V the planner.

  



V is using a black marker pen to draw his picture of the Conway castle, be begins this by drawing circles that represents the top towers of the castle. Then he add's more detail of the castle by drawing lines and boxes,which is the second level of the castle in which V decided that they were rooms for himself and his family. The wriggly line that V drawed further down the page is the bridge that helps him to cross from the castle to the other side.

In this learning of V, drawing helps him to extend upon his interests in construction but this time he is drawing the castle, where he discovers that he can be creative and expressive, in te whariki it says that children learn the "skill an confidence with the process of ....drawing...(Ministry of Education, 1996, p.80) this shows evidence that V is building upon another skill that links to his interest in construction.

 Another learning is that as teachers we should respect space as this allows children to grow and for V it allowed him to go at his own pace and to appreciate the work that he has produced. This is one of V, 8th drawing on different buildings in the world and by collecting his work it helps him to re look at his progress in his drawing. It says that "the teacher plans to offer the children their drawings to revisit the thinking...." (Pelo, 2007, p.108). That is the learning process that will help V to do recalling and building on a culture of inquiry.

In V picture he used familiar shapes to create his castle and there are mathematical concepts that he understands through his drawing so there is maths concepts being developed through his drawing and "children learn maths through making their own discoveries and using ....tools to help them" (McNaughton & Williams, 2004. p.22). It is true that children develop "a perception of themselves as "explorers"...." (Ministry of Education, 2004, p.4). By supporting his work, I have linked his work as part of the construction project, where it shows now individual work process in drawing buildings, but this time looking at it from a book and trying to create a portfolio where his work and other children's work can be shared and displayed to his friends, families other parents and staff. In Smorti it says that technology the importance is the process not the product (Smorti, 1999) and I believe that this is what makes learning fundamental is collecting data from the children and to extend on their interests.

References:

MacNaughton, G., & Williams, G. (2004). Techniques for teaching young children: Choices in theory and practice (2nd ed.). Frenchs Forrest, NSW, Australia, Pearson Prentice Hall.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: He whariki matauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa. Wellington: Learning Media.

Ministry of Education. (2004). Kei tua o te pae assessment for learning: Early childhood exemplars.

Pelo, A. (2007). The Language of art: Inquiry-based studio practices in early childhood settings. Yorkton, Canada: Redleaf Press.

Smort, S. (1999). Technology in Early Childhood. Early Education, No.19 Autumn 1999.




clay with T.

 This is T first experience with clay, in the first photo it shows the child working with clay using the  Pin & Fettling knife tools but before she did that, she used the skill of rolling and patting the clay with her hands. As she holds the two tools in both her hand, I allowed her to experience the use of the tools in her hands.
 In the second photo, I noticed that she discovered that working with the two tools in her hand did not do what she wanted done so she preferred to use the Pin tool, where she cuts out little biscuits she tells me.

The learning here is that it allows T to take control of her own learning, for a first time experience with clay she shows skills of patting, rolling, shaping using her hands and when it came to using the fettling knife and the pin tool she learns that they are used to cut, shape and mould.

 The tools help the child to "using many materials for different purposes" (Ministry of Education, 1996, p. 95) it also encouraged the child to use "trial & error to find solutions to their problems......previous experience as a basis for trying out alternative strategies" (Ministry of Education, 1996, p.89). I recognized some of the skills that she would have learnt from the 3 year old room and has now reused it again but this time with clay.

I also wrote a learning story about T and shared this with previous staff and with her parents and the feed back from the teachers was that she enjoyed play dough, family play, spent most of her time in the kitchen play area so the shared knowledge from the staff helped me to understand and extend on her interests. Mum response was that T always helped her parents and brothers, mum spends alot of time to bake and cook with her children. With these information it helps when documenting children's learning because it leads to " show how children's learning has unfolded and provides adults with awareness of what children are learning and how the centre supports their learning" (MacNaughton & Williams, 2004, p.263). The collaborative partnerships between staff and families is important because  it "enable all involved to appreciate the other's role, to promote the sharing of information and to enhance children's learning" (Arthur, Beecher, Death, Dockett, Farmer, 2005, p.34).

References:

Arthur, L., Beecher, B., Death, E., Dockett, S., & Farmer, S. (2005). Programming and planning in early childhood settings (4th ed.). Victoria, Australia: CENGAGE Learning.

MacNaughton, G., & Williams, G. (2004). Techniques for teaching young children: Choices in theory and practice (3rd ed.). Frenchs Forrest, NSW, Australia: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: He whariki matauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa. Wellington: Learning Media.

Technician on the alert

 This is an ongoing project on technology, as we noticed that the majority of the children like Transformers, so here we have A (girl) and R (Boy) both looking inside a video deck that the children have managed to unscrew most of the screws using the philips screwdriver.

R is using a turnscrew driver first he jabs the chip boards as he finds that this is easier but then he notices that he needs to unscrew more screws so he notices that the one he is using doesnt fit so he looks for the phillips screw driver its the right one but it is to big.

R decides that he will try and use his fingers instead because it maybe faster, but when he used his fingers something else happens R and his friend A decide to screw the front of the video deck because their is a loose screw that needs to come out.

The learning here is that R gets to trial out working with turnscrew and phillips screwdrivers, this helped him to make connection with how it works. Working alongside A they share similar interests very curious about what happens if I do this? nothing beats the good old hands this helps children to use their hands when they feel that the screwdrivers can not do it faster. Allowing children to explore technology it helps them to "use a variety of technologies for different purposes as they explore their world" (Ministry of Education, 1996, pg.98). We started to collect ideas from the children and made a mindmap becasue this helped us to look at what we know?, What we want to know?, What have we learnt?.

 It does not stop there, I also felt that this link on the robot man, helped me to reflect on where we could go on this and to have parents be involved. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2xP9Rztpro From here I shared the link to staff and asked for comments in how we can extend on technology that included the mindmap of the children's voice so in our newsletter to parents, we asked parents to bring in anything from home that we could use in our technology area and hopefully the children will  become familiar, confident and active explorers with using tools rightfully and create their transformer especially bumblebee seems to be the favourite. This learning also opens out opportunity for other children to become active explorers and to see where this will lead them too.

I also noticed that sharing ideas amongst the two children it helped them both identify what they are capable to do (MacNaughton & Williams, (2004). It encourages co-operative play amongst them and to focus on what they are doing, as they are using screwdrivers and where to put the screws after.

References:

MacNaughton, G., & Williams, G. (2004). Techniques for teaching young children: Choices in theory and practice (2nd ed.). Frenchs Forrest, NSW, Australia: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: He whariki matauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa. Wellington: Learning Media.

Internet:

http://www.buggyrobot.com/

My first robot.

 This time we have girls who have taken the time to create a robot from using car parts that were brought in by a parent who works as a mechanic, it has been properly cleaned so that the children can now discover, explore, engage and create something from using car parts.

S decides that she will use the spark plugs, torque converter, switch's, wires and other parts to create her robot. She firstly trials out the big parts by seeing what fits, then she tests it if it will move clock or anti clock wise from here she is building the legs for the robot to see if they will match in height if not she changes the parts to make sure that the legs are equal in height.

 

Here we have the process of the robot with its legs and what holds them all together is that they all fit in different holes and can move so she is happy with the first part of the robot although she has not done the body of the robot yet. She used wires to make sure that the were connected to the legs because she believes that she needs batteries to help the robot legs move.

 I chose to support this learning in technology because it helps children to understand the many different ways in technology, by providing equipments to explore, discuss ideas, sharing knowledge with other children and displaying and respecting their work (Arthur, beecher, death, dockett, farmer 2005). The importance of parent involvement and staff is important so that childrens work are being valued as these are girls who also have an interest in boys most liked area technology. Acknowleding that girls and boys do have equality in working in technology. 

The learning here is that children "enquire, ...,develop and test ideas and solutions as they explore and make sense of their world" (Ministry of Education, 1996, p.98) this is demonstrated in how she did alot of problem solving as she does this hands on project in making a robot. The advantages of using car parts and as part of exploration she shows the "confidence in using a variety of strategies for exploring and making sense of the world" Ministry of Education, 2004, p.4). She is trying to make links to what she already knows and this time it is testing if a car can be transformed into a robot.

The benefits of technology is that it informs both children, staff and parents and this is done by displaying documentation of the process of children's work in the process in robot making and technology. S skills in the arts has been beneficial in technology this is linked to how she tries to take risks, trial and error, problem solving and "Technology is also a creative and purposeful activity aimed at meeting needs and opportunities through the development of products, systems or environments" (Smorti, 1999, p.5). There are also mathematical concepts in this learning as she uses measurements, heights and width and these are important for children.

References:

Arthur, L., Beecher, B., Death, E., Dockett, S., & Farmer, S. (2005). Programming and planning in early chidhood settings (3rd ed.). Victoria, Australia: CENGAGE Learning.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: He whariki matauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa. Wellington: Learning Media.

Ministry of Education. (2004). Kei tua o te pae assessment for learning: Early childhood exemplars.

Smorti, S. (1999). Technology in Early Childhood. Early Education, No.19 Autumn 1999.