Day NinePlay nourishes every aspect of children’s development –it forms the foundation of intellectual, social, physical, and emotional skills for success in school and in life. It paves the way for learning. Canadian Council of Learning As we keep reading about play disappearing from our early childhood classrooms due to the increased emphasis on academic and standards, teachers are struggling to ensure that needed balance. As teachers of young children we need to fight and advocate that children learn through play. Providing children with child- initiated free play and intentional play opportunities is an integral part of the early childhood learning space. When we are thinking about intentional play we are thinking about designing activities that reflect the child’s or children’s developmental stage. The activity is designed to encourage children to thinking deeper, to explore a new concept, to investigate what if, to solve problems that have been asked, and engage in observations and inquiry process. Now consider how the learning opportunities change on a daily and weekly bases. A child in the group went to a museum of dinosaurs. The following day they discovered that the sand table had been turned into an archaeological dig site. Measuring tapes, magnifying glasses, paint brushes, bones, clipboard with paper and field hat with vest. With intentionality teachers can create play that reinforces the skills needed to meet the demands of the standers. By being intentional about the play opportunities children can learn during their play, a win, win for everyone involved. Task: Think of an interest of a child or children in your group and design a learning activity that encourages the children to think, explore, investigate, solve problems and to share their learning with others. ![]()
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Day EightIn today’s classrooms with the mandated curriculum and assessments it's hard to find the time to fit in children’s interest, but we must. When we set up provocations for our children to explore and investigate during worktime we must consider children’s interest. In order for them to be truly engaged in an activity they need to feel that they're connected in some way, for them to want to discover more. How can we figure out what children are interested in? Our role as the teacher is to thoughtfully listen to children as they're playing, to determine where their interest lie. As we observe we will discover what their interest are at the time. If they're interested in gardening what is it about gardening that they like?
Day One Child: "Look we found a worm. Can we keep it?" Teacher: "How do your think we could keep the worm?" Child: "I don't know, lets google it." Teacher: "I think that is a good idea, we need to know how we can care for our worm." Child: "Guess what? We can keep it, but we have to google it." "So we can take care of it." Day Two Child: "Don't forget to google about worms." Teacher: "Yes, lets get the tablet and paper so that we can take notes." Children: "We need to feed our worm." Teacher: "Yes, how should we ask the question?" Children: "What do worms eat?" "How do they live?" "In the dirt of course." Children: "Our worm garden needs dirt, leaves, and grass." "Don't forget newspaper." "We need to dig for dirt." Children: "Guys we can save our food from lunch." Day Three Day Four Children: "Are all the worms the same size?" "No look, that one looks little." Teacher: "How could we find out?" Children: "Can we measure them?" Teacher: "What could we use to measure them?" Children: "Those color squares that stick together." "The stick with numbers." "Ya a ruler." Children: "Look they get longer." "Watch." Teacher: "Your right, as they move they are getting longer." Children: "Why?" "It's because of the wrinkles in them." "Because they are soft." When children are interested in something and you give them the opportunity to explore their interest, big things happen. Listen carefully so that you can determine where to take them next with their learning.
Task:
![]() Day Five“An environment which speaks sees and reflects the child as an active and productive person. An environment which is silent seems void of life with no real sense of who plays there.” Loris Malaguzzi When you think of your learning spaces think about how children learn. Children that are actively engaged are learning through play. As we talked about our learning spaces as the third teacher the choices we make about our environment create a link directly to the play and learning in the classroom. Now on to today’s order of business, improving learning spaces. In order for us to improve on our learning spaces we first need to reflect on how children are using our learning spaces. Ask yourself:
I’m almost embarrassed to let you see this picture but this was the starting point of my classroom transformation. Identifying the problem In the art studio we had minimal storage for art supplies, children had a hard time finding items that they wanted to use, so they would get discouraged and avoid the area all together. Also we had a lack of space for children to use material uninterrupted. So since art is such a valuable tool for children to anchor their learning through we knew that this area needed to be fixed pronto. The Solution To created three different zones in our art studio that will allow children the opportunity to work with several art mediums all at the same time. To rework furniture allowing for more storage in the area. Here is what we did. We placed a small rectangle table on the far wall of the studio and hung a shelf above that to hold clay tools and supplies. Here two children can work together sculpting and creations with clay. We placed a large rectangle table in the middle of the studio so that children could create with a wide range of art mediums at the same time. Allowing the children to work together and still have room to create. We placed another small rectangle table next to sink and dry rack that is used for painting projects. Children are encouraged to prepare their own paint trays for painting. Once they have finished their painting project they wash up the paint tray and paint brushes themselves. Across from the table is two sections of storage shelves that houses a large variety of art supplies. All supplies are accessible at all times for the children to create with. Now embrace the space that you have and work toward creating a dynamic space that reflects the people that live and play in it. You can’t create your perfect classroom in a day or a week, but you can create a perfect learning space one learning space at a time. Lets work together to create spaces that are worthy of miracles for our children. Task:
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Welcome!I'm Tami Sanders creator of Learning and Teaching with Preschoolers, a blog to help teachers create magical moments for the young. Follow MeArchives
May 2024
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