning numbers…here is the link to the cards which we love:  http://www.montessoriprintshop.com/uploads/MF-9_Large_Number_Cards.pdf  Even though, she has put together numbers up to 9,999, we are still practicing before moving on.  I want to reinforce the vocabulary of numbers and it gave me the opportunity to reinforce the concepts of 12 months, 30 or 31 days per month, 365 days a year, and family birthdays.

We have a magnetic calendar.  We used the magnets to put the calendar together.  This also worked on ordinal numbers(first, second, third).  I didn’t try to master that with her because it is dry.  It was merely an introduction, but she did seem to pick up on it.  We put events on the calendar.  I said, “What if someone asked you if you could go bowling on August the 20^th.  Find 20 on the calendar”  And so on.  We also discussed that the year is 2012, because there have been 2012 years since Jesus was born. 

Thursday

We reviewed the numbers and the sight reading words.  We listened and tried to sing the months of the year song.  Then, we had a huge art project.  I printed off the months and we decorated them based on something about the month.  We put a sticker on some important days. 

Friday

My plan was to go to a Hallmark store and notice how the cards related to special dates.  We were going to read the cards and notice the cultural ways that people make each other happy by sending greetings on certain dates.  BUT, that morning, I got a call from a WORLD FAMOUS JAZZ STRING BASSIST that is a friend from my home town.  He was touring…the freaking planet, going to four different countries on three continents this MONTH, and we got to spend the day with him!!!!  I think we’re going to do some more review of the months this coming week.