Recently I was working with a group of children in a school where the nursery and reception class share the same outdoor space. I had been asked to provide some activities related to superhero play and, as part of this, had put together a small collection of scientific toys with properties that could reflect the powers of superheroes. The toys were put in a tray outdoors. Children were free to access the toys and explore them. One of the toys was a large, soft, shaggy ball. When the ball is shaken it lights up, changing colours as it does so.
One of the nursery children, three years old, approached the collection of toys and chose the large ball, pressing it to his tummy, so that it expanded just like a balloon would when squeezed. He made the following statements, laughing as he did so:
'Ha! It looks like a big belly.'
'It looks like a frog's belly'.
'It looks like a hairy frog's belly.'
'But you don't get hairy frogs, do you?'
These statements were all made in quick succession while he was playing with the ball and chuckling to himself at the same time. Watching his play would have given you a certain amount of information; he was definitely highly motivated to come to the activity, and confident to join the other children at the activity. However, listening to him, and I mean really listening to him, adds another dimension entirely.
This is a little boy who knows certain groups of frogs inflate themselves (the fact that, in reality, it is the throat of the frog that inflates is irrelevant) and who also knows that frogs are smooth-skinned.
However, there is more to this than some knowledge of reptiles. As practitioners, we need to understand that these apparently simple utterances are indicators of what children know, and equally importantly, that they offer us the potential to contemplate how they know it. It is this kind of reflection that will not only help us to value each and every child as an intelligent, thinking person, but also to recognise the vital part that families play in supporting young children's need to know and learn.
Think about it. This little boy has seen tree frogs inflate their throats. We should be wondering where he has seen this. Has he seen them in a book, at the zoo, on TV? Wherever it is, it needs to be valued, because not only has he seen these creatures, he has been fascinated enough to remember their behaviours, and these memories have been triggered by his self-initiated play with the ball.
This is a child who also reflects upon his own thoughts. Hearing himself say, 'It looks like a frog's hairy belly,' he considers this and then says 'But you don't get hairy frogs, do you?' This shows that he is able to generalise his experience from one kind of frog to all frogs. Therefore, his knowledge must be even wider than we first assumed.
It would be interesting to discuss his knowledge with his parents, who would be only too pleased to hear that their son's knowledge was not only identified, but also valued. Conversations between practitioners and families centred on interests and hobbies build everyone's self-esteem and can be used to identify meaningful and relevant future learning opportunities.
FLEXIBILITY
It is helpful here to reiterate what has been said in the previous parts of this series. Be flexible and have the confidence to value all outcomes and accept all responses, whatever our planned intentions might be.
We might have put out the collection of toys with the intention of encouraging the children to ask questions about how things happen and why (and indeed, some of the children were doing this). But to ignore the unusual, the unexpected and the surprising would do the children a disservice. We need to have the ability to recognise significant aspects of children's communication and to be able to understand why they are important.
As discussed in the previous article in this series, observation is key. However, we must not be so busy watching that we forget to listen. Little snippets of talk such as the one described above (which, incidentally, lasted no more than about a minute) are windows into young children's cognitive processes - visible thinking.
Talk is a primary tool for assessment in the EYFS, and we need to ensure that our environments enable the children to talk to us freely, not just in artificially constructed situations.
At this point you may well be thinking, 'But we just don't have the time to write down everything that they say as well as everything that they do. No-one would want you to do that.'
The key is in recognising the unusual, the significant, the surprising. Being able to recognise when something noteworthy is taking place is an essential part of our professionalism, as is being able to articulate it to others.
We also need to know 'what next?' We are fortunate enough to have a legally binding curriculum that requires us to plan from children's interests. In order to do this, we have to find out what they are. This information may come from families, but it may also come from the children themselves. In this instance we may decide to put out a small world that contains figures of exotic frogs and perhaps use it to sing 'Five Little Speckled Frogs'. We may also check our book collection to see if we have any non-fiction books about frogs that we could show to this little boy.
Most importantly, however, we need to add to our already existing knowledge and understanding of the child and his family. Our pre-conceived notion of what a three-year-old might know or do can frequently be barriers to their achievement. Listening to young children will challenge our preconceptions and help us to create a more accurate picture of what they could be capable of.
INVALUABLE INSIGHTS
Take another example, in this instance two little girls playing with some small-world figures. They are using a storybox, a collection of miniature animals that are housed in a shoe box. The inside of the box has been decorated to resemble a veterinarian's surgery.
This is a snippet of their conversation:
Child 1. Pretend these two baby frogs ... (offering the frogs to Child 2, who is holding a cat.)
Child 2. Oooooh! I don't want to be a smelly old froglet! (said in a very haughty voice)
Child 1. Oh, that's not kind ...
Child 2. I wasn't saying it to you. The cat was saying it to the frog!
The physical arrangement of the animals continues and then ...
Child 2. Cats chase frogs, they do.
(At this point Child 2 uses her toy cat to chase the frog and pretends to gobble it up.)
Child 2. (In a cat-type voice.) There. That was a tasty snack.
Child 1. Pretend all the pets have to line up ...
This snapshot of play offers invaluable insights into the worlds of these two girls. But we need to be prepared to listen carefully to play and to reflect upon their interactions afterwards, if we (and they) are to benefit from such observations.
Child 1 enters the imaginary world immediately - it is not difficult for her to do so, and she clearly has a story in mind. In offering the frogs to Child 2, she is inviting her to join in with the story that is about to unfold. As you can see, Child 2 has other ideas. She has already chosen the part that she wants to play, that of the cat. It is as if someone had decided which character she might become in the role-play area. She has, in effect, been offered a suit of clothes that she has no wish to wear.
She rejects the toy by talking 'in role' - she doesn't use her normal voice, but rather that of a posh princess and makes her feelings very clear. Clearly, Child 1 feels rejected. However, Child 2 rescues the play by explaining that it was in fact the cat and the frog that were having a conversation.
This is incredibly clever. Substituting animals for people to get a message across safely is a device that has been used by many authors and storytellers, including Aesop, Beatrix Potter and George Orwell. She has rescued the game, in effect. In order for this to have happened, however, Child 1 has to have accepted that they inhabit a shared imaginary world and that those animals, at least in stories, do in fact talk.
Let's see what happens as the play continues. Child 2 is still a little concerned that the role of frog may be thrust upon her one more time. Thinking aloud, her statement 'Cats chase frogs, they do' is a reflection drawn from her real-life experience. (It's not something that I have seen myself, but I understand from cat owners that it does happen.)
However, as we see next, it solves the problem in the imaginary world that the girls have created together. The cat eats the frog - job done, no-one can ask her to be a frog any more. She uses the character of the cat to draw a line under it completely - a 'tasty snack' has been devoured and the matter is closed.
Child 1 is clearly accepting this, and starts a new story, with the pets dutifully lining up to attend the vet's surgery. In fact, the girls did go on to make a wonderful story about a vet who became totally overwhelmed with pets and decided to go and open a boarding house in Clacton instead!
ACHIEVEMENTS
The point that I would wish to make is that this apparently small snippet of conversation can tell us so much, if we take time to reflect upon it and consider the achievements of these two children. In terms of the EYFS, we might congratulate ourselves, and them, on the fact that they had, without dispute:
- used spoken language, and readily turned to it in their play
- experimented with words and texts
- made up their own stories
- used language to imagine and recreate roles and experiences
- used talk to organise, sequence and clarify thinking, ideas, feelings and events
- sustained attentive listening
- interacted with each other, negotiating activities and taking turns in conversation
- used the language patterns of stories
- spoken clearly and audibly, with confidence and control.
We also need to recognise that these children are more than just a sum of their parts! What they have achieved is quite remarkable, and very sophisticated. To paraphrase Vivian Gussin Paley, we need to recognise that play is the work of young children, not a bonus, an added extra, or a treat for when work is completed.
These girls have been so successful that they should be given access to such an activity again. Revisiting learning opportunities is key if children are to be able to consolidate their skills and talents. Consider what might happen if such an activity were not to be offered again in the foreseeable future, because our planning was telling us to move on to a new 'topic' or activity.
Our observations and our reflections upon them are only valuable if they feed our plans, supporting us in the learning opportunities that we create for the children in our care. Pages of notes, trapped forever in a ring binder, will not support anyone, especially not the children.
To return to the girls, we also need to recognise how their behaviours link to their development as writers. They both inhabit an imaginary world, which they need to do as authors of stories. They talk in role. Indeed, Child 2 talks in several voices, and this is an important step in the journey towards writing dialogue. The story that they told had a recognisable structure, and they told it with great gusto, with expression and enthusiasm.
LEARNING ENVIRONMENT
I make no apologies for repeating myself when I reiterate that when we reflect upon the children we reflect upon ourselves, our practice and the environment, both emotional and physical, that we create for children. There is no getting away from it: unless we have the broadest definition of what achievement looks like, some children will continue to fail. This is especially true where writing is concerned.
Evidence collection tends to be based on a very narrow definition of what it really means to be an author. The girls' discussion clearly shows that they possess skills that they need as writers. We must continue to offer such experiences and value them for what they are. The implication is that small-world play is a key ingredient in children's writing development, and will help them develop their imaginations, experiment with vocabulary and inspire each other with new ideas. We are now justified in offering it as part of our continuous provision, as we can be in no doubt that it is an activity that will support all learners.
If we seize control of the assessment procedures, through observation, listening and reflection, we can confidently justify a play-based approach both to ourselves and to others.
- With thanks to children, staff and parents at Archway Children's Centre, Islington, London for their help with photographs.
