Posted by Chip on February 2, 2010
In my entries about children’s positive attributes, you can find details about the kinds of strengths children seem to display at different ages and stages of their development. No two children are the same, of course, and each will gravitate to different interests at the same ages because different things excite different children, energize them, [...]
Categories: Parent Questions and Concerns, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, observing children, parent concerns, parent questions, Parent Questions and Concerns, Positive Attributes, Strength Awakening, The Affinities Program | 
Post a Comment »
Posted by Chip on August 25, 2009
One of the more important “back to school” activities teachers facilitate for their students is their setting of personal and class goals for the year ahead. In theResponsive Classroom approach, the goal-setting strategy is known as “Hopes and Dreams. By the second week of school, kindergarten through six grade classrooms display colorful pictures of children [...]
Categories: The Responsive Classroom® approach, The School Year |
Tags: back to school, building classroom community, children's positive attributes, Positive Attributes | 2 Comments »
Posted by Chip on August 6, 2009
Closer to teenagers than middle childhood, the twelves, too, are still tweeners. Twelves have enormous positive energy for both independent and group endeavors, whether at school, in sports, or in after-school activities such as dance, gymnastics, martial arts, chess, cooking, or crafts. This is a great age for camp, whether day or residential. More mature [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes, seventh grade, twelve-year-olds | Post a Comment »
Posted by Chip on August 3, 2009
Elevens are powerful advocates, strong believers, and budding lawyers. They are passionate about their ideas and their opinions, their allegiances and their sense of justice. They are devoted to their classmates and peer groups,and the social negotiations surrounding cliques, which tend to peak at eleven and twelve, elevens are in a clear growth spurt both [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, eleven-year-olds, Positive Attributes, sixth grade | Post a Comment »
Posted by Chip on July 16, 2009
Double-digit kids, these tens can take on anything and love every minute of it (well, almost). If you sense my unbridled enthusiasm for this age, you’re not off the mark. It didn’t take me long as a teacher to latch onto the understanding that if you want to teach in “middle childhood,” there is no [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: bellasara.com, children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, fifth grade, Positive Attributes, Rick Riordan, ten-year-olds | Post a Comment »
Posted by Chip on July 14, 2009
Nine is not always an easy age, but it is an age of growing social awareness, of intellectual stretching, wondering, and clamoring These are the “ing,” kids, the “dangling participles” easily misunderstood, the kids who are doing, encouraging, questioning, doubting, arguing…sometimes seemingly just for the sake of it, with no clear antecedents for their [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: Billy Collins, children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, fourth grade, nine-year-olds, Positive Attributes, Yardsticks | Post a Comment »
Posted by Chip on July 9, 2009
When eight-year-olds wake up in the morning, new plans for adventure are percolating before their feet hit the floor. These plans usually involve a friend, or better yet, a group of friends to share adventures with in the neighborhood or at school. It can be as simple as rounding up a game of kickball [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, eight-year-olds, Positive Attributes, third grade | 2 Comments »
Posted by Chip on July 7, 2009
Sevens notice everything…in detail. Smallness is characteristic of their drawing, writing, and play constructions. Everything’s reduced to the microcosm, miniaturized to an intricate and controllable world they’re trying to make perfect.
Dioramas fit in shoeboxes, providing room enough for furniture, rugs, vases, with tiny flowers, people and/or animals smaller than clothespins, cut out of cardboard and adorned with colorful [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes, second grade, seven-year-olds | 5 Comments »
Posted by Chip on June 29, 2009
No one is more industrious than six-year-olds. They take on every activity, at home and at school, with unbridled enthusiasm. Work is completed in no time at all, though quantity, not quality, is the measure that counts for sixes, along with trying new things. Being first to read a new book, spell a new word, [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, first grade, Positive Attributes, six-year-olds | 1 Comment »
Posted by Chip on June 26, 2009
There is a discernable turning point in the fifth year where the focused, centered, rule-following kindergartener becomes the full-fledged explorer. A growth spurt is beginning that will last through the sixth year. “Stretching” is a good word for this age. At home and in class, children are often stretching the truth, testing the rules, seeing [...]
Categories: Developmental Needs, Positive Attributes |
Tags: children's positive attributes, children's strengths, developmental changes, Developmental Needs, five-and-a-half-year-olds, kindergarten, Positive Attributes | Post a Comment »
Recent Comments