Things That Go
As our first three weeks as a class at The Olive Branch have flown by, the children are quickly growing more and more comfortable with their environment and their peers, and are already beginning to bond over a clear group interest: vehicles. As I observe the children in their play and exploration, my primary goals are to provide them with materials and opportunities to explore their curiosities and expand their learning in the moment, and to observe for ways to extend a greater curricular arc. The curiosity and interest around cars and other “things that go” shines through their play so brightly that it’s hard to miss!
We have a few class sets of small cars and other special vehicles, and every one of our children has been drawn to these sets on more than one occasion. We love to drive them, sort them, count them, label them, share them, and otherwise use them in every area of play. The cars find their way into the sand, the garden soil, the wet mud kitchen sink, the paint, the floor, the walls, the grass — they’re everywhere in our play! Here are a few of the many interesting ways the children have been expressing their interest in these materials as well as their real-life counterparts:
Drawing the rain
One particular day this past week, we had a little storm roll in. It was a bit wet and cold, and we collectively decided to stay inside for the day. We were, however, enjoying the view from our front door and windows. As the rain began to pick up, the children gathered around to watch. We looked out the windows and started to talk about what was happening. The rain was coming down hard, we heard a “drip, drip, drop” sound, we sniffed the air and noted that it smelled rainy, and we even caught a few misty gusts on our heads through the small crack at the top of the front door! We sure do love trying to understand our senses. With all of this chat about the rain outside, we decided to get out some paper and crayons and see if we could draw what we were experiencing. Each child had their own setup with a big paper and some crayons and a perfect vantage point to observe the storm.
Nailah chose a light blue crayon and made strong, vertical lines on her paper as she looked at the rain. “Nailah, I see you making those blue lines,” I said. “Will you tell me about it? Is that what the rain looks like to you?” She responded, “Uh huh. See?” I told her, “I do see!”, to which she gleefully responded, “Look at me!”
When I asked what the rain seemed to be shaped like, Ronin observed that it’s “shaped like lines.” He peered out the window, crayon in hand, and I quietly asked him, “What do you see out there?” He looked a little harder, then declared, “Cars!”
”Cars in the rain? Are you going to add cars to your drawing?”
”Yeah! The circle wheels. With circle wheels!”
Ronin returned to his work and drew big purple circles. He then moved onto some other shapes, commentating as he drew, “And lines of a car. Lines of a car…and polka-dots.”
A Problem-Solving Cooperative Game
One of our new friends who joined us in our second week, Miah, has shown a big interest for cars right off the bat. He’s chosen to incorporate them into our painting projects and outdoor sensorial learning, inspiring everyone else to follow suit! On only his second day here, we were inspired to continue using our cars and brought them out onto the front yard with us while following the sunshine that doesn’t always reach the classroom yard. Miah led us in a game of driving the cars in a big caravan along the top of our fence. When the plot of our game was in need of a bit of conflict, the children began to dramatically “lose” their cars through the slots in the fence! Oh no! How on earth can we solve this problem while we’re all confined here in this fenced-in space? Exploring our boundaries, Miah and I walked through the gate to the sidewalk and implemented a bit of a fire-brigade-style cooperation of passing each of the cars back through the fence to our friends on the inside of the yard. This plan wouldn’t have worked without thoughtful communication, gentle handling, planning, listening, and cooperation. The yard rang out with repetitive cheers of, “Thank you Miah!” and we were so happy to have our cars back (until the next time we lost them, of course!).
This was such a fun way to observe the children testing the waters of not only their physical boundaries, but the boundaries of Parallel Play, and how they can begin to cooperate with one another in a larger game of social interaction and communicative practice.
The Special Vehicles in Our Neighborhood
Another new friend of ours, Braden, has seemed to latch onto his interest in vehicles as a source of comfort here at preschool, which, of course, has been the perfect interest over which to create close friendships with others at The Olive Branch! As many of you may already know, we are awfully close to a flight path for planes coming in from the East to land at the Livermore Airport. What an awesome preschool treat! We can all rely on Braden to be the first to notice when a plane is approaching overhead, as he always gathers everyone’s attention with shouts of “Do you hear that?” or, “Look!” We always discuss what we see and hear - big, small, loud, quiet, etc.
The bond we created over spotting special vehicles was only strengthened when Tuesday rolled around. If you hadn't yet guessed it, Tuesday is…garbage day. Oh boy, have Tuesday mornings been a treat for us! When we hear a big engine approaching, everyone flocks toward the side gate and waits for me to open it to run out and see the truck as it passes through. A couple of times, we even got some honks and waves from the drivers! It has been such a great exercise in communication and observation and in learning about our community and neighborhood.
Implementing Further Curriculum:
After observing the children in their work and noting that cars are becoming a clear theme, I’ve begun to find ways to provide further opportunities to extend their processes of discovery - using cars as the primary vehicle (no pun intended!). When I see a new project beginning to emerge, I prefer to begin by finding out what we already know about the subject we’re interested in. This helps to guide us in our further inquiry, it points and focuses the children’s line of thinking, and it gives us a reference at the end of our project to see how far we’ve come. We spent a portion of each day’s Together Time this past week brainstorming: “What do we know about cars?”
We used a big sheet of paper and some colorful markers to compile our list. Each morning we readdressed our question to see if there was anything we could add to our list of things we know about cars. Some children made connections to what cars have, what cars do, and even categories of cars.
What do we know about cars?
Ronin: “It beeps.” “Wheels. Cars have wheels.”
Miah: “Trucks, cars!”
Prithvi: “Wheel! Wheel, wheel, wheel! Write that. Write.”
Adelynn: “Cars!”
Nailah: “A cars, a wheels!”
Braden: “I wanna play with cars.”
Dominic: “That one broke down.”
As long as our children do continue to display a strong interest in cars and other vehicles, our curriculum surrounding the subject will continue. Later on, we’ll readdress our initial question, “What do we know about cars?” and we’ll be able to see what we’ve been learning! We might learn a lot about cars, or maybe more about language, observation, abstract thought, or making connections.
With this as our baseline, our car curriculum slowly begins. Click on each photo to read about it! (If you’re using a mobile device, tap the small dot in the bottom corner of each photo to display its caption.)
