Looking for engaging, cross-curricular kindergarten activities that work online? Here are three learning experiences that were a hit in our class!
Directed Show and Share:
After organizing our online class into smaller groups, we started weekly Show and Tell time. This was the traditional showing of a toy and resulting discussion. Students’ attention, however, was often on telling their own story (loosely related to the item being shown) or on the item they were waiting to show themselves.
We made the first shift to Show and Share with the request to bring a picture online that they drew or a photo of their family. It was a nice way to learn a bit more about our students and a good opportunity for them to speak about what they knew. Their classmates listened with interest.
The directed sessions tied into things we were focused on in a given week. We requested that our students find something focus-based for Friday’s Show and Share in Monday morning Week-at-a-glance postings. Here are some examples: two things that rhyme, something that starts with the same letter as your name, two different things that are the same shape, something with numbers on it, etc. This gave students a scavenger hunt they could do that allowed their parents some peace! Kindergarten students love feeling like they get to be the teacher for a few minutes a week, too. Win-win!
Jillian Jiggs box activity:
I read Jillian Jiggs to the Rescue to our class (an awesome storybook lesson)! We had been focusing on rhyming, and these stories lent themselves well to that. Phoebe Gilman’s illustrations offer so much for their audience to lose themselves in, and the reader to extract meaning from. Our students were enthralled with the monsters that Jillian and her friends made out of the cardboard boxes. Boxes were constantly being delivered into most of their homes because of the pandemic!
With Jillian Jiggs’ monsters fresh in their minds, and pictures of the ambulance my class made last year online as models, our students were excited to create box projects. We talked about materials and what they would have to ask permission for and get help with. They shared many creative ideas. Some stuck with the monster theme while others branched off into robots. Vehicles were the most popular!
I posted the results of our discussion in our online classroom as an asynchronous option and invited sharing of pictures. Over the next few days, many pictures showed up and classmates (through their parents) left rave reviews in the comments for each other. It was wonderful how they supported each other, and it gave them more to discuss during social time.
Kids only social time
Why we did it:
Virtual learning environments by nature do not foster social-emotional growth and independence in our youngest students. Those short yet powerful moments when they would normally speak for and amongst themselves are lost in online learning, so it’s important to schedule them in! We want ‘Computer school’ to be as much like going to school in person as possible – with as many of the engaging, cross-curricular conversations and activities that make kindergarten feel like kindergarten!
Before 2020, kindergarten students engaged in conversation during play, at snack time, outside, during transitions and before and after school. For the first time in history, adult – child ratios in kindergarten are nearing 1:1 or 1:2 in some areas with parents taking on even more responsibility in their already full lives. Colleagues who also teach little ones have commented on the puppet phenomenon that has been a side effect of online teaching – students who look to their parents to tell them what to say, when they are capable of saying it themselves.
How we set it up:
We had Meet-the-Teachers Meets early in the school year, and introduced the idea within those family Meets, reinforcing what we had discussed before they started. We reviewed some ideas for conversation starters, and then it began.
Students could expect:
- that when they enter each Meet during the day, they will know it’s on because they will see the microphone on sign on display
- they will not see a teacher right away
- the kids get to visit with each other
- grown ups are nearby, but the kids are visiting for the first 5 minutes.
At the beginning, it was all about ‘What did you have for lunch?’. A few well-meaning moms were right there to jump in and get them talking. Once truly left to themselves, and sitting with a bit of awkward silence, they started to talk to each other. (I admit I sent my cat past the screen a couple of times for some comic relief once or twice in the beginning – picture a gift appearing in a toned-down Hungers Games.)
Within a couple of days, they were arriving early to visit each other and the five minutes flew by with engaging conversations about pets, toys, activities and more. They had become friends.
We had four schools worth of kids in our virtual class, in multiple groupings. Moms from two of the schools organized small ‘bubble’ groupings within their own home schools to meet at the park most days so their kids could also be in-person friends, too.
We were in the process of creating a virtual by interest play group schedule for asynchronous time when our board switched to the hybrid model mid-October. We had to say goodbye to our virtual class.
What was planned:
Anticipating that we would have our class all year, I did create these assessments with the intention of using my iPad through the screen, on printed recording sheets. I had too many split screen issues trying other things! They are Google Slides compatible, and I dreamed them up before COVID, as a way to have a portable (i.e. use on tablet in the kindergarten yard), kid-friendly (short sections with fun visuals), mess-free (vs. my letter tiles, shape manipulatives etc.) time saver.
I bundled them with The Complete Personal Letter Sounds Bundle to create this:
Have you noticed the puppet phenomenon? How do you address it?
Best wishes to all of you and your loved ones as we climb out of this!
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