This week, Tesoro Preschool packed its bags and headed into the great outdoors, right inside the classroom.
The Camping theme brought tents, campfires, forest creatures, and the magic of the outdoors into every corner of our learning environment.
Camping week taps into something deep in young children: the love of adventure, the comfort of togetherness, and the wonder of nature. Our teaching team set up the classrooms to feel like the great outdoors, complete with dramatic play areas that had the tesoritos roasting pretend marshmallows, identifying constellations, and going on nature scavenger hunts.
The week also included a Spanish movie session, giving the tesoritos the chance to experience a beloved animated wilderness adventure in Spanish. Watching a familiar story unfold in a new language is one of the most natural and joyful ways for children to absorb vocabulary and storytelling patterns in their second language.
Spanish vocabulary for the week was rich with the outdoors: acampar, fogata, carpa, naturaleza, estrella, bosque. Children used these words in songs, in dramatic play, in art projects built around forest and night-sky themes.
Camping week is always one that children talk about. There is something about the campfire setting, even a pretend one, that brings a group of children together in a special way. This week did exactly that.
