Dramatic Play: It's Brain Smart!

Dramatic Play is not only a source of wonder and magic -- it is good for cognitive development!  Pretend play requires the ability to transform objects and actions symbolically; for example, pretending to be mommy or a doctor; pretending a bowl of nuts and leaves is oatmeal for Goldilocks. 

There is research that has shown that pretend play coupled with literacy props increases a child's understanding and awareness of environment print and the use of signs.

In Dramatic play children:

• develop their receptive and expressive language skills (listening and speaking)
• expand capacity for imagining
• imitate life around them (being a mommy, fix a meal, etc)
• build their attention and engagement capacity
• learn how to negotiate other children and their thoughts, ideas and strategies
• develop important abstract thinking skills
• put math understandings to use in meaningful/playful context (counting, sorting, etc)
• practice problem solving skills with their peers
• build their working vocabulary
• and more!

 Here are some elements of a high quality pretend play in the Dramatic Play/Housekeeping Center:

•  The use of real objects such as placemats, cups, forks, wooden plates, tins, wooden spoons, etc.   These can be more engaging and meaningful to role playing when chosen carefully. 

•  The home in miniature.  Dollhouses are excellent places to "pretend" the daily round of life and all the rich relationships held in this primal place.

• Using nature items such log discs for plates.  

• . . . using pinecones as food.  The use of non-representational (open-ended) items is very important.  It exercises the imagination (frontal lobes).

•  The use of warm and comforting colors (versus loud and primary colors).  This provides a visual canvas for the child's imagination.

•  Chest of drawers filled hats, scarves, and other role playing props. 

•  Shoes for different occasions.  These can encourage seasonal pretend play as well as a variety of coats and outwear. (Builds a relationship and care for the impact of weather.)

•  Baby dolls and beds.  These can encourage the nurturing actions of pretend play. (Builds empathy and compassion skills)

•  A sense of beauty and order to the pretend rich spaces.   It is important to restore the order after the play is over.  Have the children help in putting things back in their places.  (Sorting and classifying skills)

•  A variety of textures - plastic, metal, cloth, wood, woven. 

A BIG THANK YOU to the teachers of Rosa Parks Early Childhood Center for the generosity of sharing their rooms.  All the photos in this post are from Rosa Parks.  What an inspiration!!

Homeschooling in France: The Secret Garden

Guest Blogger:  Elizabeth des Roches
Blog:  Handwork Homeschool

Last week, here at Fairy Dust Teaching, I introduced my family & gave you a glimpse of our days at home. You can see that post here & more photos on my blog, Handwork Homeschool.

Welcome to our house.

We do a lot of learning, making & general fun stuff during our homeschool days. As a Wild Waldorf Mama - I generally don't make much of an effort to separate the "learning" times from the "play" times. We have formal lesson times, 4 days a week. The rest of the time we just DO. My kids are learning from the moment they get up until the moment they fall into bed at the end of a busy day.

Today, let's go out into our yard. Everybody knows how good it is for children to spend time in nature. Of course, there are the main benefits - like fresh air, sunshine, exercise - but there are also benefits that aren't mentioned quite so often. The sense of accomplishment after some (self-imposed) hard labour or the sense of freedom while yelling at the top of your lungs or the sense of excitement when hiding in the bushes during an extended game of hide and seek (or "cache-cache" as it's called in French).

Our Secret Garden

When we lived in Toronto, we had a tiny yard. Room enough for a large sandbox & to ride a bike in a small circle. We always hoped that we would have some land one day. We never dreamed we'd end up with an old orchard, room for a veggie garden, a river that wrapped around our house, a bridge & even an ancient stone ruin (aka my future garden crafting room & BREAD OVEN) !!

When we arrived, no one had lived here full-time in about 20 years. Needless to say, things were a bit overgrown...

Andrew got right into hacking back the jungle.

The weeds & brambles were so high, the kids couldn't even walk through the yard ! 

I've often seen books & blog posts talking about the 4 elements & how to include them in your homeschooling. It's amazing how naturally the kids do it when left to their own devices.

Earth

We looked & looked for a great place for the sandbox (you'd think it would be easy with a yard this size...) finally, an unusual idea hit me. Why not wrap the sandbox around the house ? It had never occurred to me to dig out one of the garden beds, line it with plastic & fill it with sand. They love it because they are close to the house & have lots of room for them both to play.

Needless to say, my kids know their way around our local quarry. Andrew can tell you exactly how much a ton of the fine, sparkling sand we bought costs - around 20 euros. Our orchard had been sadly neglected too over the years, but amazingly our few trees bear plums, apples & pears. Andrew, whose interest in anything to do with farming skyrocketed since we arrived, insisted we put in a garden. Of course, we agreed. The kids used to stroke & kiss (!) their veggies as they grew.

 

Water

With a river (this is not a stream, but a real river with speckled trout, that empties out into the ocean !) winding along one side of the house & around the back, we day-dreamed of the kids paddling idly on hot summer days.

In the summer, the water level is quite low & many a river walk has taken place. What we didn't know was that we had another "water feature" on our property. After clearing part of our land which lies on the far side of the river we discovered a strange indentation....

which after a good bit of digging turned out to be ...

a pond which is fed by a spring that flows down the hills above our house. Our neighbour, who has lived here since 1938, says she has never seen it before !

 

Fire

While we've been here, I've had to get used to my kids becoming more & more adventurous. Along the way, they have developed many new skills. While watching his father re-build part of our stone wall, which had fallen, Andrew decided he wanted to build his own BBQ.

He found old bricks in the basement, mixed up his own mortar from mud & sand & came up with the design all on his own. The best part of the whole project is that it works ! He even cooked crepes one Sunday morning for us. He is proud of it (although he still mutters under his breath because we won't let him light it...maybe this summer he'll be old enough...)

 

Wind

We do have hopes for installing some wind-generators, as the wind seems to get caught down in our walled garden. For the moment, most of the wind that gets enjoyed around here is experienced on the swing set.

Next time, come & explore Our Petite Cité de Caractère (“little town of character”), which was founded in the 11^th century & is now filled with an international array of interesting people.

Until then - have a happy week !

Elizabeth

P.S. When I collected photos for this post, I came up with so many... come over to my blog, Handwork Homeschool to see the rest if you'd like !

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN!

The Making Lessons: Creating Unique Handwork Experiences
Guest Teacher:  Elizabeth des Roches, Handwork Homeschool
When:  June 16 - July 12
20 hours of Professional Development

• Take hold of your curriculum, draw out a few interesting threads & twist them around some fresh inspirations.  
•  Choose from your new collection of simple tools & start designing imaginative projects! 
•  This novel approach, presented in engaging multi-media lessons, is perfect for those who dream of enhancing their teaching with vibrant colours, rich textures & creative memories.

 Early Bird Registration!

Only $57!

 Don't miss this opportunity to jump in at the introductory beta price!

Reggio: Ramps & Texture

Guest Teacher:  Kati Nash
Reggio Blog Series


For months friends had been exploring ramps and their relationship to the objects that travel down them. After exploring with different objects in our classroom from wooden spools to water, friends began making objects with clay to roll on the ramps. Friends started by making balls and logs to roll down the ramp.

As friends explored the ramps and clay they soon  decided they should use clay to decorate the ramps. Friends worked tirelessly adding collage materials to clay and placing the clay with the utmost care onto the ramp in precise spots.

Friends brought their decorated clay to morning meeting with pride.

As friends began discussing it they soon realized that nothing was rolling down the decorated ramp and that it must be broken. Friends initiated brainstorming how to “fix” the broken ramp.

Three theories were put before the group: A.) Clay must be added to the back of the ramp. B.) The clay at the top of the ramp must be made taller. C.) All the clay must be removed. A small group of friends then went back to the atelier to test the different theories.

Through trial and error friends discovered that out of the three proposed solutions only removing the clay was a viable possibility for causing movement down the ramp. Friends plan to bring the bare ramp to morning meeting and discuss their findings.

Teachers wondered if this would lead into further investigating the texture and incline of ramps. This experience provided children with rich scientific inquiry and problem solving possibilities, along with opportunities for showing flexibility and inventiveness in thinking.

After children began exploring the texture of the decorations they made for their ramp the teachers realized the children’s ideas of texture were expanding and developing, but their ability to express their ideas of texture verbally were still limited to an unimaginative vocabulary.

Teachers decided to set up different provocations to promote further development of texture concepts. Children really became intrigued with creating their own textures using paint and a variety of small materials including rice, sprinkles, baking soda, birdseed, noodles and other items.

As children created textures they began bringing them to morning meeting to share and discuss with their friends.

Children brainstormed names for each texture and then worked tirelessly in the writing center to put pen to paper and get the names of their textures written down.

These experiences provided children with the opportunity for comparison and classification development, along with furthering their knowledge of the physical properties of objects and materials. Children also expanded their expressive vocabulary and inventiveness in thinking.

The Making of a Clay Fairy House

 One day, while a few children were exploring clay, the notion of building house emerged.  Several children pulled out some of the log blocks. 

 Pieces of clay were placed in the log "forest" as one child called it.  The piece with the hole in this photo was created for "lady bugs to crawl through."

 Another child created an umbrella to protect the creatures from rain.  He poked a wooden dowel on top of the clay "pancake" to make raindrop markings.  (It is the piece laid on top of the log in this photo.)  Pieces of clay became homes for bugs and butterflies.

One child decided to make a wee bird to sit on the tree.  Another made a place for spiders to walk.  

The next day,  two girls gathered at the clay table.  They chattered about the forest and the fairies.  "Fairies live in trees."  (I am so sad I do not have photos of the next phase.  But little clay fairies were formed and added to the landscape.)  

It was amazing to let the story unfold as each piece of clay revealed a new layer of the plot.   It was extraordinary to be a witness as simple organic shapes of clay became something so magic.

Easy DIY Name Center

I saw this idea in one of my colleague's rooms and loved it at first sight. It is so simple and super cheap to make.  It is a great letter matching game and the clothespins help build fine motor skills.

What you will need:

• a couple packages of clothespins 
• a sharpie (permanent marker)
• printed & laminated name cards (or sight words!)

Write the letters (I used uppercase - you could use both) on both sides of the clothespin.

Make sure you have at least two of each letter and a bunch of vowels!!

The children find the matching clothespin letters and put them on the card - on the corresponding letter.

The children love searching for friends names and then the letters.

Homeschooling in France: Part One

Guest Blogger:  Elizabeth des Roches
Blog: Handwork Homeschool  

My good friend Sally, here at Fairy Dust Teaching, asked me if I'd like to share a bit about my homeschool & life in France. "Sure", I said, "why not?" 

Today, I'll be giving you a glimpse into our time at home - learning, creating & making. 

Who are we?

 

The Parents.

The kids.

 The Kittens.

We’re Canadians, who decided 3 years ago, to sell our city house and most of our belongings, buy a glorious old house in the French countryside, pack up the kids and live on the wild-side! We have 5 children, 3 grown adults & the younger set, who are 5 & 9 years old. Andrew & Arabella have been homeschooled their entire lives. 

 

Our Wild Waldorf Ways

I say wild, not because the kids swing from the trees during their lessons (well, not usually!), or spend their days in their PJs (they’re usually dressed at some point) but because I pick from the many Waldorf theories & techniques that make sense to me, mix them in with a bit of Reggio & add a dash of my own style. I call it “Worldschooling”. 

LESSONS

I do make plans for the year, design lesson blocks, gather books & resources, gather the children for a circle-time & teach Andrew a main lesson 4 days a week. I have been known to “forget” about wet-on-wet painting for weeks on end, build entire lessons around handwork & use cranes, diggers, princesses & fairies as teaching tools. 

Andrew's Office.

Arabella's Play Space.

 

Our all round lesson/baking table.

Our giant PURPLEboard!

Construction word writing.

Cute sight words.

Our homeschool is inspected once a year by a state inspector and the interview is conducted entirely in French (I can speak fairly well but I still worry that I’ve said something totally nuts by mistake!) 

The kids are picking up the language through daily interactions with friends (old & young) and by being totally surrounded by it! Our tri-lingual babysitter comes once a week to hang out with them and ensure that they end up with great accents! 

CREATING

My kids are lively, engaged & learning in leaps & bounds. My son (9) has 5 minutes a day to spend wandering around virtual construction sites online & other than that, they never look at a screen. They don’t miss electronic media one bit. They are too busy telling their own stories, drawing their own pictures & making their own things. 

 

Fireside Reading.

  Handmade INDOOR Sandbox.

Andrew's First Knit Horse.

. The Princesses.

 

Safety first!

Props for a French song Une Poule.

WORKING

We are restoring our house, bit-by-bit. My husband does most of the construction work, I tell him what to do (ha ha!) and the kids help when they’re needed (or they want to)! We are with each other almost all the time as my husband works from home. Our days are always busy.

Building an Ikea Kitchen.

Andrew's new bedroom (one day).

Next week, come & explore Our Secret Garden (see the pond, river, bridge, ancient stone ruin, old orchard & new veggie garden). Until then - have a happy week! 

Elizabeth 

P.S. When I collected photos for this post, I came up with so many... come over to my blog, Handwork Homeschool to see the rest if you'd like! 

EXCITING NEWS!  Elizabeth is offering a course through Fairy Dust Teaching on integrating handwork into your existing curriculum!  Stay tuned for more details!