I need ideas of how to get rid of our monthly planned activitiy calendars now that we are emergent based.?

Question

Parents were furious when we took away our planned monthly calendars for our daycare.

We planned special days of the month on a calendar and had it posted. We are now emergent based and want to get rid of this.... HOW do I do this?

Answer 1

You don't need to get rid of your calendar.  You just need to generalize it, or post something weekly.

With emergent based learning, you're still the teacher, you just listen to your class, find out what they are interested in, and teach that!  I tend to combine the two (theme based/emergent based.)  It makes it easier to plan.  I watch them at play, see what books they are really into, what animals or people they are talking about, and plan from there.  So I still know what I'm doing next week, but I don't know what I'm doing 2 or 3 weeks from now.  Sometimes it all gets dropped if the kids switch what they're REALLY EXCITED about!

So for an emergent based calendar, you can post "movie day" without putting a specific movie.  Then, when the kids are talking about whales, you go borrow a whale video from the library.  Or when they're talking about dinosaurs, or police, or the corner store, or getting haircuts, or whatever, you find a video that correlates to it.  

You can post "cooking day" without putitng a specific thing.  When the kids are talking about bugs, or birds, or breakfast, or whatever, you tailor the cooking activity to that.  

You can post "puppet show" and plan it based on what they are talking about or what book they're really into at the time.

You can post "gross motor day" and gear it toward whatever: move like animals, dance like dancers, crawl like bugs.

"Special project days" can be group-based and involve making a washer/dryer out of boxes, papier-mache a dinosaur, set up a classroom post office, whatever the kids are interested in.

For emergent based learning, you can also point them in the direction you want to go.  Set out a lot of apple books and see if they get excited by them.  Point out the birds you see outside and be ready to explain more about them and have binoculars handy.

Or you can post something weekly with more specific activities, once you know what you're learning about with the children.

Answer 2

what about being earth friendly and sending a weekly email and ditching the paper.... save a few trees :)

Answer 3

Offer a daily calendar...

Answer 4

Parents want to know what is going on so maybe consider not getting rid of the calendar.  I am in agreement with scarlet and generally add the "special activities" but do not be specific...allow the children to lead you in choosing what the topic will be.

A side note...I've come across few have used the excuse of "emergent based learning" as a way to go by the seat of their pants and not plan.  Please don't let your daycare fall into that category!  Planning still needs to take place...order still needs to be there :-) I'm sure you already know that!

Good luck!