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Date: 9/2/2016
EAST LONGMEADOW – For the past 20 years, East Longmeadow High School (ELHS) students have been teaching and learning from preschoolers first hand as part of the Little Big Kids Nursery School program.
Denise Gauthier, a family and consumer science teacher at ELHS, who has been teaching the course for 13 years, told Reminder Publications the high school students learn child development skills and the preschoolers learn from the high school students.
“The [upper level] high school kids write all the lesson plans – just like a real teacher,” ELHS family and consumer science teacher Mary Jane McMahon, who ran the course for its first seven years, said.
The primary duty of the high school students in the course is to become “great observers,” of the preschoolers who are between 3 and 5 years old, Gauthier stated.
"[High schoolers] spend a lot of time writing anecdotal records, running records, and different observations of the preschool children,” she added. “That’s sort of an introductory duty, but as they go on in the levels they go from just participating in the classroom and being great readers of children’s books … or building a specific center in the preschool room and they go from there to actually planning the learning activities for the children.”
McMahon explained the high school students also assess how their lessons plans went.
“There’s a lot of feedback and [they] try new and different things if it didn’t work out,” she noted. “You’re learning from the kids, basically.”
The course takes place three days a week from 7 to 10:30 a.m.
Gauthier said the program runs like a normal preschool – the preschoolers have story time and there are various centers for learning in subjects such as art, science, math, dramatic play, and music and movement. There are weekly themes for preschoolers to learn about that center around a storybook.
She added preschoolers also have the opportunity to see what’s going on in the rest of the building, including seeing the school’s band and chorus perform, seeing art shows, as well as visiting chemistry labs and classrooms.
Gauthier said she believes the course has been a success during the past two decades because the preschoolers grow immensely during the time they attend Little Big Kids Nursery School – some attend the program for two to three years.
She added the greatest growth that she believes high school students gain from the experience is a passion for working with kids.
“Every time I hear of one more high school student who’s decided to go into early childhood education or become a pediatric nurse or pediatrician,” Gauthier said. “This kind of started their love for children and they might branch it out into a different direction, but that, to me, is success for the high school student. Some of them really just find their niche or what they really love.”
At the end of the course, Gauthier said she asks high schoolers what the best and worst parts of the course were for them.
“Invariably, they say that the best part of the course is the interaction with the children,” she added. “And then I usually ask them, ‘What did you learn most from this course?’ Fifty percent or more of the time they’ll say, ‘patience.’”
McMahon said the course focuses on real life skills with a hands-on approach.
“It’s not just reading a book about children, it’s actually sitting down next to them and teaching them and listening to their responses,” she added.
She said sometimes new high school students who enroll in the course attended Little Big Kids Nursery School when they were preschoolers.
“They were there as 4 year olds and now their at 14 or 17 working with preschoolers,” she added. “They’re learning, but also giving back because a lot of them have fond memories of the high school kids that worked with them.”
High school registration for the course is closed as of now, but there are three openings for preschoolers, Gauthier said. The start date is Sept. 20. The nursery school is open on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
“In years past we’ve had a waiting list,” she noted. “This is the first year that we’ve had openings.”
For more information about Little Big Kids Nursery School call 525-5460 and ask for Gauthier.