What are the traces/happening during my practicum at Kiddies Korner? This past 3 weeks, I have been working on what my pedagogical commitment in the classroom after being able to build connections and relationships with the children. Finding their interest and how I am able to reflects the concepts of the children development. In my case, I observed how children from 1 year old and 2 years old were interested with the trees surrounding them. I made my happening with building relationships with the land, specifically connection with the trees around them. Down below is the happening I have presented in class ECED 3450 program development infant toddlers.
Week 1 Happening
J was the first child I noticed who is very into nature, trees, people, rocks, cars, and other stuff that is surrounding him. My first week in practicum. I was so focused on building relationships with the kids that I was not able or yet find what the kids were interested in. Until, I noticed J would always point at something outside or even inside the room. When I was observing him, that was one of the moment where I’m like “what are you thinking? What’s going in your little brain?” There’s just a lot of questions like “are you watching the big kids playing or the cars?” And this is how I came up with building relationships with the trees or the land with them. That is more focused on trees for now.
In the video where M was calling the fly butterfly shows her understanding of animals or insects are still developing. We know butterfly and fly are two different insects, but to M it may seem like a butterfly because it has a wings and on this picture were L and M thought a leaf was a fly or bug (I can’t exactly remember) shows that they are living with other living or non living things in their world.
Connect this to Elf or personal beliefs:
I connected this with Elf on well being and belonging about joy in relationships with people, place, materials, and ideas and the reflective question was with “Moss suggests that childhood spaces can give “constant rise to wonder and surprise, magic moments and goose bumps, and a source of hope and renewed belief in the world”(moss,2013,p.82). Personally, this quote inspires me to think about how I might foster more “magic moments” for children around me. Just like how M and L were excited about the bug on the slide, we can see how wonder and surprise they were and this made them feel joy to discover other things that are not human beings.
When I introduced the learning or activity to the children, where they can draw tree however they wanted with the colours they wanted. My goal was to let children express themselves with how they view trees. At the beginning of the activity, I told O, M, and L to draw the tree however they’d like. At the start they were drawing on the tree but after a couple minutes O started colour ing on the tree with the colours orange. He’s favourite colour. And so when children were more interested in colouring the tree, I adapted to that quickly and stick the paper on the tree. I got different responses from the children. I asked them “who do you think live on the tree?” One child said, “bugs house” while other child said “teacher home”. This shows their creativity and ability to express wondering. The different responses from the children illustrate their imaginations and how they each perceive the world differently. It’s fascinating to get a glimpse into how children think and the ideas they come up with to explain things they don’t fully understand yet. Their creativity and willingness to guess shows their curiosity. Nurturing and encouraging that sense of wonder is important for their development and growth. Even incorrect responses can provide learning opportunities if explored respectfully. And not only it brought wondering and creativity. It also brought belonging to a child who we can call M it also create different responses from the children to illustrate their imaginations and how they each perceive the world differently.
Week 2 Happening
During outside time, I played music to one of the children and we were dancing to it. Then she picked up two leaves and started using it as a prop inviting other children to join us. When they saw us with the two leaves, they picked one and danced with me and the child. This inspires me to explore the other trees that are much bigger than the one inside the fence from the daycare to let them play with the leaves and explore the trees like scavengers hunt. Children were excited about finding acorns and pine-corns and excitedly moved or run around to look to another trees. We asked the children what they could hear and see. Maddy was interested with the big truck that was cleaning the dried leaves which all the kids called “Vacuum”. They searched for acorns and wanted to bring it back to the daycare but then they started throwing them which turn into a fun activity for them.
First image- the tree has a lot of sticks sticking out so children couldn’t really come near it but they still wanted to say “hi” by wanting to touch it with their hands. And then we found a tree that is long and skinny enough for the children to give hugs and conversation such as “ spider” emerges.
conversation such as, “Spider live in here”- Logan
“This spiders”-Oscar pointing at the bark.
We looked at the bark and Logan actually took a piece and asked me “what is this?” I asked in return what he think it is and he said “It’s a spiderweb!”. He said it’s the spiders home and the bark is the spiderweb that protects them while they’re sleeping. Logan stated that the bugs went home to see mom and dad on the ground. He was determined to dig or search for bugs to see if they were home.
In the quote “ Children construct meaning as they engage with materials, other children and adults,
the environment, the community, and the
world shows how children we’re engaging looking at the bark as spiderweb and the trees were spider live. Children where connecting materials found in nature to concepts they understood about spiders and spiderwebs. By imagining the bark as a spiderweb, the children were making meaning of the natural environment through symbolic play and social interactions.
The children likely engaged in collaborative imaginary play as they explored the bark, pointing out features to one another that resembled spiderwebs. As they projected their internal representations onto the external environment, they co-constructed an imagined reality layered onto the physical reality before them. This type of fluid and creative meaning-making allows children to stretch their thinking in new directions and make connections across contexts.
Seeing snippets of play like this provides insight into the sophisticated ways young minds work. When adults observe and listen closely to children at play, they gain understanding about children’s development, knowledge, and perspectives on the world around them. We learned that thoughtful observation and reflection enable adults to support children’s learning in ways responsive to their current interests and capabilities.
Reflective question: Can children engage with materials in ways that are meaningful to them? i think with this happening. There is an evidence that children can engage with materials that are meaningful to them if you introduce it properly. Children often have natural curiosity that can be tapped into through reflective questions. By asking children open ended questions and giving them opportunities to explore and manipulate materials meaningfully, they are able to make connections that an adult may not anticipate. When an adult is receptive to how a child wants to use materials based on their interests, this validates the child’s perspective and supports self-directed, meaningful learning. Often the most powerful learning comes not from an agenda adults set out, but from following the child’s lead and guidance. This requires flexibility as well as trust in the child’s abilities. Rather than dictating what must be constructed, exploring what can be constructed together expands possibilities.