#ECOOearlyYears Series: Building a Maker Mindset in the Early Years Learning Environment
Klara Redford and Michelle McKay
4 Sessions (Register once, attend all four sessions)
Tuesday, April 6, 2021 7-8 pm ET(session recording below)Tuesday, April 20, 2021 7-8 pm ET(postponed)- Tuesday, May 4, 2021 7-8 pm ET
- Tuesday, May 18, 2021 7-8 pm ET
Description: Dedicated to Early Years educators, this multi-session support series will begin with a look back at the joyful journey that many Kindergarten students undertook this past year as part of their exploration and inquiry into “Making” in the Kindergarten virtual learning environment (VLE).
Sessions will rotate bi-weekly between speaker presentations and sharing sessions. Speaker presentations will be focused on sharing information about getting started with making in a virtual Kindergarten learning environment and extending opportunities for children to make while learning online in a responsive way. During sharing sessions, you will have the opportunity to collaborate and discuss with other educators your experiences and plan next steps that can be used within your practice. Our last session will focus on how we can continue as a community to support one another in our maker journeys, and beyond! #ECOOEarlyYears
- 60-minute sessions
- Tuesday nights (7:30 – 8:30 pm)
April 6th: Setting Sail with Making in the Virtual Kindergarten Classroom
Mentor texts, technology and artifacts of student learning will be shared to exemplify and amplify student voice and choice as our learners planned, created, innovated, failed up, persevered, collaborated and communicated their ideas and maker journeys – an example of the sincere JOYS of learning while at home! Educators will be invited to integrate some of this new learning into their current practices and share their experiences during the next session, April 20.
April 20th – Reflection/Chat/Community Building
May 4th: Cruising with Creating in the Early Years Classroom
This session will follow-up on educator experiences in Session #1 and 2 and how we can extend our understanding of making and the maker mindset through cross-curricular experiences. We will look at deepening our understanding of how ‘making’ naturally links to computational thinking and all of the math processes. Student examples of ‘making’ linked to coding and spatial reasoning will be shared. Educators will be invited to integrate some of this new learning into their current practices and share their experiences during the next session, May 18th.
May 18th – Reflection/Chat/Continuation of Community Building