Away we go!

Hello!
So, here I am at my very first blog. I've decided to use this slice of the internet to document my journey as a brand new Pre-School teacher, and I am so excited.

I have just finished up with college. Boy howdy, was I glad to shake my head out after all those exams, a dissertation, and countless projects and essays. I got my results recently, and it turns out the hard slog paid off, because I am now the proud owner of a First Class Honours degree in Early Childhood Care and Education!

And it is armed with this knowledge and enthusiasm that I take my first steps into employment. I went for a couple of interviews and managed to bag a great job as a Pre-School Teacher in a village within driving distance of home.


My contract is for 38 weeks, so the plan is to keep this blog going for that time, as I explore the ups-and-downs, rewards and challenges of being a first time Pre-School Teacher.
The kids I'll be working with are between the ages of 3 and 4 years old, and are all Irish kids. There are two other pre-school teachers in the centre with me (and they are such lovely, enthusiastic ladies!), and there are 30 kids in all.

The way it works in this particular pre-school is that I'll have a group of 10 children, with whom I'll go through my lesson plans and activities with, for one week. The other pre-school teachers will each be working from their own lesson plans with a group of 10 kids each, and after the week is up, we rotate our kids and start again! After 3 weeks, it's new lesson plans and activities. I think this will be an interesting way to do things, as we can constantly improve our practice, and get a really good idea of what works and what doesn't.

So! Here's where the blog comes in! I'll be documenting what I'm learning as I go along, as well as all my ideas for lesson plans, activities, my influences and the future!
I get a lot of inspiration from the Irish Early Childhood Curricular Framework, Aistear (it's Irish for 'journey', nice huh?), which you can read all about HERE. It's a pretty great curriculum and worth a read. It has pieces for parents too, which is handy!
I also love the Steiner philosophy and will be working a little with that. You can read more about how Steiner works for pre-schools HERE.
I'm really interested in the Reggio-Emilia school of thought too, but I'm still learning!

I'd love to hear from any readers of this blog; if you come offering advice, suggestions or ideas all the better! For the moment, I'll keep preparing my scrapbook of ideas for when I begin (I'll post some pictures up in my next post). So looking forward to the Big Day of starting Pre-School!
Bye for now!