Student teachers in Stephen F. Austin State University’s Community Responsiveness and Engaged Advocacy in Teacher Education program, or C.R.E.A.T.E., are sharing 30-minute activity lessons from 10 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. on Monday, March 23, Wednesday, March 25 and Friday, March 27, in the Supporters of Nacogdoches ISD Facebook group.
Children and their families can participate or just watch by joining the Zoom meeting. Suggested materials will be listed for each activity.
“During this unprecedented, unpredictable time, we are emphasizing the C and R in our name by expanding our community and responding to its need for creative online learning,” said Dr. Lauren Burrow, an associate professor in SFA’s James I. Perkins College of Education.
This week, the lessons are based on activities for kindergarten through fifth grade, but Burrow hopes to expand the topics and grade levels.
The C.R.E.A.T.E. student teachers will present their favorite topics and activities for virtual playtime, including reading stories, drawing friendly monsters using the letters in children’s names and making homemade lava lamps and vision boards.
“For now, we wanted to add some ‘edu-tainment’ for at-home enjoyment,” Burrow said. “We will see how this goes and get a sense of what families need from comments during the sessions on Facebook this week.”
C.R.E.A.T.E. was developed in 2018 by Burrow and Dr. Heather Olson Beal, a professor in the Perkins College of Education, to help student teachers receive mentoring from families in the district and volunteer in the community.
“NISD families need some fun, and our student teachers need to keep on teaching, so this is what we have come up with for now,” Olson Beal said. “We wanted to give back to all those NISD families who have been helping our student teachers.”
The sessions will be recorded and stored in the Facebook group for later use by NISD families.
For more information, join the Facebook group or email burrowle@sfasu.edu.
By Jo Gilmore, marketing communications specialist at Stephen F. Austin State University.
