Integration

When I was going to school to become a teacher, one of the key things we learned in our early childhood classes was the importance of "integration."  The idea is to take a theme or a subject and then integrate math, arts, writing, reading, language, etc... into the theme.  For example, if you were to study "family" you would try to integrate a math activity while studying family (that still taught about family).  So on a simple level you might have your toddler count and name all the members of his/her family and that would be integrating math and family.  

Hopefully that wasn't too confusing.  It's actually a pretty basic concept.  I've been formulating a few lesson plans to get us started and I'm really looking to use this concept of "integration" into the themes we'll be working on.  Research has shown that students learn material better if it is integrated.  That makes sense to me :)  Now that I'm writing about this it makes me want to go look up my old notes and books.  We'll see if I still have any left that I didn't sell back!