Supporting Development Through Observation and Documentation in the Wonder Primes
The Wonder Primes have been busy this year developing routines, meeting new people, and learning how to be away from parents and caregivers. We have become a classroom community and we are starting to see where the play in the classroom can go now that we are comfortable with each other and our school environment. Our play is growing richer and we teachers have been carefully observing the play of our students.
We noticed many students wanting to hold, collect, and carry many items with them at once. We began finding collections of acorns in students' pockets, dry beans from our sensory table in the kitchen area, puzzle pieces put into pots, cars carried around in baby diaper bags, etc. As we practiced being even more active observers of our students' play, we started to make connections to our discussion with Peggy Martalock in our early education professional development days and our discussions about “play schemas.” Play schemas are simply repeated actions or patterns of behavior that happen during play. Not simply, they are essential to a child's growth and development and ways of learning about their world.
There are many play schemas, and they serve as building blocks for many advanced types of learning later on, such as math, literacy, science, sports, and more. One play schema we commonly see in our toddler class is “transporting,” and we are seeing this all over our classroom these days. Transporting is when students learn through the play of carrying items around the room, putting them in various containers, and taking them with them. As we observed this play in our classroom with a variety of different objects, we wondered what the students were learning from this play and how we could support this play schema for them? What were they learning through transporting objects and how could we invite more opportunities to carry it out?
We set up a table with small gems and canvas bags, small wooden containers, and kinetic sand to put gems in. We saw happy, engaged students start filling their bags with gems and carrying them around the classroom. One student held on to her bag of gems most of the morning, showing her friends “her sacks” with joy. Students dumped gems from the wooden containers into their bags, others picked them up with their hands or with a set of tongs. Some students enjoyed dumping gems and small bears into the sand and hiding them, showing us more play schemas!
We’re curious about what it is the students are learning through this type of play, and we’re noticing changes in many students' behavior and level of engagement in the classroom. We are seeing less conflict over toys, a deeper level of focus, and overall ease of emotions in students. As we provide our students with the learning opportunities that they show us they need, we can meet our students where they are developmentally, and help them learn and grow. Are they learning about distance? Their environment? Belonging? ownership/identity? Maybe they like how it feels to carry a heavy bag around?
When we take the time to carefully observe and be open-minded about what their play can teach, they show us what it is they want and need to learn and we can begin to hypothesize about what their play is teaching them. We teachers also learn about unique interests, patterns, and emotional responses in our students, helping us to develop deeper bonds and stronger relationships. We are grateful to be able to support the development of our students through this process of observation and documentation and strive to continue to be responsive to the developmental needs they show us through their play.
