Discovering Nature with Young Children
Let's Do Real Science!, The first unit in the innovative Young Scientist series Discovering Nature with Young Children, guides teachers through an inquiry-based curriculum that builds on children's natural curiosity about the living world around them.
From indoor terrarium and planting projects to outdoor animal searches and habitat discussions, this step-by-step guide leads you through preparing yourself and your classroom; guiding children through both open and focused science explorations; and observing, assessing, and documenting their learning. Children will learn the following:
- Essential, lifelong scientific reasoning skills, such as hypothesis, inference, prediction, and estimation, as they investigate the natural world
- Important language and literacy skills as they communicate their findings, participate in discussions, and represent their experiences
- Crucial math skills as they count, measure, sort, categorize, and compare the many plants and animals in their surroundings
For teachers who want to do serious science in their preschool classroom, this resource-rich curriculum gives you all the tools you need.
Discovering Nature with Young Children
Field-tested across the country, this comprehensive curriculum expands and extends the role science has traditionally played in the early childhood classroom. The first in a new series from Redleaf Press, Discovering Nature with Young Children explores the wide-ranging elements that make up the natural world around us. The curriculum replaces simple fact-feeding practices with the development of long-term scientific reasoning, including literacy skills and numeracy skills, such as hypothesis, inference, prediction, and estimation.
Discovering Nature with Young Children, Trainer's Guide
A companion to the curriculum, this trainer's guide serves as an indispensable handbook for trainers and administrators to use in introducing staff to the curriculum—from planning to implementation. Special sections outline the curriculum and introduce scientific reasoning to adults, and eight workshops detail the complete curriculum for staff members. The guide also includes strategies for supporting teachers over time through mentoring and guided discussions.
Discovering Nature with Young Children, Training Video
A wonderful training companion to both the curriculum and trainer's guide, this full-color video contains real-life vignettes of this complete curriculum in action in the classroom. Perfect for staff training and development.
Discovering Nature with Young Children was developed through the Tool Kit for Early Childhood Science Education at EDC, a project funded by the National Science Foundation designed to improve science teaching and learning in early childhood education.
The curriculum is available from Redleaf Press:
Redleaf Press
Phone: (800) 423-8309
Fax: (800) 641-0115
URL: http://www.redleafpress.org
