Competency III

Establish a Developmentally Appropriate Environment for Math, Science, and Social Studies.

A developmentally appropriate math environment to support physical development would

consist of a movement area that provides opportunities for children to climb over, duck under,
crawl through, and walk around several pieces of climbing equipment. A movement area would
promote measuring, distance, size comparing, counting, and other mathematical concepts. To
promote cognitive development in a math environment you need to create various opportunities
for analyzing, comparing, and evaluating, providing a variety of shapes, blocks, puzzles, &
Nursery Rhymes is a good start. To achieve language development in a math environment I
would include children's books that promote math concepts and I would talk about shapes,
comparing, building terms, and other math terms. To implement social/emotional development in
the math environment I would provide opportunities for children to plan and complete tasks, to
work as a team to build with blocks, and to interact with peers through sharing materials like
puzzles. In the math environment I will observe children's likes and dislikes of the math
materials and activities then acknowledge the children's likes and dislikes to create individual
activities for them.
To create a developmentally appropriate science environment to benefit physical
development, I would plan a variety of discovery walks, make bird feeders, and provide various
sensory table activities. As for cognitive development I would always have a lot of science
experiments available, I will provide materials to encourage comparing, experimenting and have
activities that support and encourage the use of all five senses. For language development in a
science environment I would promote different sounds of nature, cloud watching, and once again

discovery walks, and we would all talk about our experiences. For social/emotional development
I would encourage children to work together to do experiments, I would provide group and
individual scavenger hunts, and have each child take care of their own class plant to provide
them with responsibility. Last is individual difference of children I would acknowledge their
individual achievements and publicize their uniqueness.
To create a developmentally appropriate social studies environment for physical
development I would plan lots of field trips to teach about various community helpers such as the
fire department. Where I would provide opportunities for the children to try to walk in a
firefighters boots, hold and spray the heavy hoses, slide down the pole and climb a ladder. For
cognitive development I would promote name activities for children to learn each other's names,
I would ask the children to describe the events of our field trips, and I would ask the children to
demonstrate what certain community helpers do. To provide language development I will
encourage children to tell me positive things about themselves, I will define what positive means
to the younger children, and we will learn words in a different language. Social/emotional
development I will focus on each child's uniqueness, I will encourage them to point out what
they think makes them special, & I will promote strategies to calm down when we are angry. To
support individual differences of children I will acknowledge that each child's family is special
and make sure that each child knows they are a very important part of their family and or
classroom.