2-24-10

Observation times: Children's Center 2-22 2:00-3:00pm & 2-24 2:00-3:00pm

I have been trying to really pay attention to the type of play that children engage in while working at the Children's Center and I have noticed some very interesting things. Earlier in the semester I had been in the block areas with some of the boys at the Children's Center. They were building a boat out of blocks. While I was playing with them, I was offering suggestions of different things they could add while still keeping a distance so that they were the ones in control of the building. They invited me into their play and I became the controller of the rudder for the boat. We had a fun time pretending the boat was going and stopping while I would turn or not turn the "rudder." This week I was walking past the block area where the same boys were again building a boat. I heard one of the boys suggest to another worker that she be the one to make the boat go. I could tell that the worker wasn't exactly sure what the boy was talking about. I found it really interesting how the boy's play was changed after our interaction and how he continued to adapt his play to those changes. It is interesting how play changes and adapts and how even the smallest interactions can affect play.

I was not there are the time, however, one of the preschool teachers was excited to tell me about how she allowed a boy to take on the role of teacher for a while in the morning group. As the teacher, the boy really imitated what he experienced in his daily life at the preschool. The teacher had become one of the students while the boy played teacher and she purposely did silly things that she often sees the preschoolers do like lay down during circle time. The boy looked at her and said "If you are going to lay down, I'm going to make you go on your cot." The teacher joked about how much the child had really picked up on things that he had heard. In just hearing this I immediately thought of the readings we have done and how it is explained how a child's play is often used to make sense of the world around them. This rang true in this situation because the boy was reenacting the things that he experienced but he took on a different role. It was especially interesting because this particular boy is one who is working with the teacher about some behaviors that she would like to see changed. I think that it is really true that children use play to better understand and take control of their world.

2-17-10

This week I have been thinking a lot about educational play. The PicoCrickets really sparked me to think about educational play. I had a really fun time working with the PicoCrickets in class last week. The energy in the classroom changed instantly as everyone began exploring the new technology and starting to create. Thinking back to my grade school and middle school classrooms, even high school classrooms, I can remember how the mood in the classroom would really change when we got to explore, create, and play. It was no different with our class and the PicoCrickets. I would much rather have a classroom in which everyone was excited about what they are doing. I think that the PicoCrickets are something that I would love to incorporate in my classroom in the future because they are not only fun but they are extremely educational. They merge art and technology in a really cool way. It is a really cool way for kids to learn about programming. I especially liked Krissy's introduction with the other toys. I think that starting by looking at more simple programs like the duck would be helpful because it shows a simple cause and effect program. Moving on to more complicated programs would be good as well because it forces students to think even more about how the toy works. You could even have kids bring in their own toys and explain how they think they work. Allowing students to build their own programmed toys after would be the best way for them to learn because they are really experiencing the creation process so they would truly understand how it works. I think that kids would love to just dive in and explore how to make the different sensors work. I really like that the kids are able to actually create something they can hold and move instead of just making a program that stays on the computer. I think that too often when people think of play in the classroom they don't see how it can be incorporated in extremely educational ways. I definitely feel like using the PicoCrickets felt like playing and I would love to incorporate these and other types of technologies into my classroom one day.

2-10-10

The first two weeks of class have really gotten me to start thinking about the role of play in both child development as well as in education. I have been lucky enough to have witnessed play being used in education in both my sophomore block placement at Aldo Leopold as well as during my work at the children's center on campus. I have seen how play can really foster learning. At the children's center, all of the learning is done through play. There are different play-based centers set up in which children can do math, science, art, dramatic play, blocks and other activities. The dramatic play area especially demonstrates how play can foster learning. The dramatic play area is usually set up to coordinate with what the children are learning about or have recently learned about in preschool. The children learned about the senses during fall so the dramatic play area was set up as a doctor's office. The children were able to really demonstrate the understanding of a doctors office through their play. It was evident that they really understood the role of the doctor through their play. They would ask their friends, dolls, or teachers what hurt or what was wrong and then give then write a prescription for medicine. Many of the children would have had a hard time communicating their knowledge verbally, but when they were playing their knowledge was evident. At Aldo Leopold, many different games were used to teach math. One such game was "Banker, Banker" in which the children learned about the value of different coins as well as equalities between different coins. It would have been really boring for the children to just do worksheets to demonstrate their knowledge, but playing the game was much more fun and as a teacher you could clearly see the evidence of their knowledge. Overall, I am really excited about this class and its content because it will help me to be able to better incorporate play into my own classroom one day. I really feel that learning through play is a much more effective way to teach children of all ages, especially early childhood.