Are you a new teacher who just landed a job teaching preschool? Or are you an early intervention preschool teacher who is looking to revamp your classroom? This early intervention preschool classroom tour blog post will give you ideas to get started!
Schedule Wall
A big focus in our early intervention program is to build a sense of routine and school readiness in our students. Schedules help us do that. Students in the early intervention program utilize personalized visual schedules throughout their day. We spend a substantial amount of time building independence in our students to check and follow their own schedules. Use lots of modeling and stay consistent.
Similar Visuals can be found here.
The schedule symbols are on velcro. Students go to the schedule wall and remove the top schedule symbol. They take them and match them to their next activity.
Carpet Area
This is where we have our morning meeting, whole-group read-aloud, and music time. In order to develop student agency, we supply students with flexible seating options.
As you can see, our morning meeting wall features our calendar, a feelings chart, and our class schedule. Morning meetings last around 20 minutes, as students in our early intervention programs are still young, and have lower attention stamina.
Table Work
This is where small-group instruction happens. Small-group activities include art projects, fine/gross motor development exercises, and sensory bins.
Again, we keep each table work rotation to a short duration, no more than 10 minutes each. In between each rotation, students will return to the schedule wall to check their schedules.
Calm Corner
The calm corner is an area for students to calm down, decompress, and get their sensory needs met. Our calm corner is equipped with comfy seating options, a variety of sensory tools, and a crash pad.
Our vision is for the calm corner to be a universal tool for students to use whenever they need it. However, students in the early intervention program sometimes struggle with knowing when they need to use the calm corner. In view of that, sometimes a visit to the calm corner is scheduled into students’ daily schedules. Other times, the teacher will pass a calm corner visual icon to the student as they see the need.
Classroom Library
We all love a good classroom library! At the preschool level, students may not be able to independently read. But we still promote reading. As you can see, we intentionally pick seasonal, age-appropriate books and place them in accessible locations for students to enjoy.
Toys
Our early intervention program follows a play-based curriculum. Through facilitated play, we work with students on social skills, basic academics, and communication skills. Similarly to the classroom library, we have a rotation of seasonal, age-appropriate toys for students to use their imagination and play away.
Some of our favorite must-have toys are: trains and train tracks, dolls and/or plushies, kitchen and food items, and blocks!
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I hope you enjoyed this early intervention preschool classroom tour! Please let us know if you would like any more information about any of the zones mentioned above!
