Over the summer, we have noticed a spike in the children’s interest in dramatic play, and have been consistently reflecting on how we can enhance their emerging play in this area of our classroom. We have added and exchanged materials out based on the children’s actions, interactions, and engagement to ensure that the space is not only inviting, but also relevant and meaningful to the children. We as educators, make inferences from our observations of the children, get involved in their play, and follow their lead in order to create an optimal learning environment. We build on their interests spontaneously in the moment, as well, in pre-planned experiences.
One afternoon, we observed a small group of children gathered around the sink. We wondered what they were doing, and soon discovered that they were collecting water from the sink to fill a large pitcher for their restaurant pretend-play. They began to add many pieces of wooden fruit such as oranges, strawberries, and bananas into the pitcher as well. They engaged in pretend-play, filling many cups with their creations. “Milkshakes for sale! Who wants a milkshake?” offered one child. “Here’s some bananas!” another child said. “This is juice!” they explained. Soon, many children took an interest in the spontaneous kitchen water play, and suddenly the restaurant was full of children taking on different roles such as chefs, cooks, servers, cashiers, and customers. “I’m the chef!” said a child. “I’m the chef too!” replied another. “Can I please have some butter with chicken?” one customer ordered. One of the children brought a paint brush over from the art area and used it to stir their secret recipe. The paint brush had some leftover purple paint on it, which transformed their water purple! “This is plum juice!” the child concluded. Many ideas were brought to life as the children transformed the water into many drinks, soups, cakes, broths, ice cream, and many other treats and meals.
We scaffolded on the children’s interest in adding water to their pretend play environment, by adding a large pitcher with a spout to the area, where the children had the opportunity to collect their own water in the restaurant space. This provided many new and exciting learning opportunities as the children built on their existing ideas and formed new ones. “I’m washing the fruit!” One child said as they held a strawberry underneath the water spout. “I’m making chicken broth!” One child said as they stirred their concoction. We also built on the children’s emerging interest in incorporating colours to their water play, by adding some watercolour paint pucks to the area as well. We watched in wonder and amazement as the children explored concepts such as volume, buoyancy, transparency, overflowing, transferring, combining, and colour mixing. They simultaneously enhanced skills such as communication, collaboration, cooperation, language, fine motor, hand eye coordination, problem solving, imagination, cognitive thinking, and creativity. Allowing the children to use the water indoors and embracing the mess, allowed for additional learning opportunities such as risk assessment, cleaning skills, and responsibility as they continue to build their sense of self, confidence, and gain a deeper understanding of their environment.
Each day is a new adventure in Preschool 2, and we always look forward to providing the children with opportunities for them to think, imagine, create, and investigate in increasingly complex and meaningful ways. “Knowledgeable educators get involved in play with children to support development, challenge thinking, and extend learning” (How Does Learning Happen? Ontario’s Pedagogy for Early Learning, page 19). We can’t wait to see where the observations from this experience will lead us to the next!
