Understanding schemas can help practitioners in the Foundation Stage in the way they observe children at play, support children's learning, plan future learning and work with parents, who invariably find schemas fascinating.
Knowing about schemas will also help practitioners to implement the planned framework for working with under-threes. Effective Framework for Adults Working with Children from Birth to Three is currently under development and will be introduced in England in 2003.
Below are a series of case studies detailing observations and showing how practitioners used the information to decipher, support and plan children's learning and work with parents.
Karl by Samantha Dent
Observation: I noticed Karl's (not his real name) liking for dolls as soon as he started nursery. He laid five dolls (wrapped) in a line, he walked around the nursery carrying 'Karl's baby' and would put babies around the room saying, 'Baby, sleep'. He would also become very protective of the baby if someone tried to move it.
Parents: His mother said he had recently been taken to a toyshop where he had chosen a doll - with nappies!
Schema cluster
* Transporting Carrying dolls.
* Enveloping Putting nappies on dolls.
* Scattering Leaving dolls around the room.
Planning and resourcing: I will introduce activities involving the baby, such as bathing (enveloping in water), and show new ways of enveloping using blankets and nappies and clothes that fit the doll.
Practitioner role: While working with Karl and his mother, I:
* identified, with his mother's help, the forms and content of the schema cluster.
* discussed with his mother how to build on observations from home and the nursery to promote Karl's learning.
* assessed the learning that was occurring, principally, learning about size (and what fits in relation to clothing) and caring for babies.
It is important to approach observations without any preconceived ideas about what may be happening. Remember also that schemas are but one 'window' on child learning and behaviour, so consider other 'windows' when analysing observations.
Sally by Amanda Harman
Observation: Sally (not her real name) uses the hole punch confidently on a piece of paper. Next, she looks at a magazine. 'Ah, we want that,' she says, pointing to a picture of a climbing frame. She turns another two pages, each time pointing to a climbing frame. She then makes various patterns on the page -'like a register,' she says - and continues to write. Finally, she folds a piece of paper and cuts along the lines.
Schema: Sally is making grid patterns with the hole punch and by folding and cutting paper. She is selecting pictures of grids in catalogues (the climbing frames) and is choosing the contents page of the catalogue to make a register, all of which have a grid configuration. From this we can see that the early trajectory schemas (up and down and from side to side) have become a co-ordinated cluster of trajectories, known as a grid schema.
Planning and resourcing: We will provide an environment and resources that will enable Sally to develop her learning through her schema. We will take into account the extent to which children learn as much from other children as they do from adults, especially adults who are affectionate and sensitive towards them.
Sally will be able to develop her learning in particular in the workshop, which will offer opportunities for cutting, drawing and folding paper and other materials, and on a climbing frame, which will also encourage the grid schema to develop. We will show her buildings which display grids in window designs, scaffolding and architecture.
Jaspreet by Naomi Taylor
Observation
12.30am The adult shows the children how to use home-made musical instruments. Jaspreet (not her real name) shakes a bottle and watches the sand move in the bottom. 'Box,' she says. 'Bottle,' I say. 'Bottle,' she repeats. She shakes the bottle, picks up and shakes another and pretends to pour from one to another, laughing.
1.44pm She scatters the sand in the sand tray and says, 'Wheee'. She spreads sand out with a fork, pours sand through the fish slice, cuts through the sand, lifts it up and scatters it. She fills the teapot and pours it from a height, fills the frying pan and tips the sand out. She puts sand in her hand and tips it out. The adult scatters sand from a height on to Jaspreet's hands. We all play a scattering game.
2.10pm She starts scattering sand again.
Schemas: This observation provides evidence of three schemas: transporting, scatter and heap, and space as a container. Jaspreet is learning materials can look different when bunched together or spread out, even though the same amount is involved. She is learning that some materials can flow, that containers 'contain' and so enable fluid materials to be transported. This will lead towards understanding the properties of materials in later scientific learning.
Parents: Practitioner and parent discuss Jaspreet's schemas and how to help her learn more.
Planning and resourcing: Her learning can be extended by making available dry and wet sand every day and providing more musical instruments.
Practitioner role: The practitioner is tuning into Jaspreet's schema cluster and enjoying playing with her. She is providing relevant language such as scatter, sprinkle, drop from a height, flow, inside the bottle and pouring.
Imran by Christine Bogle
Observation: At the mark-making table, Imran (not his real name) writes lines from left to right, then lines from top to bottom. He looks at his cousin's paper, says, 'You do it like this,' and draws lines from top to bottom on his cousin's paper. He then goes to the book corner, where he tidies the books into a neat row on the book rack. Next he starts to build a tower, counting each brick as he goes. When he can't reach the top, he stands on a chair and asks another child to pass him a brick, which he places on top of the tower. An adult supervises throughout.
Schema: Imran has a strong horizontal and vertical trajectory schema cluster. He also connects things, and is interested in the beginnings and endings of lines.
He is using this schema cluster at a level where he pretends and he is beginning to understand cause and effect. He is developing his understanding of length, which will lead him on to learning about measurement.
Planning and resourcing: I provide a train set and track (he joins the track to form a circle or straight line, without any bridges or obstacles). I position parts of the tunnel around the hall (he joins them in a straight line and goes through them). I provide the cars, garage and play mat (he lines up the cars side by side).
Parents: Parent and practitioner have already talked about how to promote his learning at home and in the early years setting. I talk to Imran's mother, who says she has observed him lining up chairs and running from one end of the room to the other, in each case pretending to be a train. I explain that he seems to like straight lines, joining things and trains, and suggest that she reads him books about Thomas the Tank Engine. She is very interested.
Clara by Susan Cary
Observation: Clara (not her real name) enjoys placing objects within objects and has a collection of bags and boxes. She shows me her baby covered with lots of blankets in bed, the 'puppet house' she had made with four rooms and a curtain covering one room, and her Lego house. She enjoys making boxes and bags and she has a making area at home.
Her drawing has lots of examples of covering, including a picture of a church. When asked to explain her drawing, she drew another church with windows, door and clock. She coloured in a square, which she said was a brick. She then drew her teacher, schoolchildren and four squares with lines through them, remarking 'They are when people die. They say what day and who it is.'
While dressing-up and dancing, Clara did a rotation dance with her arms up (definitely core radial). She danced again while gazing at her reflection, used streamers as a dancing prop and ended her dance in an enveloped position.
At home, Clara returned her guinea pig to its cage, then wove string (which I had brought with me) through the bars of the cage and attached a handtowel with Sellotape to make a curtain, 'so nobody sees her and she doesn't see anyone she's frightened of'. In her bedroom she showed me a tissue box that she had made into a house for a mouse, which her mother said she had been playing with for at least ten days.
At the park she sat on my lap on the playground equipment and enjoyed the 'enveloping' as well as the motion itself.
Schemas: Clara is clearly an enveloper and is also experimenting with core radials and enclosure. This is apparent in her dancing, dressing up and drawings. She enjoys the sensory aspect of her schemas but she is also discovering cause and effect with the covering of the guinea pig's cage. Her symbolic usage of envelopment is clearly apparent.
Parents: Her mother has found schema study useful in supporting Clara's play at home. Clara will stay with her play longer as her mother is able to provide the appropriate materials and encouragement. Once her mother found Clara made a train with the kitchen stool, put her teddies in it and drove around with it, then made a den for them all and played with them for days, developing different stories - she had been quiet and involved for hours.
