Building a house

Today when I walked into the block area I found child “A” sitting and looking at some pictures of houses. He approached me to help him to build a house. I asked him “Which type of house would you like to build?” He pointed to one of the pictures and said “like this one, it has a garage for my two cars” So I sat down with him and talked about the picture that he was intending to use as a reference. He decided to use two long pieces of block to build the base and then he continued to add small blocks to make the walls. He told me that he wanted to park his car in the garage so did a lot of problem solving to work out how he was going to do this. As seen in the picture below, he is putting a small block on one of the wall telling me that it is the button for the garage door just like the one in his home.

From this experience I can see that child “A” uses picture as a reference point against which to assess his construction. The picture has added a meaning and complexity to child “A’s” building. This experience shows that he is able to judge about the quality of his block building (Ministry of Education, 2007). In this experience child “A” is able to take control of his learning such as placing blocks delicately to balance so that it doesn’t collapse. My response to child “A’s” learning has contributed to the meaning making (Ministry of Education, 1996). In this experience the learning takes place between the teacher, the picture and the blocks (people, places and things). Children learn through social interaction and their learning reflects a recurring cycle that begins in awareness and moves to exploration, inquiry, and finally utilization. Child “A’s” interest can be extended by providing him with books that have pictures of different types of houses so he can explore constructing different types of houses.The Ministry of Education, (1996) highlights that when using technology it provides experiences in solving problems together develops children’s understanding of how technology can help them and others. This learning experience reflects that child “A” has been exploring how three-dimension objects can be fitted together and moved in space. It also represents ways in which spatial information can be represented in photographs and used as a guide for building (Ministry of Education, 2007). This kind of exploration is what architects do. In this experience through exploration, child “A” also had the opportunity to experience written literacy for example by referring to the picture.

A classroom full of technological resources such as unit blocks and other manipulative provides children with the materials they need for active learning. These materials are considered divergent (Isenberg and Jalongo, 1997). Open-ended or divergent materials encourage original thinking, creativity, and experimentation. According to Sprung (1996) playing with manipulative resources, gives children opportunities to learn about physical science and technology. " Physical science in the curriculum helps children gain experience in problem solving, creative thinking, spatial relations, decision making, observation, sorting, categorizing, estimatiing- all essentials skills for success in science" (sprung, 1996, p.31).

Reference

Isenberg, J., & Jalongo, M. R. (1997). Creative expression and play in early childhood, (2nd. Ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te whāriki, he whaariki mātauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa: Early childhood curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.

Ministry of Education. (2007). Kei tua o te assessment for learning: Early childhood exemplars. [Booklet 16]. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.

Sprung, B. (1996). Physics is fun, physics is important, and physics belongs in the early childhood curriculum. Young Children, 51(5), 29–33.