My students need a choice for their health and wellness as well as their own choice day to day to do their best learning and growing. Best practice and research support physically engaging seating.
I teach kindergartners of diverse economic, social and cultural backgrounds in a rural setting that inspires outdoor engagement through it's natural beauty and recreational focuses. Transferring from an outdoor focused environment to the 4 walls of a classroom requires creative teaching paired with best practice. We are an all-day, everyday kindergarten program. Young children need to wiggle and move a lot through the course of nearly a seven hour day to be healthy and happy.
My kindergartners will benefit from flexible seating movement to increase the intellectual and social brain stimulation and thereby increase growth and development.
My young students are in a county that is limited in it's academic extra curricular opportunities. Therefore, transferring to a traditional classroom environment can be challenging. Sitting in chairs at tables is often a new experience. Ensuring that stimulation and movement is not only allowed, but encouraged safely and productively on flexible seating is best practice for learning and teaching.
My Project
The Stability Seats, Wobble Stools, Wiggle Cushions along with the chair bands will ensure each child has an opportunity to choose a learning space that meets his or her physical and emotional needs. Using these researched based seating options, my kindergartners may feel ownership, comfort and well-being which will will enable cognitive and social growth to be optimal.
After a short research project last spring using borrowed wobble stools, I concluded physically engaging seating supports young children's ability to tackle new academic challenges while allowing their bodies to release energy positively.
Research supports the teaching strategies utilizing flexible seating options can increase student performance by approximately 17% on academic assessments. For my kindergartners that increased amount of learning will help build an academic foundation that will enable them feel pride and share their success with their families. Academic success in kindergarten is imperative on many levels for students and their families as many attitudes, beliefs and feelings towards school are formed from initial experiences. Flexible Seating can support a positive experience for each of my young students.
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