Use of flannel boards in early childhood education

What is a flannel board or storyboard? It is an invaluable and versatile educational tool for preschool teachers and children. The storyboard has become an integral part of the preschool curriculum. It’s basically a flannel- or felt-covered storytelling board that teachers can use with preschoolers to tell visual stories with pictures, storyboard shapes, and a variety of other manipulatives that are made from flannel or cutouts. felt (flannel sticks to flannel). Flannel boards can come in a variety of sizes and can be wall-mounted or a smaller tabletop style with an easel that folds up easily for storage.

The tabletop style is ideal for small groups of children and encourages more participation and interaction and can be easily stored away. The larger wall-mounted style is more permanent and better for large groups, such as in a classroom. Flannel boards or storyboards can be purchased commercially, but it’s very easy to make your own. Some of the commercial whiteboards have a magnetic side on the back for use with magnetic manipulators and some may have whiteboards on the back.

Story retelling is an important skill in language and memory development with preschoolers. Pre-literacy is important and even young children will benefit from listening and watching while older children play. Young children always learn by observing and modeling older children. Most preschool settings have a multi-age population, and age overlaps for various groups, as do most families.

Encouraging a child to retell a story or number sequence or identify colors and shapes is a great independent activity as well as fun with a partner. Retelling reinforces learning and abstract concepts. Preschoolers will gravitate toward this anyway if the materials are left on the board for their use. They will also make up their own creative stories using the flannel board shapes in a free play environment. Children enjoy touching and feeling the smooth manipulable shapes.

For parents, flannel board play is a great stand-alone activity for quiet times like waiting at the doctor’s office, long car rides, or just before bed or nap time. Flannel boards are also fun for rainy days. indoor activities for kids. Teachers love using them for everything from storytelling; abc games for kidsthemed lesson plans to teach songs, rhymes, and finger plays.

Flannel board sets are soft, colorful felt cutouts of shapes, alphabets (upper and lower case), colors, numbers, or storybook characters and accessories. Commercial sets can be found for fairy tales, nursery rhymes, popular literature, safety lessons, maps, the seasons, calendars, animals (zoo, jungle, farm, pets, etc.), special holidays, dinosaurs, multicultural ideas, Bible characters, games, transportation and many more early childhood themes. They can be purchased pre-cut, or teachers and caregivers on a budget can make their own designs with felt.

Flannel board activities are fun for families, preschools, Head Start centers, home day care providers, homeschooling families, early childhood education settings, teachers of Sunday school, special education classrooms, librarians, and school teachers in the early grades. Even teachers in higher grades can find flannel boards a good use for teaching the States or other geography, maps, or math lessons. The utility is practically infinite.