Category Archives: learning environnments

early education & play, learning environnments

Almost a Year of Teaching Virtual Preschool -What have I learned?

January 11, 2021 rightfromthestart 1 Comment

We all know that online teaching is not the ideal environment for preschool children. I’ve been doing it since March , it isn’t easy but some things have been surprisingly successful.

For context, I teach in a preschool inclusion classroom, my students have a variety of needs, 50% or more have iep’s and many do not have English as a first language. My live teaching consists of a 30 minute circle time and some small groups, the remainder is provided asynchronously. My preschool sessions are 2.5 hours, I have an am and a pm class.

Live instruction

My goal for organizing live instruction is 3- fold

To follow a predictable sequence
To be engaging
For there to be an opportunity to build relationships with teachers and peers.

Starting the Session

I start the meeting with a transition song that we sing everyday when walking into the classroom. I wanted to keep this as a signal that school had started and to introduce the transition song to the children in case we ever return to in person school.

I start the circle by referring to our visual schedule. This follows a familiar format

Songs

Movement

Sharing time

A demonstration of the project of the day

Good bye song

Songs

Our opening song is the song we use at the beginning of the circle when we are in person. It is both a signal to come to circle and to be ready. The song is sung to the tune of ‘If you’re happy and you know it ‘ but the words are changed to if you’re ready for the circle. We have 3 verses – clap your hands, nod your head and eyes on me. I play this on the ukulele and this helps maintain attention – most of the children look eagerly at the screen when they hear the ukulele.

This is followed by a song relating to our theme. I try to keep the songs as interactive as possible by using visuals, calling on children to contribute ideas for the songs or singing action songs. For example, I used puppets to help me enact nursery rhymes such as hickory, dickory dock and little miss muffet, we sang pat-a- cake and wrote the first letter of a child’s name on the cake and I used pictures and visuals for prepositions when we sang the green grass grows.

I have recently added some OT finger exercises that I adapted to a rhyme into this part of the circle.

Below is an example of one of my song videos. You can also see in this video, how I have my space set up. I sit on a cushion on the floor as this mirrors how I would sit at school and have an easel and basket of visuals behind me that I can use when I need to.

Movement

To get ready for our movement activity we practice our deep breathing by smelling the flower (breathe in ) and blowing the candle (breathe out)

For movement/dance we use a familiar song from You Tube. Sharing the video on the screen does not work so well, so we play the video on a phone and demonstrate the actions ourselves.

Before sharing time, we may introduce a concept relating to our theme by sharing some pictures, objects or part of a book.

Sharing

Every day we do some kind of sharing/show and tell. This was built in to the session to allow children to feel like they are being listened to and to give them a chance to interact with peers. Sometimes children say they do not want to share but mostly they love it! We think of something that relates to our theme, season, or maybe book we have been reading and Mondays are always an opportunity to share anything they would like. Examples of sharing have been – a family photo, something beginning with a certain letter, something cold, a thing of a certain color and something that came from a tree. We hold up a name card of the child whose turn it is to share and they have learned that at this time they unmute their microphone.

Demonstrating a project

We demonstrate our daily activity for parents and children to see what they need to do and to talk about ideas for alternative materials or modified ways of doing the activity. We also do this as part of our circle during in person learning, before we move to small groups.

Goodbye song

One teacher leads the goodbye song and the children wave and sing whilst muted. All singing is done this way to avoid lag. Children participate well, even when they are muted we have found. The children can then unmute and say goodbye to teachers and friends if they wish. We always try to say goodbye personally to anyone who unmutes.

How I Set up my Activities for Asynchronous Learning

The platform my district uses is Classroom Teams. Within this we can set up individual channels; this has been organized to mirror our in person day. Each channel has a different set of information, for different parts of the school day. Parents can pick and choose what they want their children to experience. The channels are laid out as follows.

Information for families

This is for newsletters, weekly timetables and articles and resources relating to early learning.

Meetings

Here we post a link to our daily live meetings and any specific announcements relating to our meetings.

Question of the Day

Each day at school ,we would have a question for the children to answer – we continue this on our teams site and provide visuals to help children answer the question. The questions are presented as a poll or form with 2 or 3 possible answers.

Daily Activities

Each day we provide a table top activity, with instructions modelled in our live session. Visual instructions are included. Some materials are readily found at home, some are to be printed (but we usually give an alternative if a printer isn’t available) and some are provided in packets to be collected at school. These are short activities such as sequencing, craft activities, counting, sorting , scavenger hunts etc.

Playtime

Our playtime/free-choice is the biggest part of our usual preschool day, where the majority of our learning occurs. I cannot replicate that in a virtual setting, but what I am able to do, is offer suggestions for things to do at home and explain to parents why these things are important. I feel like this has given our parents a greater understanding of what we do at preschool and why. Examples of focus plays have been dramatic play, related to our theme, different kinds of sensory play, counting (with an explanation of the stages of learning to count with 1-1 correspondence and how that can be supported in play) and focusing on particular types of toys. Our focus playtime is for a full week.

Outdoors

This usually consists of a gross motor activity and a nature/environment activity – examples have included scavenger hunts, looking for items during walks and things we can do with sticks (including how to use them safely).

Stories and Books

We pre-record our stories and books so that our meetings are more interactive and the children can re-visit them as many times as they like. Sometimes we do a few pages of a non-fiction book during our meeting.

Songs and rhymes

I record all of our songs and rhymes so that children can re-visit them. Often these songs are a focus activity for children with iep’s, to develop imitation and making requests, so it is important for the parents to have ready access to them. Sometimes I also record the audio without video. We also post a link to our movement song.

Social/emotional

This is the biggest challenge to teach remotely. I incorporate social skills during our meetings by using puppets to teach, problem solving, sharing , being kind etc. On the channel I provide resources to support that, by choosing a focus every few weeks. Focus points so far have been cues for transitions ( I made a video explaining the auditory and visual cues we use at preschool), problem solving, Tucker the turtle, waiting, imitiation and being kind ( for this I provided checklists and the children could earn badges for being kind). Sometimes I record a book with a social/emotional theme and explain what the book is teaching and how to follow up at home.

For children with social/emotional goals, I host a weekly small group session, in this we have discussions based on a book, photograph or puppet script.

Picture Wall

This is an optional space for students to post pictures of their work or things they have been playing at home. We always make a specific comment of praise for any child that posts.

There are additional small groups and parent – teacher consultations for our students with iep’s. For those that I do not lead such as speech, I use this time to observe and take data.

It isn’t perfect but I feel like there are many positives:-

The children are very engaged and enthusiastic about coming to online preschool
Parents are able to see what we do at preschool and we are able to explain why we do things
Through our discussions with parents, we are able to work on skills that may be helpful in the home environment
Children are learning new skills with technology

I have learned that young children can learn in a virtual environment and I would never have believed that before. Some things are hard to learn and the children are missing out on many early social experiences but in face of this challenge I have had my eyes opened to new possibilities.

art, children, early education & play, education, imagination, learning environnments, play, reflection, Reggio Emilia, teaching, technology

Reflections on the Wonder of Learning Exibition (Reggio Children):What role does technology play in Reggio schools?

June 27, 2018 rightfromthestart 6 Comments

It is 13 years since I last visited the Reggio exhibition. Education and childhood have evolved dramatically in that time. I was interested to see how the schools of Reggio Emilia have adapted to meet the interests and fascinations of this new generation.

The projects and learning I observed 13 years ago embraced the physical world. Investigations were made through exploring physical objects and environments, through discussion and experimentation, using art, photography, written and spoken word. The documentation of more recent projects followed a similar pattern, except for one key difference. The schools of Reggio Emilio are now embracing technology as a tool for learning and artistic expression. This is not a piecemeal attempt to use technology to teach concepts, but rather a way of using new ways of investigating and deepening knowledge and curiosity, that were not possible before. They have fully embraced it as one of the hundred languages.

Take for example, investigations that occurred during the building of the Malaguzzi centre. The children were taken into the space. They ran and danced around the pillars, making patterns of movement. They were then invited to design their own pillars. Once the designs were completed, they were projected onto a large screen containing an image of the Malaguzzi centre. The children saw, that in the image of the Malaguzzi centre, some of the pillars looked smaller than the others. “Were they smaller?” they asked, “or did they just appear that way?” The children’s pillars all looked the same size when they were added to the image, so they used Photoshop to shrink some of the images and make a realistic picture. I have often seen images of how the Reggio schools use projectors to aid learning but the addition of computer technology added a whole new angle to the learning.

In another project, the children were fascinated by the sound their feet made on the metal stairs. They decided to give the gift of sound to the stairs. To achieve this, they tested ways to make different sounds by changing shoes and using a variety of movements. The sounds were then recorded.

The children decided how they might be able to annotate the individual sounds and used the symbols to create a sequenced map of sound. The children drew a picture of the steps and scanned it into the computer. Using music software, they added individual sounds to each stair to create their desired sequence.

I love the way these projects can take an idea further than they ever could before. In the past the discussion and investigation would have been similar, representation in art would also have been used, but it would not have been possible to make a working model.

Many educators would uphold the Reggio approach as an example of why technology isn’t necessary in early education. Yet, when it is used as one of the hundred languages, it enriches the learning experience without reducing creativity, curiosity or discussion.

It makes me feel sad that schools are often encouraged and expected to use technology more in the classroom, but I rarely see it used in a creative or enriching way. I mostly see teachers using screens to impart knowledge or show examples. I have never seen teachers use music software to investigate the science of sound, use photoshop to create art projects or see it in any way as a tool for the children. It has certainly made me contemplate how we might ‘play’ with technology at home too.

The Wonders of Learning is in Boston until November 2018. Then it will move to Maddison WI.

early education & play, learning environnments, presents, review, sesame street, teaching

How to Find Treasures for your Classroom with Goodwill Online.

February 5, 2018 rightfromthestart 3 Comments

Disclaimer: Payment was received for writing this post and a gift voucher to try out what Goodwill online has to offer. All opinions are my own.

Teachers make the best treasure hunters. An early years teacher will always find a use in the classroom for bizarre objects you would otherwise throw away and they’re always on the lookout for bargains. If you have a list of weird and wonderful objects you have always coveted, then Goodwill Online could be the answer to all your wishes.

A few weeks ago, I was invited to visit Goodwill to find out more about their online auction site ( think Ebay, but where the money goes to a worthy cause) and learn tips about how to win an auction bid. We were given a chance to look around and I was amazed by all the cool things for sale.

A huge selection of musical instruments.

Bulk bags of Russian dolls

Rock collections

Old curiosities

and a whole warehouse of books

Tips For Thrift Store Treasure Hunting

Tip 1: Patience and a long list is a virtue. Dee Arneberg, America’s top treasure hunter from Spanaway, never enters a thrift store with a specific item in mind. The key to brick and mortar thrift store treasure hunting is a large wish list and multiple visits to many sites over time.

As fun as it may be to spend hours browsing interesting items, teachers are short on time so use the PERSONAL SHOPPER to help. The personal shopper allows you to set up alerts for items you are looking for and get emails every time one becomes available in the Goodwill inventory. Let’s say you were looking for Lego ( which by the way they often auction by weight) then you would enter Lego into your personal shopper and an email would notify you as to which new Lego was available.

Search key words and try properly and improperly spelled words, to catch typos that might lead you to a treasure no one else has found. Program the personal shopper to scan both item titles and item descriptions and create your keyword list accordingly.
Tip 2: Comparison shop to know the treasure’s market value. Develop your list of online comparison sites such as E-bay and specialty sites for specific categories to know the market value of an item.
Personal considerations – such as a collector looking for the last item to complete a collection – can create an artificially high auction sale, so know your item’s value and
how much you are willing to pay.
Tip 3: Household donors will often donate categories in groups,so check to see if one specific Goodwill is listing a group of luxury fashion brands or vintage lamps, or collectibles – all indicators of an estate donation of similar items. With knowledge of a specific Goodwill treasure chest, you can call up the inventory from that region and find other obscure items of interest!
Tip 4: Knowing how to maneuver the site allows you to know how many bidders you are in competition with. You can also activate a cyber ‘proxy” to always
top the leading bid up to a confidential limit you establish. And if you
really want the specific item, plan to be online during the final half an hour
of the auction, as that is when new competitors and a flurry of
bids come in. Real-time bids go down to the last second on some
items so you want to be ready to override your proxy bidder if you
simply must have an item.
Tip 5: When you lose, you still learn … about the field of regular
competitors who are interested in your categories. Each completed
auction lists the bid history which reveals the beginning/end letters
of an email which you can track as unique and learn that bidder’s
tendencies over time. As an example, those same nine bidders for
say “vintage board games” will have two or three who bid in the final minutes and are willing to spend X% of retail market value. Learning the field will sharpen your competitive edge in the final frenzied minutes of some bids. And don’t worry, most of the time another of the same item will surface over time and you will have another shot.
Tip 6: Support your local Goodwill. Each participating Goodwill has a virtual “storefront” where their current auction items are listed ahead of the offers across the rest of the site. Each Goodwill maintains their own auction inventory and benefits only from their item sales. Goodwill’s local online helps support an $8.9 million career training and initial job placement effort across 15 counties in our region.

Watch out for shipping and handling costs and remember to add the price of shipping to what you are prepared to pay. Shipping varies according to weight, size and distance of travel but can also vary according to the chosen carrier. One of the items I ordered, had priority shipping, so the shipping costs were greater than other items using ground delivery. If you support a local Goodwill you can eliminate shipping costs altogether.
Tacoma’s operation is prototyping several new attractive features such as one-cent shipping, and an instant purchase price for an item (“buy it now”). Every local Goodwill offers pickup at their operations with only a small service charge eliminating shipping costs altogether.

My experience of shopping with Goodwill Online

Firstly, be warned, it is highly addictive and you may find multiple items you simply must have. I decided to ask my personal shopper to look for puppets as this is my children’s current fascination. I wasn’t prepared for the search to bring up such amazing quality puppets and it was really difficult to choose the ones I wanted most.

My first bid was for a Muppets Wotnot puppet. I am a huge muppet fan and after a little research, found that FAO Shwartz in New York, used to have a Wotnot Studio where fans could go and make a custom puppet. The reserve on the puppet was $9.99 and postage and handling around $10. As this is a totally unique item, I wasn’t certain how far I would go with my bid but 5 mins before the auction ended, I joined the auction and decided to try a maximum bid of $35. I was really pleased to win the item at this price.

An even better surprise was when the puppet arrived. It totally surpassed all of my expectations. It looks just like a muppet, was larger than I expected and came complete with original booklets and receipts.

My 2nd puppet George was bought for $9.99 and I was the only bidder. There were a number of similar puppets available at this time so I decided on my maximum bid a few hours before the end of the auction. If I didn’t win the item, I would bid on a similar one later. The postage on this one was more that the puppet so be careful to check before bidding.

By this point I had to begin to be really selective about the puppets, as there were so many great ones. I decided only to bid on unique items or collections of puppets. I chose a Big bird and Bert puppet and my girls chose a pair of girl puppets because they wanted more female puppets. Both of these were won for under $20 with postage.

Just when I thought we were finished a 1970’s Kermit and Miss Piggy puppet came up on my personal shopper search. We have a Kermit puppet and a good Miss Piggy is hard to find so I couldn’t let this one pass. With an extra Kermit we can turn one into the evil Constantine.

Now I must stop looking at puppets because each new one that arrives is as irresistable as the one before.

What other interesting things could teachers find?

Building blocks
Overhead projectors
Old typewriters
Outdoor play equipment
Toy cars/trains in bulk
Globes
Beakers and test tubes
Maps and charts
Balance scales with weights
Shells
and my personal favourite, browsing the vintage section to find weird and wonderful old objects like washboards, apple corers , record players, old cameras etc.

If you don’t want anything for your classroom or preschool Goodwill online is also the perfect place to find unusual and unique gifts for the people in your lives who have everything. I think this will be my go to place from now on.

days out, early education & play, education, learning environnments, Life in the US, nature, outdoor play, science

Have You Ever Eaten Every Part of a Plant? We did on our field trip to Oxbow Farm.

Gallery November 7, 2017 rightfromthestart 6 Comments

Oxbow Farm is my favourite place for field trips. The guides are wonderfully entertaining and keep the kids motivated with songs, movement, challenges and a fast paced, hands-on journey through the farm.

The children learn about the farm plants and have an opportunity to investigate, pick and taste everything, whilst being shown respect for the plants and their environment.

They eat leafy plants being careful not to stand on the plants.

picking Kale leaves — Snap off a whole Kale leaf and eat it. “It tastes like broccoli”

They eat seeds, learning about where the seeds come from, how they are spread and dried out in the greenhouse.

seeds drying in the greenhouse — The children collected bean pods in the garden, split the pods and brought the seeds to dry in the greenhouse

They eat stems. We found tiny celery sticks to try.

They eat flowers. We ate small yellow flowers that tasted like licquorice.

They eat fruit. We ate juicy apples from the tree and found the seeds inside them.

They eat roots. We pulled salad turnips and carrots from the ground, washed them and ate them.

tasting a salad turnip. “It tastes a bit spicy”

The children found a caterpillar

Found out that runner bean leaves stick to you

and even played hide and seek in the rhubarb

And everyone had a juicy pumpkin to take home.

active learning, art, art and crafts, early education & play, education, expat, learning environnments, Life in the US, outdoor play, play, sensory play, teaching

I Can’t Be a Teacher who Discourages Mess and Noise

June 14, 2017 rightfromthestart Leave a comment

For a teacher like me, who spent her teaching career with under 5’s, I am used to teaching in a messy, noisy environment. Children are permitted and often encouraged to make a mess and be messy.

Young children need to do and create things on a large-scale. They use big chunky brushes, they use oversized pieces of paper, they are developing their motor skills through moving around in a large space, they build with big bricks, look at big books and work on the floor.

Children are developing their language, communication and social skills. They are encouraged to talk as they learn, to ask questions, re-tell events, act out scenarios, explore sounds and negotiate with their peers.

If an early years classroom was always tidy and always quiet, I would be very concerned.

Early years classrooms are well organised. Resources have their place and children are shown how to return resources and take care of them. But when the children are at play they are rarely tidy.

Early years classrooms discourage shouting, teach children to take turns when talking in a group and are building the foundations of listening skills but much of their learning is verbal and kinetic so would not and should not be silent.

It makes me so sad to see children at desks in silence once they start school, children walking around the school without making a sound. It saddens me to see lots of whole class teaching where there is little room to be different, make choices or move around the classroom. Carpeted classrooms where we have to be so careful about making a mess, so there are no painting easels, water trays or sand boxes. Where the kindergartners don’t have an outdoor classroom to extend their space and experiences. Mostly, the teachers know that this isn’t right for the children, they do their best to bring fun into the classroom and make learning as active as possible, but their hands are tied by environments, school policies and by national or state curriculum and assessment.

Sometimes I think I should return to teaching to show that there is another way. Mostly, I think I’d end up demoralised, frustrated and constrained by a system with very different values.

Yesterday, for our final art lesson, I wanted the children to have fun with art, to work on a large-scale and be messy. It was to be an outdoor celebration of art. My plan was to set up a number of art stations outdoors and have a volunteer on each station. This didn’t quite work to plan due to a shortage of volunteers so I scaled it down to 3 activities.

Activity one

I taped paper to the base of a large paddling pool. The children squirted tempura paint in different colours into the pool. I then threw in a variety of balls. We worked together, holding the pool and tilting it to make the balls roll in the paint and make a pattern. The children squealed with laughter. They took it in turns to send the balls towards different members of the class and tried different techniques to make balls of different weights and sizes move.

Activity two

I added powder paint to pots of bubbles and mixed it well. A large piece of paper was taped to the wall and the children used a variety of bubble wands to blow the coloured bubbles onto the paper and make it pop. They enjoyed touching it with their hands as it popped and dripped down the wall leaving splashes on the floor.

Activity Three

I would have done this one outside on a large piece of paper too, but I felt the teacher felt more comfortable at a table, so this activity was moved inside. The children blew paint onto their paper with straws and then used sharpies to turn the shape into a character or person.

My teacher was a substitute. She greeted me with a bewildered look when I described the projects. Her face suggested she was unsure that I had thought it through and that it would be a logistical nightmare to manage.

I suppose our priorities were different. I didn’t care if the kids were noisy and overexuberant. I wanted to see them laugh, explore and take risks. I didn’t mind if transitions weren’t completely orderly. The children were excited by what they had experienced and what they were to try next. I didn’t mind if the children were messy and paint got onto the playground. The paint was washable and the weather would wash it away. I didn’t mind that the end product wasn’t beautiful or particularly thoughtful. I wanted them to see that we don’t always have to sit at a desk to paint, that we can create with our whole bodies and with a variety of materials. I didn’t have a learning goal. I wanted the children to share a new experience and to have fun.

Children from other grades who were out at recess, came flocking to see what we were doing, they looked on with envy. The Kindergarten children were full of joy, they talked freely amongst themselves and to me, without inhibition and they helped me to lay the pieces to dry, placing rocks to stop them blowing away. They enjoyed the responsibility, before returning to the classroom to sit at desks, eat their snack and listen to a story in silence.

If you have thoughts about spaces for children Suzanne Axelsson is collecting information about how space affects children’s play and learning outcomes and also, more importantly, how it affects your teaching…. if you cannot teach the way children learn, then it is going to have a HUGE impact… You can respond to her questions and engage in a conversation about learning spaces here.

active learning, art and crafts, early education & play, education, imagination, learning environnments, motivation, parenting, play, pre schoolers, teaching

Scrap Workshop:What do children learn from playing with boxes and scrap materials?

May 17, 2017 rightfromthestart Leave a comment

One of my favourite workshops to lead at a local play centre was scrap workshop.

I liked it because it was suitable for all ages, it was a natural extension to my heuristic play workshops with toddlers and it gave children the freedom to develop both creativity and skills.

We collected all kinds of scrap materials, large and small and displayed them in separate containers.

Examples of materials

boxes
tubes
plastic containers
fabric
pipe cleaners
beads
shells
pinecones
bottle tops
straws
netting

Sometimes we would give the children a project

make something that moves
make something that makes a sound
build a replica of the Mayflower

or a problem arising from a project or book

invent something to help Rapunzel get out of her tower
Can you build a house that can’t be blown down
How could you be rescued from a desert island?

but best of all we would make sure there was plenty of tape, string, scissors and markers and let them create and explore.

Sometimes they worked on small projects

or larger group constructions

they practised threading

and joining

made things for dramatic play

and problem solved

‘ When children engage with people, objects, ideas or events they test things out and solve problems. They need adults to challenge and extend their thinking. (EYFS 2008 – Active Learning).

scrap workshop — How can you balance 3 boxes without them breaking?

They made choices

Provide flexible resources that can be used in many different ways to facilitate children’s play and exploration’ (EYFS 2008 – Supporting every child).

and tested strategies

they discovered how two different materials could work together

‘ Every child’s learning journey takes a personal path based on their own individual interests, experiences and the curriculum on offer.’ (EYFS 2008 – Supporting every child.)

and nobody asked them “What is it?”

Active learners need to have some independence and control over their learning to keep their interest and to develop creativity.’ (EYFS 2008 – Active Learning).

They worked at a table

or on the floor

and made discoveries using all of their senses.

An open-ended project like this gives plenty of opportunities to observe and work alongside children, guiding them towards their next steps and sharing ideas together.

’ When children have opportunities to play with ideas in different situations and with a variety of resources, they discover connections and come to new and better understandings and ways of doing things. Adult support in this process enhances their ability to think critically and ask questions’ (EYFS 2008 – Creativity and critical thinking)

This child wasn’t interested in joining pieces or making anything. They explored filling and emptying.

This child wrapped and wrapped their construction with tape. They went on to wrap their hands with string. We provided them with materials they could explore wrapping in more depth – paper sheets, tape, string, ribbons , blankets, paper strips with tubes, poles, boxes, and table legs wrapped in string.

‘ Children need and will respond positively to challenges if they have a good relationship with the practitioner and feel confident to try things out.’ ( EYFS 2008 – Supporting learning).

The children were able to work in mixed ages. The youngest children were 2 and the oldest 10. All the children enjoyed the workshops and learned from and supported one another.

‘ In their play children learn at their highest level’ (EYFS 2008 – Play and Exploration).

‘

days out, early education & play, forest schools, learning environnments, Life in the US, outdoor play, play, pre schoolers, risk taking, Seattle, Uncategorized, wildlife, woods

Big Rock Park

June 3, 2016 rightfromthestart 3 Comments

We consider ourselves very lucky to live in an area where there are lots of great parks. Last week saw the grand opening of Big Rock Park, so we took a trip to see what it was like.

I liked that it didn’t have the same old playground equipment. The slide was built into a hill, with a natural climb up to it and the zip wire was low enough for young children to climb on independently. There were also a number of climbing posts made from tree stumps and plentiful building blocks crafted from branches.

They have really tried hard to maintain this as a nature park. The fences are all crafted from rough cut wood and they are still cultivating the meadow around the slide complete with little peep holes. In collaboration with STEM High School, Big Rock Park will design an environmental education programme and promote renewable technology.

Beyond the playground you can head down to the nature trails. On the way admire the giant nest built by local families last year.

At Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands centre, in England, the playground (wellyboot land) had giant bouncy eggs. This nest is crying out for some of those.

slimbridge eggs

As you head into the trails you have a number of paths available, all well signposted. The trails aren’t very long, so perfect for little legs to explore.

Leading towards the trail is another little guest.

Where would Big Rock Park be without a big rock?

This was easily the main attraction. The trails circle around the rock and lead back to this wonderful natural climbing area.

We loved the new park and will be heading back soon with the older children, who were sad that they missed it.

early education & play, forest schools, learning environnments, Life in the US, outdoor play, Seattle, Uncategorized, wildlife, woods

Spring Babies

May 4, 2016 rightfromthestart 2 Comments

carson

On our walk to school every day, my daughter loves to stop and look at leaves and flowers, to take a short cut through the woods or to save worms stranded on the path. Often there isn’t enough time to stop and share her observations and wonders. It is important therefore, that I make time to walk with her when we aren’t constrained by time.

Last week, when I was out running, we spotted ducklings on the local pond. I decided to take a walk and see what other babies we could find.

Our first observation was a deep, vibrating sound, a little like a honking goose. The sound followed us but we couldn’t see anything. We thought perhaps it was a type of frog or maybe a bug.

We sat on the bank and watched the ducks come in and out of the water.

IMG_1395 - Copy IMG_1387 (2) - Copy IMG_1391 (2) - Copy

As we carried on around the pond, we came across a family of geese.

IMG_1420 (2) - Copy IMG_1422 (2) - Copy IMG_1423 (2) - Copy IMG_1424 (2)

We watched them until they swam away. Passing a smaller pond,we decided to rest there a while, watching the birds and dragonflies. We noticed ladybirds on the lupins. Looking closer, we could see the leaves and stems were covered in aphids. On the centre of one leaf was a pair of ladybirds, who proceeded to fight, just like in the ‘Bad Tempered Ladybird’ by Eric Carle.

IMG_1431 (2)

As we sat watching the ladybirds, the geese came swooping across the sky and landed in the pond with a splash.

The spring baby theme has continued. We found a salamander with its eggs in a friends back garden, a newt in the drain and a tiny frog in our worm composter.

WP_20160225_002

The birds are building a nest in our bird box and we expect to hear the babies soon.

IMG_0583 (2)

We noticed that the frog spawn has gone from the storm water pond and if you look closely you can see tiny tadpoles swimming.

To top it all off, the horse at preschool finally gave birth to a foal.

WP_20160422_011

However simple, the wildlife we see around us every day, is a constant source of wonder. I hope my children will always see the world this way.

IMG_1414 - Copy

This photograph depicts what all childhood should be; full of the magic and excitement of the unexplored. It reminds me of the magical tales of Enid Blyton that inspired me to pretend to run away to the woods, when I was a child. My friends and I would sometimes pack a picnic or a bag of sweets and sit deep in the trees, listening to the streams and waiting for magic to happen.

From Nature and her overflowing soul

I had received so much that all my thoughts

Were steeped in feeling.

William Wordsworth

active learning, early education & play, education, EYFS, imagination, learning environnments, Maths, outdoor play, play, pre schoolers, Uncategorized

Do We Over Complicate Loose Parts?

April 12, 2016 rightfromthestart 5 Comments

WP_20160324_006 For those of you who aren’t familiar with the term loose parts, check out my post on the theory of loose parts. In simple terms, loose parts are moveable objects that can be used to create, explore and discover.

Educators often collect loose parts for their environments. Collections include buttons, feathers, beads, coins, shells and seeds. Loose parts are added to clay and dough, left in baskets around the room, used for weighing and measuring, to create art, on light and mirror tables and added to block play. I think though, that sometimes educators over-complicate loose parts. We get so excited about the different things we can provide for the children and the beautiful ways we can present them, that it is easy to forget the true essence of the theory of loose parts.

I was reminded as I played with my daughter at the park, that loose parts are everywhere. If we as educators don’t provide loose parts, the children will find them. A brick will become a piece of food, a calculator is a telephone, a sheet will become a cloak or torn paper will be money. Playing with loose parts is the way I played as a child, playing shops with empty boxes or filling empty bottles with leaves, petals, dirt and water. For the child, loose parts are everywhere, they probably don’t call them loose parts but they will find them.

For me the theory of loose parts is an attitude to how children play. It is an acceptance that children may use what is in their environment and make their own choices about what to do with it. Materials do not have to be displayed or stored beautifully, they simply need to be there. The following video illustrates children’s natural ability to find and use loose parts creatively.

childhood, days out, early education & play, learning environnments, outdoor play, parenting, parents, play, risk taking, water play

You’re My Kind of Mum Friend Because…..

Image March 23, 2016 rightfromthestart 20 Comments

A few weeks ago I went for a walk to the park with my daughter. She likes to climb to the top of the climbing frame and play pirates. The game involves roaming the edges of the park for interesting treasures and on this day, she discovered big rocks. She proceeded to pick them up and roll them down the bank, watching them crash at the bottom. The only other child at the park was a little younger than my daughter and after observing her for a while, she found her own rock. She used all of her efforts to lift the rock and proudly show it to her mum. At which point, she was greeted with a look of horror and her mum quickly took the rock away and ushered her to ‘more suitable’ pursuits.

This kind of reaction is very familiar. When my children were toddlers, other parents would often ask me if my children were okay when they climbed a ladder and slid down the longest slide, as I observed from a distance. I have never been a parent to shadow my child’s every move and rarely feel the need to step in.

It is always refreshing to find a parent who shares my attitude. On a recent trip to the park with a friend, I was so happy to find someone who not only didn’t bat an eyelid when my eldest started paddling barefooted in the cold wet mud but actively encouraged the others to join in. When the children threw rocks on the ground to see if they would break , she gave them advice on how to do it safely, rather than stopping them because it was too dangerous.

You are my kind of mum friend because you let all these experiences happen.