Kindergarten teacher finds fun ways to engage students of all ages

It is becoming common for the kindergarten classroom at Bothwell School to transform into different community environments. 

Pam Reimer is putting all her creative energy to use during her term position as she looks for fun ways to teach a variety of skills. 

Her students can vouch for the fun aspect of recent learning centres, but they might not realize how many valuable skills they are learning. 

The class recently had a post office which Reimer thoughtfully designed to reflect the many aspects of mail delivery.

The Post Office dramatic learning centre was a huge hit with the kindergarten students at Bothwell School.

“In the post office, they could pretend to be the clerk and they could sell stamps which I had I had made some little stamps to glue onto envelopes,” Reimer explains. “And they loved giving supplies to tape up or stamp a package. I had a little scale, too, so they could weigh the package as well.” 

The post office had basic beginnings with new aspects gradually added to the centre until the students were confident in the operations of the complete learning centre.

It did not take long for word to spread, and these young students quickly found themselves with pen pals, students from higher grades were excited to exchange letters with the kids in kindergarten. 

Reimer says it was pretty special for her students to receive mail from older kids, they even had some pen pals from junior high. 

“So, it was really a good community-building thing,” she says. “It ended up being a really neat experience for me, also for all the kids in the school. Everyone was very excited about this centre I had in our classroom.” 

Her students are now having fun in a new activity centre, a grocery store.

The Grocery Store learning centre has barely opened, and students are quick to learn the ways of shopping and nutrition.

Reimer says this is proving to be a fun way to learn about nutrition as well as literacy and numeracy. Plus, students get to learn about the different aspects of a grocery store. 

“And then my principal found a cart, a real cart but smaller, and that was a huge highlight!” 

The Bothwell Kindergarten Grocery Store has only been open for one day so far. It closed for stormy weather and the Easter weekend. There are no doubts that Reimer’s students are eager to get back to the store. 

Reimer says students learn a great variety of skills while they are having fun in dramatic learning centres like the Post Office and Grocery Store. 

“Learning to communicate, learning language, right? You're using different language, and then also learning to take turns and cooperate with each other,” she explains. 

Reimer says the students’ response was something she had not anticipated. 

“Everyone just cooperated, and I was so proud of them. There was no fighting about the (shopping) cart or being the cashier at the cash register.” 

Students were eager to have fun while learning the details of a grocery store. As the children are enjoying the dramatic activity learning centres, one can be sure Reimer is also having a great time, bagging groceries for the young shoppers. 

“It’s a fun place to be,” she admits.