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Thursday, September 30, 2021

2 Simple Ways To Teach Your Child To Put On Their Coat Independently





2 Simple Ways To Teach Your Child To Put On Their Coat Independently


As a preschool teacher, one of the most stressful times of the day can be getting ready to go outside. Putting on your child's coat may not seem like a big deal, but it can be a time-consuming activity when you have 20+ students in a classroom. We want our students to spend their time learning or playing. Not putting on coats! 

How can we help them without doing everything for them? I want to share my two favorite ways to teach children to put on their own coats.


Why Should I Encourage My Child To Put On Their Own Coat?


As parents and teachers, we want to do what is best for our children. We want to take care of them and help them, but sometimes we are hurting them by not allowing them the time to do these things independently. Allowing your child to dress themselves enables them to learn skills they will need in their day-to-day lives. Something as simple as putting on a coat helps your child with balance, coordination, flexibility, and strength. Your child will also build necessary self-confidence by doing these things independently. 


How Do I Teach My Child To Put On Their Own Coat?


Over the years, parents and teachers have tried many ways of teaching children to put on their coats. I am going to teach you my two favorite tricks! These are effective methods that have been used for decades and handed down. They are simple to teach and easy to learn... with a bit of practice, of course!


Flip & Zip: The Magic Coat Trick


This is my favorite method to teach children. We call it the Flip & Zip method in my classroom. This method is excellent because you can use it with ANY type of coat. You do not need a hood for this trick to work.

  1. Have your child/student place the coat on the floor or a table with the armholes facing up.
  2. Show them how to stand by the hood/tag/neck of the coat.
  3. Place their arms inside the armholes and have them flip the coat over their head. 
  4. The coat will easily slide on and will be ready for zipping!
Once the child learns where to stand, they will be putting their coats on without assistance in no time! My assistant and I wait for our students to Flip and come over to us for a Zip until they are ready to learn the zipping part. 

Give your child enough space to Flip & Zip without hitting anyone with their arms or coat! If you have a large classroom, allow only a few students to go get their coats at a time.




The Hat Helper Trick

This method is another excellent way to learn how to put on a coat. However, your child will need a hood for this trick to work. We call this the Hat Helper trick. 

  1. Have your child/student first place the hood of the coat on their head. 
  2. Gently pull the coat with the opposite arm and slide your arm in the hole. 
  3. Now place the other arm in the armhole using the same method.
You will not need as much space to do the Hat Helper trick, which is helpful in a busy classroom setting. 



Practice, Practice, Practice!

Give your child time to practice! This is a new skill that will take time to perfect. 

  • Don't ask your child to get their coat on when you need to head out the door. Give them plenty of time to achieve the task without feeling rushed. 
  • Don't help unless you are truly needed. It's hard to see our children struggle, but doing it for them takes away the learning opportunity and will make the task harder to learn. Explain, encourage, and then, only if they are really tried their best, help them. 


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Friday, September 17, 2021

How To Use Bingo Games To Teach Colors To Preschool Children


It's that time of year again! I just welcomed 21 new students into my classroom a few weeks ago. We spend our first weeks working on rules, routines, and just getting to know each other. Once we start settling into a routine it's time for me to get an idea of what these new students already know. One of my favorite ways to learn and review colors is to use Color Bingo games. 



Using Color Themed Bingo Games To Teach Colors

Every year I will have students who come to my classroom knowing their colors already, and I will also have students who can't name a single color. It is important to have games and activities that both sets of children can enjoy playing. That's why I created my Color Bingo games. By holding up the picture, saying the color, and then having the children search for the picture on their game board, I am reinforcing the name of the color and letting them search for it to connect the name to the color. You can hold up the picture and ask the students to name the color for you. The more we play these games the more students begin to learn colors and connect the name to the color.

I currently have two Color Bingo games that I use with my students. I will talk more about them below.



Dinosaur Color Bingo

My students are learning about Dinosaurs for the next two weeks! Dinosaurs are so much fun to learn about, so I wanted to have a connecting color activity for them. I created Dinosaur Color Bingo for the very beginning of the school year. 

This game has only 9 spaces on the card making it an easy bingo game for students who may have never played bingo before. There are 11 colors included, so not every card will have every color. 




Show your students the dinosaur card that you draw from your pile and have them name the color out loud. Then have them find the color on their card and place a bingo chip or other type of marker on that spot. Continue until someone gets three across or three down.



Color Bingo

Once your students get the hang of how to play bingo, you may want to continue playing color bingo games with a slightly harder game. Color Bingo has 16 spaces and includes 22 pictures. That is 2 pictures for each color. 

Color Bingo is great to use for practice throughout the year. Sometimes I just pull it out to make sure we are not forgetting what we learned earlier in the year. Sometimes we just play it because it's fun!


Are you ready to play Bingo? Grab these Bingo games and many more by going to my TPT Store HERE.






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Friday, June 25, 2021

5 Amazing Ways To Teach Young Children Using Educational Bingo Games



Bingo is a timeless classic among children and adults, but did you know that it was used as an educational tool in 19th century Germany? Teachers used Bingo games to teach children math, animal names, spelling, and history!

We can use educational Bingo games to teach young children many different skills. Let's talk about 5 things young children can learn while playing Bingo games!


Learning With Bingo Games

You can use Bingo to teach so many different things! It's one reason that Bingo is a staple in my preschool classroom. Here are 5 ways your students will learn while playing Bingo.

1) Vocabulary

Even the youngest learners will grow their vocabulary through bingo games. Use themed games and discuss the words and pictures on the cards before playing the game. 




2) Literacy

Learn letters and letter sounds with bingo games targeted towards literacy skills.



3) Math

Basic math concepts such as counting, number identification, and shapes are easily learned through bingo play.




4) Visual Discrimination

Picture Bingo games rely on visual discrimination to find the correct picture on the game board.




5) Fine Motor

Bingo is a great way to practice fine motor skills! Students must use their pincher grasp to pick up the chips, gems, or other items to place on the game board. You can make this more difficult by adding tweezers and pom-poms.


There are so many ways to learn with Bingo! What are some of your favorite Bingo games? You can check out ALL of my Bingo games by heading to my TPT store HERE.




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Preschool Calendar Time: How To Increase The Benefits By Incorporating Linear Calendars








Calendars In The Classroom 


Many early childhood educators use a calendar in their classrooms. This practice seems to be engrained into the classroom routine. To many teachers, a calendar seems like a good thing to teach young students. You can discuss days of the week, months of the year, and so on. Is this REALLY developmentally appropriate for our youngest learners? 


I came across this wonderful article that discusses this very subject. You can check it out by clicking here. 


So how can we use a calendar in our classroom and make this time meaningful? I want to talk to you about linear calendars!


Do Preschoolers Care About Calendars?

Most preschoolers are too young to understand or care about the aspects of calendars that are being taught using a traditional calendar. They don’t care what day of the week it is, but they care if they stay home or go to school that day. They don’t care if it is April, but they will care that their birthday is in April. Using a linear calendar, we can focus on the things that the students care about, which will keep them engaged and excited about calendar time!


What Are The Pros Of Using A Linear Calendar?

A linear calendar is very much like a number line. There are no breaks in the calendar, and it stretches from 1-31 across the wall. Due to the way a linear calendar is constructed, it gives children a more concrete way to visualize the passage of time. We can count down to special events and count the days that have passed. My students love anticipating what number comes next when we do our calendar time each morning!





How I Use My Linear Calendar

I set my calendar up a bit differently than other teachers I’ve seen. I do not place the numbers on the calendar and keep them there. Instead, we place each number on the calendar when we do calendar time in the morning. You can opt to add your numbers all at once and simply cross them off as you go.

I start my calendar time by asking what number it was yesterday. They know this because it is the last number on the calendar. Everyone gets to say the number together as a class. Then I will ask them what number comes after (the number they just shouted). They will answer together as a class. After placing the number on the calendar, I will state the date correctly (Today is Monday, March 4th). We will look for special events coming up and do a quick count down. Sometimes we will count each day of the month to see how far we have come, and then we count to see how many days we have until the next month. 

Our calendar time lasts less than a minute! There is no time for the students to get bored or misbehave. You can still have your calendar time without the boredom and hassle of a traditional calendar. 


Click HERE to grab my Linear Calendar Set on TPT.








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Monday, June 14, 2021

The Purple Daisy Teaching Resources


 I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Jamie and I am the owner of The Purple Daisy Teaching Resources. 


I began teaching in a preschool setting in 2014. I would often purchase curriculum materials for my classroom, but many times I felt the materials lacking something I needed or full of items I didn't. I started creating materials for my classroom in 2019. My students loved everything! They were engaged and loved to learn using our new materials. I loved creating them, so it really was a win-win situation!


In 2020 we were hit with COVID-19. Many schools closed and we were left without jobs or working reduced hours. I decided to take advantage of this extra time and post some of my creations on Teachers Pay Teachers. Even during the pandemic, my items were selling. I realized that other teachers had the same needs that I had and I wanted to make sure they had access to my creations.


A year later I am still creating and selling my classroom materials. I decided to start this blog as a way to show off some of my creations and interact with other teachers and parents. I hope to post informational, fun, and exciting teaching ideas!


Welcome to my blog!

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