Aistear

Early Childhood Curriculum

Aistear

In Junior and Senior Infants we follow the Aistear : Early Childhood Curriculum.    ‘Aistear is the curriculum framework for children from birth to six years in Ireland.’ Both  teachers have set up their classrooms into designated areas some of which include : Construction Area, Literacy Area, Small World, Messy Play, Role Play, Junk Art, Sand & Water, Discovery.

Whilst we as teachers have set up the areas, it is the children themselves who lead the learning.  Through guided activities and ‘suggested’ resources we as the teachers are facilitating the children to become active learners.

There are huge benefits to this approach to learning

  • Children learn by being with others
  • They feel secure and confident
  • They take risks and explore
  • They take part in challenging experiences
  • They direct and co-direct their own learning
  • They feel like they are in control
  • They become involved in making choices and decisions
  • Challenge themselves
  • Their own interests and experiences are built on
  • Through play children build on and extend at school what they have learned at home, at their childminder’s and/or early years setting.
  • Play and first hand experiences are important for children’s well-being
  • Children develop to their best potential through play.
  • Children who are ready to move on can do so, as all children learn at their own rate, through play.

Construction

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Our construction area is always busy.  The children make use of our wonderful wooden blocks and construct their ideas either independently or with a partner.  The children have access to measuring tools to assist them in using mathematical language associated with length, width etc and also writing materials to assist them in labelling their work.

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A brilliantly constructed bear during October when we were working on the story ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’.

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Construction during Fire Safety Week.

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Koren worked independently to create a forest fire close to the deep river….brilliant work from Junior Infants in October.

Small World

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Small World is proving to be very popular this year in Junior Infants.  The children use resources to create a world for their characters and objects.  We have seen a huge variety of settings over the past 3 months : forests, farmyards, underwater worlds, nursery rhyme lands.  The children can create stories and scenarios for their characters in their worlds.  We may very well meet our future movie producers in Small World!

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In the story The Bear and the Scary Night the teddy bear floated in the pond….look at how Koren recreated this scene from the story.

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Here you can see the story of We’re Going on a Bear hunt recreated…..can you spot the forest, the bear cave, the family’s house and the thick oozy mud?

Messy Play

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Messy Play can indeed get very messy.  The children can choose to use water, sand or play dough to create their work.  From time to time the children can experiment with different paint techniques without using paint brushes.  When we studied We’re Going on a Bear Hunt the children used different objects, such as forks, corks, pine cones, matchsticks and lollipop sticks to create their paintings.  When we covered the story Cave Baby the children used spray bottles full of paint to create their own cave paintings.

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We’re Going on a bear hunt.

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Long wavy grass, the deep, cold river, the dark forest and of course the bear.

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What a beautiful selection of minibeasts.

 

 

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Using playdough to make paper dolls.

Role Play

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Role Play is so much fun!  We have been visited by Jack and Jill who after tumbling down the hill needed to visit the doctor to check them over!  The receptionist had everything organised for them,

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There were bears and other forest animals roaming around our bear cave!

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We even opened our own Bug Research Lab and became minibeast explorers

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Literacy

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Everyone loves our literacy area.  Here the children can read and look at books based on the theme of the month.  Other activities include playing snap games, using fuzzy felt to create stories, creating plays using the puppet theatre, drawing and labelling pictures.  It is truly amazing what the children are enabled and choose to do.

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Junk Art

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Junk Art is so much fun! We collect lots of interesting junk such as plates, buttons, yogurt cartons, boxes, bottles, tubs and containers and turn them into amazing creations!

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Creating a fire during Fire Safety Week.

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Creating paper dolls was great fun but tricky!

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This scary crocodile had VERY sharp teeth added afterwards!

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We had lots of bears during the month of October!

CONTACT US

Donore Avenue, Dublin 8

Phone: 01 4542679

E-mail: secretary@stcatherinesns.net

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