Past projects 10
Creative Building Structures!
Funded May 2, 2019What a great email to receive after school! I cannot wait to incorporate these materials into my classroom. I am looking forward to opening up the items with the students before the end of the year! It’s always a fun activity when new boxes arrive! Thank you so much for supporting early childhood education!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by PNC Grow Up Great® and 6 other donors.What Can We Investigate?
Funded Dec 9, 2017Providing natural science experience's into the preschool environment is always something that sparks interest, excitement and inquiry. The items provided not only have been well loved since being received, students ask for them even when the units don't relate to the particular theme we are working on.
Bringing large cardboard boxes into the classroom sparks excitement regardless of what is inside. However we opened the boxes as a group and some of the activities I had put away until the specific unit of Traditional tales came up in the curriculum 2 months after we received them. However due to the amazing minds and memory of the preschool group, they continued to ask for the Stem kits so they were brought out much sooner to explore. The sink or float activity sure was messy but every student in my classroom was eager to complete the investigation!
On a regular basis, when I have a new student, move items for summer school the binoculars that were purchased through this project always come with me. I may have a photo with every student since this project was funded using the binoculars, carrying them around the room, or looking out the classroom window to see things. They are an absolute staple to the preschool classroom environment. I am so thankful for all the donations, this project has made since fun and engaging on a daily basis with materials that children can self-initiate and use!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by PNC Grow Up Great® and 7 other donors.Learning Without Tears for Pre-K!
Funded Jul 10, 2017I was so excited before attending this professional development workshop, and still am so grateful for the opportunity. This is one of those professional development workshops that I already knew I would be putting into action as soon as I returned to my classroom. The most incredible part is I was able to use materials with a purpose. My students already had access to many of the core materials for the Learning Without Tears program, however without the knowledge background, scope and sequence and fundamental understanding of the program I was unable to implement the materials to their full extent.
Even during the training I was able to think and create new ideas and modifications of activities I am already implementing daily. The additional bonus of this training is that they provide you with a lot of the base materials which means I am now able to do a full small group and each child has physical materials to work with and follow along with.
My preschool students were excited to use their "Long lines" and "Sort lines" to make letters and patterns, they were captivated by the songs, and visuals to support learning through play and activities rather than worksheets and tracing. Thank you so much for your support, I am so appreciative of the amazing opportunities Donors like you have been able to provide for my students, both current and into the future.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by PNC Grow Up Great® and 3 other donors.A Shape to Call My Own!
Funded Jul 10, 2017Wow, one of the items I have been waiting to replace in my classroom, came just a few days before school started. Even my coworkers talked about how bright and inviting this particular rug is. It has surpassed my expectations and has really had some amazing impacts in my classroom. Students now have a clear understanding of their place and personal space during carpet time. I was able to make a "seating chart," as seen in one of the photos, which was picked up and understood easily the first day it was put to use. Students are able to check their bodies, stay focused and following simple directions when moving around during brain breaks and small activities that I have planned throughout large group times. I cannot thank you enough for the amazing contributions and helping my classroom complete this project!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by PNC Grow Up Great® and 6 other donors.Developing Little Movers!
Funded Apr 26, 2016Wow! It has taken a long time to get great photos of all the amazing things our students have access to thanks to everyone support. This February during our Healthy Habits unit, students were able to access so many neat materials and opportunities. They were climbing rocks and stepping stones inside and able to ride bikes/scooters outside. Students have responded so quickly to the fitness cue cards you have provided to them as well.
Our Basketball hoop and child size basketballs are used throughout outside time every time they are available to our students. Having a backboard helps the students become more successful with their new skills.
Due to some materials no longer being available we were able to get strong paint to support our outdoor hopscotch that the students helped create. This has become a huge focal point of our outdoor learning environment. With stones numbered up to 15, students get daily practicing counting up to 15 and using 1:1 correspondence.
Our Early Childhood Program is so grateful for the amazing opportunities you have provided not only for our current students, but the materials will be used year after year by our program students.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by Dunham Fund and 4 other donors.A Place to Read and Relax
Funded Sep 23, 2016As the year started students were so excited to guess what was coming in our boxes. There were lots of fun ideas as to what the big blue rectangle could be. Only one students guessed it correctly!
Teaching students to use their environment functionally has always been a key component to using a quiet and calming corner appropriately. Students love having a place they can escape to if they are tired, overwhelmed or just needing a moment to take some belly breaths. We were even able to add some visual supports and Ideas for students to use in order to calm down. We often use materials for our listening center that was also a Donors Choose Project in 2014 in quiet space.
I am so grateful for the Donors who supported our class project and to those at Donors Choose for creating a way for others to give back to children who often cannot advocate for themselves and their needs.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
Let's Sing and Dance!
Funded Feb 4, 2015So much change has happened within the "Yellow Room" over the past few months. Originally, this request was to help support 15-20 students and now, up to 40 students could have access to these wonderful materials throughout the school year. Everyone was excited to have a new selection of materials to use for large group participation activities. The new music was also a plus, we are still learning new songs and dances this year.
The students will first learn how to be safe with the materials and then they will have the ability to use them during their free choice play later in the year. All of the music blends seamlessly into our learning to listen, be ready and be safe activities so we can use them year round.
When I started using the new materials students were excited to have new choices. With multiple colored Rhythm sticks, scarves bean bags and eggs, students are able to work on appropriately requesting items they want instead of getting the same as everyone else.
Thank you so much for you donations. Due to the change in classroom environment it took much longer to get materials out and in order for everyone to have access to them but they were out last year and this year everyone is excited to learn about our new materials as well.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
This classroom project was brought to life by Dunham Fund and 8 other donors.Ways To Go!
Funded Oct 21, 2014The children were so excited to participate in the movement experiences related to our transportation unit. They could not wait to get on the scooter boards and go! The whole class had a big WOW!, when they entered our Purple Room and saw the car wash. Unfortunately due to unpredictable cold weather we were not able to use the train station outside very often, but we did bring those materials into our hallway to experience safe movement patterns while pretending to be trains.
We put the arrows down on the floor to help direct "traffic" around our car wash. The floor tape helped create road lanes to direct traffic too. This helped everyone to be safe and go in the right direction. This allowed the students to be independent with the scooter boards.
Part of learning about transportation is learning that traffic follows rules and moves safely because the roads are marked and guide drivers and vehicles safely. Teaching these concepts in an interactive experience allowed the children to understand the importance of safety and following rules.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
L is for Learning
Funded Sep 15, 2014Wow, I cannot believe the amount of learning and exploring that is happening at our Alphabet Center. Student choose to visit this center daily and I am able to create so many different activities with the puzzles and games we received through this project.
I often use the puzzle pieces for letters sorts and I have even included them with object identification. With a classroom including many English Language Learners the wonderful real life images have been an added support in their language development too.
The most exciting news, is that after our winter preschool assessments of early language and literacy development, students in my classroom all improved their scores. Most are now falling into the Tier I: Strong Progress range in the Sound ID and Alliteration categories (meaning their scores indicate the child is understanding the task successfully) . Currently all of the students in my classroom have Individual Education Plans and your donations have helped support "closing the gap" between their academic needs in a school setting.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski
The Literacy Benefits of Listening
Funded Mar 26, 2014Thank you so much for your kind donations! When the materials arrived I was so excited to introduce the students to them as soon as possible. We began to introduce the steps for using the tape player and head phones, then we worked on following along with the reading and turning the pages when we heard the signal. The younger students will need more time to develop that skill, but I was able to watch them blossom even in the short remainder of the school year. Before these materials were available, the students were able to remain in the independent reading area for only a few short minutes, after having the listening center for three weeks almost all of my students including the three year olds were able to remain and participate in developmentally appropriate reading: holding the book the right way, turning the individual pages of the book, and some even pointing to words and pairing them with the language. Since the students are so young, it was not a fully up and running as an independent center just yet, but I think for some they definitely could have managed it. I have the listening center already to go for next year and those returning students will be able to self activate and listen to stories on their own.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Bielski