50 Fantastic Ideas to Captivate Boys

Description

_______________ The 50 Fantastic Ideas series is packed full of fun, original, skills-based activities for Early Years practitioners to use with children aged 0-5. Each activity features step-by-step guidance, a list of resources, and a detailed explanation of the skills children will learn. Creative, simple, and highly effective, this series is a must-have for every Early Years setting. You only need to watch children to know that boys and girls learn differently! It's not that girls don't like to be outdoors, to get messy or to be noisily active, they do - they are just able control their muscles at a younger age, so they can sit, watch and listen to adults more easily. They can also manipulate materials and tools such as pencils (called fine motor skills) earlier than many boys, so they are ready for the reading and writing activities in school. But we must resist the temptation to think that boys are not as good as girls - they are just different. Their skills and interests draw them to activities that are big, adventurous, risky and messy, and of course, they love being outside. All children like pretend play, but this is sometimes limited to domestic activity in the home corner, rather than allowing boys to experiment with roles often associated with grown-up men. This book offers you fifty ideas for things that make the most of the ways boys learn, capturing their interest and helping them to learn. Many offer opportunities for early writing, mathematics and reading, as well as technology, science and role-play.

Following a career in teaching, 6 years headship of an Infant school with a large nursery, and 4 years as an LEA adviser in Leicestershire, Sally Featherstone has been working as an independent trainer and consultant for the past 9 years. Her work covers a wide range of current issues in the management and assessment of learning in the early years. Sally's particular interests are in the development of independent learning, whole brain learning, gender, and play in the early years. She is the series editor for the successful Little Book series and is the co-author of the recently completed series of Little Baby Books. She has worked with Nicola Call on the titles Thinking Child and Thinking Child Resource Book, both addressing whole brain learning in the Foundation Stage, and with Ros Bayley on Foundations for Independence, We Can Do It, Smooth Transitions, and Boys and Girls Come out to Play. In 2005, Sally wrote Making it Work in Year 1 specially for teachers aiming to build on Smooth Transitions, and has since worked with Ros Bayley and Lynn Broadbent on the Carrying on in Key Stage 1 series. New titles Sally has been involved in are the Baby and Beyond Series, L is For Sheep, Again, Again and Like Bees, not Butterflies. Sally divides her time between writing and training and conferences for practitioners working with children from birth to eight.

Any learning environment, home, classroom, nursery or staff room would be all the richer for having a set of these books on their shelves for reference. * Early Years Educator *