Establishing a predictable environment
You can start the day on the right note by first considering children’s transition from home to school. Start by mindfully designing your classroom to welcome children each morning. Provide cubbies where each child can store belongings and find them when they are needed. Near those cubbies, and in other places in the classroom, display images of the most important people in children’s lives, so those familiar faces can accompany them through their day. And, most importantly, take the time to greet each child with a warm welcome and a clean slate, leaving behind any challenges from the previous day and offering an unconditional fresh start.
The arrangement of your room can be almost as important in creating a welcoming environment as your warm and caring presence. You don’t need elaborate furniture or equipment to be purposeful in the ways you arrange and stock each individual activity area. Make the most of the space and supplies you have to support emotional and social development and to encourage learning.
One way to do this is to keep the classroom environment predictable, introducing change, challenge, and novelty in small doses. For example, arrange your library area with cozy areas for looking at books alone and larger chairs or benches for reading books with friends and with you. Keep the library furniture and arrangement basically the same from day to day, but spark children’s interest by introducing new themes and highlighting different books throughout the year.
Make sure the physical environment of your classroom meets children where they are. Provide enough toys and materials (offering duplicates if necessary), so children don’t have to wait longer for a turn than their age and developmental stage allow. Children can only practice the important skills of waiting, sharing, and turn-taking when they trust that their turn will come before they are out of patience!
You can help set children up for successful transitions from one activity to the next by providing cues about how to maintain order. Label shelves and storage areas, and use furniture to divide play spaces (for example, using bookshelves to create a special place for dramatic play, or easy-to-clean table mats to delineate where to work on your very own art project in the art area).