Customer Reviews

Early Learning Environments That Work

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I would suggest buying two books (if no others) on designing early childhood environments: Kritchevsky's/Prescott's PLANNING ENVIRONMENTS FOR YOUNG CHILDREN PHYSICAL SPACE and this one.

Isbell moves you through ever meticulous detail to designing the class, from setting up your mental/education viewpoint to understanding appropriately scaled furniture for the correct child age.

Highly, highly recommended because I used this book as my instruction manuel for constructing my well-reviewed Pre-K classroom.

First the good: The book has pleanty of creative ideas, like using see-through jars and storage units so kids could awe the materials they're about to choose. There are also tons of neat ideas for making storage racks out of hangers and plastic bottles.

Now, the not so good. The authors base their work on the Reggio Emilia school system in Italy. However, they never show a picture of these superb Italian schools and the philosphy behind these schools is generalized.

In an an ideal world, all of our preschool centers would look like the ones written about in this book. However, the authors never take into consideration that the majority of teachers are constrained by budget. They can't buy nearly half of the material the authors suggest for each center. The ideal centers in the book, roughly sketched, are huge and if they were paired all together, the preschool would be the size of a grocery store.

The book continues to be very general and never dives into the detail about design. Instead it tells you, for example, in the area of color, to buy a color wheel and learn how to use it. I would think the purpose of buying this book would be that I would learn every thing possible from the book and not have to find extra resources, until the book was exhausted.

The book goes on to say that every child learns differently at certain ages, but I think it's safe to say that boys in general learn differenlty from girls. The book doesn't mention how to design a center if you have 14 boys and three girls in the room or how to accomodate learning preferences.

Finally, the authors never consider culture as one aspect to designing a preschool center. How can a center reflect a child's home culture and language?

I am opening a childcare center and this book helped me to figure out what I had to buy before my building was finsished. The classrooms in this book are pretty busy and cluttered, but I was able to pick through what I didn't need pretty easily. I do have to say that the book was worth buying.

From infant/toddler care through Kindergarten this book is all you could ever ask for to help you set up a space that is perfect for young children! From suggesting a dimmer to soften the lighting to plans for building a loft, this book has it all!