Social Studies - Kindergarten
Standard 1 Objective 1
The "I Grow" activities in this lesson will help students understand the abstract concept of time passing.
Additional Resources
See How I Grow published by Dorling Kindersley
The passage of time is an abstract concept for kindergarten children. They can, however, be assisted to identify some personal changes, such as differences between themselves now and when they were babies.
The children can use their personal knowledge of how they have changed to write a book about themselves. They may "write" using letters or pictures. Their writing can fall into any of the stages of emergent writing. The most common will be writing some consonant sounds they hear in the word. They can be taught to stretch out the word to hear the sounds in the word and then write the symbols for those sounds. A predictable pattern of text can be used to reinforce high frequency and content related vocabulary words, such as "When I was little, I _______. Now I ______."
Process Skills
Symbolization, prediction, classification
Intended Learning Outcomes
1. Demonstrate a positive learning attitude.
Invitation to Learn
Read the book. Allow the children to share experiences about when they were
babies versus now.
Instructional Procedures
Differentiation of Instruction
Possible Extensions/Adaptations
Create a compare/contrast chart to show the differences between being a baby
and a kindergartner.
Compare various measurements for each time period such as weight, height, number of teeth, and length of feet or hands. Nonstandard or standard tools of measurement may be used.
Family Connections
Parents can write a short paragraph about what their child did as a baby and
can do now. Parents can also help in the measurement of items comparing baby
and kindergartner such as how long they were as a baby, and how tall they are
now, how much they weighed versus what they weigh now, or even the size of their
hand or footprint if they have one.
Analysis of the children’s text can indicate where the children are in their sound/symbol development. You can tell if they understand sound/symbol relationships, beginning sounds, ending sounds, or middle vowels.