Session 1

Session 1: Physical Development

 

Learning Activity 2: A Practical Approach for Developing Children’s Physical Development

 

Focus

 

As a child care provider it is important that you plan activities that support and stimulate children’s gross motor skill development by including opportunities for children to jump, bounce, reach, throw, climb, roll, and so on. It is also important that you effectively introduce these activities in clear, fun, and interesting ways that encourage children to get involved.

 

Directions

 

Step 1: Choose a song or alternative activity that promotes children’s gross motor skills. Some suggestions include the following:

• “Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes”
• “Shake My Sillies Out”
• “The Ants Go Marching One by One”
• “If You Are Happy and You Know It”
• “This Old Man”
• “The Chicken Dance”
• “The Hokey Pokey”
• “Ring Around the Rosie”
• “I’m a Little Teapot”
• “The Macarena”

If you are unfamiliar with the above songs, use the Internet or ask someone in the child care centre to teach you the tune, words, and actions for these or other songs.

 

Words and actions for a song can be changed or modified as needed and as appropriate. If you are developing an alternative activity, you might include actions such as the following:

• walking
• hopping
• galloping
• creeping
• running
• leaping
• climbing
• jumping
• skipping
• rolling

Step 2: Identify which age group you would teach the activity song to. Using the developmental milestones presented in Inquiry 1, determine why you think the activity song is appropriate for the age group you have chosen.

 

Step 3: Plan how you would teach the activity song to the age-appropriate group of children. For example, consider the following questions:

• Will you explain the actions included in the activity song to the children with words, with demonstrations, or with both words and demonstrations?

• If you are teaching a song, will you teach the words before, after, or at the same time as teaching the actions?

• How will you motivate the children to participate in the activity song?

• How will you ensure the inclusion of all of the children, and how will you modify the activity song, if necessary, for the children’s diverse physical abilities?

• What type of teaching space (indoors or outdoors) will you use?

• Will you include music? If so, where will you get the music and what device will you use to play the music?

• Will you need to include any equipment? If so, how or where will you access the equipment?

• Will there be safety risks to the children? If so, how will you minimize the risk?

Step 4: Practise teaching the activity song to a peer, a friend, or a group of peers and/or friends. Give the Peer Rubric for Learning Activity 2: A Practical Approach for Developing Children’s Physical Development to at least one peer or friend, and have that person assess your teaching demonstration. Make any necessary adjustments to your work. Practise demonstrating teaching the activity song as many times as you feel necessary.

 

 

Step 5: Teach the activity song to either an actual or an imaginary group of children. Prior to beginning to teach, explain the age of the children and why the activity song is suitable for that age group. Be sure to base your explanation on children’s physical development milestones.

 

It must also be clear how you will include children of diverse physical abilities in the activity song. If there are children with diverse physical abilities in your group, you will demonstrate your strategy by including those children. If you will not be demonstrating your strategy for inclusion, you can write about your strategy and save your information in your course folder.

 

 

 

Checking In

 

 

 

Save your peer assessment in the appropriate sub-folder of your course folder.

 

In consultation with your teacher, choose a suitable method for you to demonstrate to your teacher how you would teach the activity song to children. You might use one of the following methods to demonstrate your teaching method to your teacher:

• Make a recording of your teaching session in a format that is acceptable to your teacher.
  
  
• If you are teaching real children, as opposed to imaginary children, invite your teacher to sit in on your teaching session in person or by webcam.

 

 

Course Project

 

 

 

How might you apply the thinking and work you have done in Learning Activity 2 to items and strategies in your strategies box? Remember to build your strategies box as you progress through the course.

 

CCS3120 Learn EveryWare © 2010 Alberta Education