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We are excited to share with you the successes and advice shared by a co-op group that completed a year of My LDS Preschool.
The group consisted of 5 precious girls, ages 3 and 4, each with their own personality. The moms took turns teaching each week and a grandma even took turns hosting. The group met twice a week for 3 hours.
The following are questions posed to the co-op group and their corresponding answers.
Q: What do you think the perfect age group is for the curriculum?
A: We found the 4-year-olds got more out of the curriculum but it was still beneficial for the 3-year-olds.
Q: What size group makes a great co-op?
A: 4 kids per group would be ideal.
Q: How did you adapt the curriculum to fit the needs of your group?
A: There are more ideas to use than what we scheduled time for so we didn’t always do each movement or snack or speech suggestion.
Q: How did you organize supplies for the group?
A: We purchased community supplies such as scissors, markers, glue, and crayons to put in a tote for the teaching mom to keep for the week. We were individually responsible for any additional weekly supplies during our teaching turn.
Q: How did you handle any behavioral concerns?
A: This area was slightly difficult because each teaching parent would have a different level of expectation for behavior. If a child didn’t want to participate, she could sit by herself until she was ready.
Q: How did your co-op group parents communicate?
A: Group texting worked great.
Q: How much time did you put into preparing to teach the lessons during your teaching week?
A: The lessons are thorough and easy to use. We spent an average of one hour to read through the lessons, print a few things, gather a few items around the house and occasionally make a quick trip to the store.
Q: What advice would you offer another co-op group?
A: Be easy-going with the kids and moms in the group. If something isn’t working, drop it or adjust it. Structure is good, but so is a good sense of humor and a large dose of flexibility. With younger children or larger groups, it may work more smoothly to have 2 adults there on the teaching day: one as a teacher and one as a teacher assistant to help ease transitions and help children who require more assistance or behavioral interventions.
Thank you Katy, Texas co-op group for sharing your experience with us! You are incredible moms with very special girls and we are honored you chose to teach with our curriculum.
We would love to spotlight you! Send an email to us with the title “spotlight” (the submission form is at the bottom of the page). We want to hear from both individual teachers and co-ops.