Your primary role as a member of Lakewood Co-op is to work as an Assistant Teacher in the classroom. This involves supporting the teacher in whatever way possible. It also means modeling social behavior for all the children. Your job is to help children know what they can and cannot do.Humor and faith in children's growth is essential!

Here are a few helpful hints to keep in mind to make your job easier:

• Sit down whenever possible while working with children.
• Use a low, quiet voice. Enunciate clearly.
• Try to limit socializing with the other adults while working so that the children can benefit more from your time together.
• Use language that the child can understand. Help the child learn the meaning of words by example. Show her/him how. "Pull on the lever" makes little sense if she/he doesn't understand the words.
• Answer questions and talk to children when the occasion calls for it but avoid talking to them all the time.
• When children are working or playing well, do not interfere - just observe and perhaps add to or provide resources when appropriate.
• Avoid talking about a child in her/his presence.
• Be patient. Children need time to develop and improve gradually.
• Suggest what a child is to do rather than what she/he is not to do. Look for what is right with the child instead of looking for problems.
• Before giving a direction, obtain the child's attention.
• Avoid conflicts and forcing an issue as much as possible. A little ingenuity often makes a situation go smoothly. The child needs to establish a pattern of happy performance rather than one of negative refusal.
• Utilize the positive guidance techniques taught in parent education meetings and demonstrated by the teachers. Physical discipline is never used in the classroom.
• Praise the type of behavior you wish continued. Success is the best reinforcement possible.
• Allow the child to learn by experiment. Help her/him only when it is necessary to avoid failure and discouragement. Encourage her/him to find out for herself/himself.
• Accept and appreciate each child as she/he is, remembering each child is different. Observe and study her/his "uniqueness" and her/his "sameness." This will give us the foundation for what we do with and for her/him.
• Reflect the anti-bias philosophy of the classroom through your words and actions (see ANTI-BIAS GOALS).
• Be relaxed, enjoy the children, and let it show when you are having fun.

Always feel free to ask questions and request help. And remember.you first need to make mistakes before you can learn from them. So please give yourself permission (and opportunity) to do so!

Listed below are detailed job descriptions for each of the four classroom stations (Art, Floaters, and Snack). You will be assigned one station for each scheduled work day, on a rotating basis through the year.
On any given day, this can seem like a lot to do. So it's important to remember the valuable things our children are learning at the various stations. A few of these benefits are listed below each station-specific job description.

ART PERSON

• Arrive five minutes early.
• Supervise art projects and easel painting.
• Keep easels supplied with paper and paint.
• Place dry paintings in children's boxes (artist's name should be written on the project).
• Clean-up:
  • Return art materials to shelves.
  • Cover paint containers and wash brushes (except when another class will be using materials in afternoon).
  • Clean paint, glue, etc. off tables, chairs, floor.
• Stand by the slide at Lakewood Park.

Child learns:

• To relax and allow the senses to teach the properties of sand, paint, water, etc.
• Small muscle development.
• Words to express sensations, observations, and actions.
• The joy and pride of creating something with own hands.

FLOATER(S)

• Supervise large room (craft table, home center, dress-up area, library, etc.).
• Clean up:
  • Return all materials to shelves with the help of children in your area.
  • Clean bathrooms/Sweep front entry hall (mop if needed) (floater one).
  • Vacuum carpeted area (floater two).
• Join circle time.
• Stand by swings at Lakewood Park (floater one).
• Stand by sandbox at Lakewood Park (floater two).
• Stay and supervise children in the classroom until last child is picked up (floater two).

Child learns:

• To work with other children towards a common goal (for example, building a castle of blocks).
• To discover safe use of body on climbing equipment.
• To release tension through physical activity.
• Large muscle coordination.
• Properties of science and nature at science table.
• Hand-eye coordination.
• Color, size, and spatial relationships.
• Numerical comparisons.
• Problem-solving, logical reasoning.
• To wait for her/his turn.

SNACK PERSON

• Bring snack for entire group. Be aware of any food allergies children in your class may have. A list is posted in the kitchen.
• At the beginning of each morning class, a spray bottle of fresh bleach solution is to be made up by the snack person and used to wipe down all areas used in snack preparation.
• During free choice: Supervise play dough, and sensory tables during free choice time.
• Prepare snack with help of children (see SNACK SUGGESTIONS).
• Clean up:
  • Return play dough and materials to the shelves.
  • Empty wastebaskets and garbage into LCP's garbage can outside the kitchen door if your class is last class of the day.
  • Empty recycling into LCP's bin outside the kitchen door.
  • Empty water table.
  • Wash tables with bleach solution.
  • Wash dishes with dishwashing detergent.
  • Wipe place mats with bleach solution.
  • Sweep floors.
• Join class activities when finished.
• Turn off lights in building when class leaves for the park or at the end of class.

Child learns:

• To discover taste, texture, color, temperature, and sense of smell.
• To try new foods.
• To be part of a social group.
• Language development through dramatic play.

When a non-parental caregiver is the primary adult working in the classroom on a full-time or part-time basis, it is the parents' responsibility to ensure that both they and the caregiver attend the New Parent Orientation and take Risk Management Training. In addition, the parent should walk through the classroom and school facilities with the caregiver and stay during the first class that the caregiver is working. Parents are to arrange to work in the preschool at least once a month, in accordance with our Standing Rules. If there is a change in non-parental caregivers during the year, it is the parents' responsibility to train the new caregiver in the classroom duties and to arrange for Risk Management Training. Parents are required, and alternate caregivers are encouraged, to attend monthly parent meetings and all-school meetings.