OPPORTUNITIES
FOR WORK EXPERIENCE
AWAIT YOUR CHILD
DEVELOPMENT STUDENTS
Reprinted from Educating For
Employment; Your Guide to Creating Career and Vocational Programs that Work;
January 1996.
Marilyn Swierk, CFCS,
CFLE, is Vice President of Programming for Prepare Tomorrow’s Parents. A
speaker, author, consultant, and former classroom teacher, she serves Vice
President of Program for American Association of Family and Consumer Economics
(AAFCS).
Rhode Island Students
Teach Preschool, Earn College Credits
Warwick, R.I. --- Child development students get practical experience in day
care operations, earn college credit and pass on practical skills to their
young charges in an innovative Family and Consumer Sciences program at Warwick
Veterans' Memorial High School.
"My overall umbrella is combining
career skills with service learning," said Marilyn Swierk, the teacher who
continues to develop new options for her students, including earning up to six
credits toward a degree at the
Students not only work at an in-school
preschool, they spend a few hours each week during their senior year working in
community day-care centers and pre-schools and occasionally teaching
kindergarten and first-grade children. The students also are active in the
FHA/HERO (Future Homemakers of America/Home Economics Related Occupations) club
in the school. "We're training the kids in child development to deal with different ages," Swierk said.
Tougher Requirements to
The university charges the high school
students $50 for three credits and $75 for six credits, but Swierk obtained a
community service grant from the Feinstein Foundation that she has used to
offset the students' tuition costs. She has 19 students now working toward
college credit.
The Northern Rhode Island Cooperative
Extension Service offers teacher training for the college-level child
development classes. Swierk secured the relationship with the university two
years ago; now more than 10 teachers at other schools are taking the training
so their students can work toward college credit.
Ins and Outs of the In-School Preschool
Here's how Swierk's in-school preschool --called Little '
Students at least 3 years old and toilet
trained enroll for an 8- to 10-week session for which their parents pay $30 to
cover supplies. Swierk's regular departmental budget
covers most of the costs, but she holds yard sales and other sales to aid the
operations.
The children come for three hours twice a
week, and each session includes art, music, literacy, special events, games and
exercise. The high school students are assigned a subject and must develop a
lesson tied to the theme of the day.
The themes are another area where Swierk is
determined to make a difference. She calls her plan "Life Skills for
Little Ones." The children learn about nutrition, fire safety, staying
substance-free, keeping their hearts healthy and helping others.
"It's very easy to integrate into the
existing curriculum, and we expose the kids and their parents," Swierk
said. When parents pick up their children, they are given a folder containing
their child's work and comments on each student's day. Swierk has solicited
pamphlets from community agencies addressing each day's topic. She then passes
the pamphlet on to the parents.
Her students also use that information to
help design their lesson plans. They have performed plays about nutrition, sung
songs about the heart and, as Swierk said,"you can do a ring toss based on any theme," but
try to scale things down for the preschoolers. While her high school students
are gaining STW (School to Work) skills through their experiences, she also
makes sure the preschoolers learn something about the working world.
"A lot of people think STW is talking
about getting a kid ready for a particular career, but that's not true,"
Swierk said. "It's getting them the skills to enter the work force --
being courteous and on time and working together. I don't think preschoolers
are too young to learn that."
Six of her students are interns who take a
double block of child development classes so they can simulate the ownership of
a day-care center. They plan out a month of activities and receive asistance from other day care centers.
Students in child development spend three
hours per week at a field site. Swierk was able to line up participating
businesses through the Adopt-a-School program the high school started in the
late 1980s. Liability problems were easily solved. If a person is insured to
drive a vehicle, they are covered when they drive to their field site. Those
who don't drive must get their parent's permission on a form stating that they
would be in an insured vehicle. The preschools and day-care centers all had
coverage for volunteers coming in, she said.
For more information on "Life Skills
for Learning" and forming a good articulation agreement for child
development, contact Marilyn Swierk at (401) 884-5510.
Reprinted with permission from Educating For Employment; Your Guide to
Creating Career and Vocational Programs that Work; January 1996; copyright
1999 by LRP Publications, 747 Dresher Road, P.O. Box 980, Horsham, PA
19044-0980. All rights reserved. For more information on products published by
LRP Publications, please visit Education Administration Online at www.lrp.com/ed or call 1-800-341-7874, ext. 275.
