Guest Posted February 28, 2005 Posted February 28, 2005 Hi everybody. I found sometimes very difficult to concentrate on activity because of noise level. We are open plan setting, and that is issue for long time now. We did separating rooms with peaces of furniture and we have 2 sliding doors but it is still sometimes hard to get children to focus. We mention the mobile screens also, but I am interesting of yours opinions and ideas. What do you think?
Guest Posted February 28, 2005 Posted February 28, 2005 Hi, I am in a very large hall, with high ceilings. We use furniture, low level to seperate "play areas", and screens for role play area. Noise is an issue ( although I find if staff sit down at activities then children will) We do have seperate rooms to take groups to but staffing is an issue here, no less than 2 people per room. Hope that helps. Peggy p.s. we changed our "bright patterned" screens to plain earth colours, this made the hall look and feel less "busy"
Susan Posted March 1, 2005 Posted March 1, 2005 Sorry, B, dont know the answer to the noise problem except that the quieter the adults are the quieter the children tend to be and you need to use carpet/ mats/ rugs to muffle the sound as much as posiible.
Guest Posted May 2, 2005 Posted May 2, 2005 Hi, We have shared the same problems e.g defining areas and noise. It's true that the quieter the staff and the more involved they are with activities the quieter the pre-school is. We also looked closely at the activities provided obviously some are noisier than others and were careful not to plan them at the same time or if we had to, we set one or two of them up outside where the children can be as noisy as they want! We used furniture to seperate areas, mats, rugs, and we are going to invest in some trellis. I think the trellis is a fantastic idea, we are going to purchase some that have planting boxes at the bottom for extra storage. You can staple material to trellis so that the children can't see what is going on in the next door area without walking around it. It has been used by a teacher friend of mine who has found it to work fantastically. Depending on your staffing and setting you could also have outdoors available at all times, our staffing has increased and so we have begun to do this and it has made a huge difference to noise levels and concentration. Sarah
Guest LucyQ Posted May 2, 2005 Posted May 2, 2005 We too have been looking at defining areas - noise is and will always be an issue if you work in a high ceiling hall - we have rugs and screens which help a little. I was thinking about the colours we have in our setting - beginning to think that a quieter, more natural colour would perhaps provide a calmer environment. Our sweatshirts are red!! rag to a bull springs to mind! I agree that calmer adults mean calmer children - like my friend keeps telling me "our childrens moods mirror our own".
Guest Posted May 2, 2005 Posted May 2, 2005 SJP, The trellis idea sounds great and as we have to put everything away every day a few hooks on the storeroom wall should make storage quite manageable as well. I shall have to do some costing up, and learn more about "hardy" indoor plants to grow from them. Ivy springs to mind but is this not poisonous/ Peggy
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