Building a Community

One of my main goals as a teacher is to build a cooperative community of learners.  Today we took a short break form our regular circle time routine to discuss what it means to be a good friend.  Over the last few days we have been having a few problems with children taking toys out of other friends hands, wanting to be first in line, and cutting in front of people in line in order to stand next to the person they like. 

Today I read the story It's My turn! to the children.  In this story cat would go down the slide, but would not give dog a turn. Then he would go on the marry-go-round, but not let dog on, and then he would go on the swings, but not let dog on.  In the middle of the story dog finally got to go on the slide, marry-go-round, and swing.  At this time cat asked if he could have a turn, but dog said, "No."  At this time we discussed how it would feel to be dog and cat.  We also discussed solutions to the problem of wanting to play with the same toys.  The story concluded with cat and dog working together on the seesaw.

It is a good character trait to be an independent thinker and know what you want.  With this being said, I will work with the children to use their words to express their needs and wants, as well as use conflict resolution to solve social problems.