How the garden grows

One of the best parts of returning regularly to the same place is to see how it changes over time... the garden close to the preschool (named "The Snail Park" by the children and us as we have found so many snails there) has turned into a jungle - everything seems to be suddenly taller than the children - and now there is also a HUGE ocean of Iris attracting bees and other flying insects to marvel at.

The beauty with different kinds of weather is that there is always something to discover - on wet and damp days there are plenty of snails, on dry days there are seeding dandelion heads to blow and beetles to look for. Finding things is such a great way to share experiences - to learn about social interactions

here you can see just how tall everything has grown... the children felt very adventurous making their way through the greenery ...

and nature is always so amazing to look at, to find new details each time you are there - like how plants will wind their way up stalks of other plants to reach the sunlight... the whole idea of #lookclosely - the need to slow down... and by visiting the same place we give children, and ourselves the opportunity/possibility to slow down and see things up close...

I think it is an important aspect of learning to return to the same place and to allow children to discover the changes - and as this post shows, you do not have to have a forest school to do this... this little patch of green was a small public space between the shops and the underground station... and yet it provided countless natural experiences for the children. They learned about weather, the seasons, about the natural cycles of plants... shoots, leaves, flowers, seeds and repeat... they learned about the animals that came to this area - the snails, the birds and sometimes squirrels... going to larger natural areas gave us more natural diversity...

The returning to the same space also meant that the children became comfortable with the space... they felt safe there, so energy was spent on play, learning and exploring rather than getting to know the space. New locations are fun, but returning to the same space offers another type of learning.

here are some more photos of the same space...

space for fairy exploration and imagination

a space for social interaction - making up new games together

a space for art... for discovering science and the self

snails... featured big... and gave us the opportunity to explore friendship, expectation, empathy, dealing with fears, learning about nature etc etc etc

space to think outside the box... to challenge the body... risky play

and to find more things to challenge

to doscover that surfaces change with the weather... from dry, to wet to frozen and slippery

the steps down to the garden offered many different opportunities for play, and rest and chatting with friends

loose parts could always be found

colour exploration over the seasons

visiting the same space allowed the children to play with scary ideas...

texture, sensory exploration

taking art out, and exploring the space in a new way... sometimes dress up clothes, or chalk or....

different seasons... and also the chance to be a part of the world... to meet others...

This post was updated and posted again on June 13th 2018.

Recycling art

In 2008 I worked with a group of 5-6 year olds where we started on a piece of HUGE artwork of the sea based on the children's interest (no doubt influenced by their summer holidays)

The background was created by using a white glue wash with different shades of ripped blue, green and white tissue paper overlapping each other. Then the children painted waves across this and splashed on bubbles and then finished off with glitter.

Over the weeks the children filled the sea with images of fish that they created themselves and stuck on. The artwork filled an entire wall.

a sea filled with fish and sea weed

The next project was France, as we had a child that moved from there and we were all curious to learn more... as part of that project we decided to take down our sea and replace it with a Monet inspired artwork. It just felt a shame to take it all down... so we looked at Monet's artwork and we decided together that we could keep up the background and that it would be the water part of our Monet inspired painting...

The children worked out how to make a bridge for the painting (with lots of dots on it as Monet's style seemed to be full of dots and splodges). We also made waterlilies and Irises to complete our Monet inspired creation. I mixed flour and art medium into the paint to make it very thick and structured an we studied how the flowers only looked like flowers from a distance and not close up. It was wonderful watching the children move back and forth across the room to be able to see their flower "grow" from a distance. I noticed that painting flowers this way was easier for the boys than the girls ( I brought in real Iris for them to paint) and I wondered if this was because it was seldom they drew or painted flowers while the girls did it often, you know the kind with a circle in the middle and five round petals going round it...

The children got the taste for exploring new countries so we moved on to a variety of countries each with a connection to the children in the group in one way or another... when we "travelled" to Africa we decided to once again re-use the blue background

This time it was animals that really caught their imagination (this is a close up) we created a baobab tree, with a leopard and parrots in it and a life size 3D giraffe baby using old scraps of paper glued onto the giraffe form and then we glued tissue paper over it to create the 3D effect... the children then painted the giraffe patterns - if I remember correctly there started off with 4 children and ended up with 12 working on the giraffe... and just like the sea artwork the children could add to this African animal scene as they pleased

Sorry the photo quality is not the same as usual - but they are photos of photos...

The Love Tree revisited

In January February the children and I embarked on a art-philosophy or a philosophical artwork together where we discussed what LOVE was and how we could transform these ideas of love into art... our LOVE TREE came into being...

you can read about it


Unfortunately there have been a few weeks of troubles in Stockholm (you might have read about it or seen it on the news) and our preschool had the misfortune of being a part of that - luckily it was just one window that was smashed (and fortunately just the outer glazing) - but not so luckily it was the window where our Love Tree was...

Last week the window was replaced and we had to take down all the parts of the love tree... I put them to the side and today I presented them to the children with the task of creating something new with them...

here is the original Love Tree - with snow in the background (so glad THAT is gone and the green has returned)

I placed the parts onto the table with a long piece of paper... the children started by sorting all the parts - hands, hearts, butterflies, footprints etc - I had also "thrown in" some grass or long green strands. Once we had sorted everything we moved the project onto the floor where it was easier for everyone to work together. I asked if they had a plan... how were we going to position everything... yes I have a plan, I have a plan, and I have a plan... but not one plan could be verbalised or shown - so it was decided that we start with the  footprints and work out a way from there...

It was an intense session there was a lot of "me, me , me" and not very much "we" so there are not many photographs... as all my energy was needed with the children to listen, to support, to remind that we are working together and that we are sharing and that is part of LOVE... but I guess they were just not feeling the LOVE today. So this got me thinking - could this be partly due to the fact we have just had a long weekend (most children have had 4 days off in connection with Sweden's National Day) would it have been better to have had this session on another day where there was more we and not quite so much me?
Anyway - they enjoyed learning a new technique - of making "bridges" with the green grass/strips (they had been pre-painted with green, blue and yellow for a more textured look).

The children then glued on the oranges, butterflies, hands, hearts and stars - again no time for photographs as most of the discussions were about "mine" "no the preschools" "Now I can't reach the glue" - so it was necessary for me to be present and not behind the camera - to act as mediator, to support them in their thinking processes, to encourage them to pause and reflect on what they were saying... to even reflect on what they were doing for they started getting so involved in their words they stopped looking at what they were doing and started putting glue on the "wrong" side of their hearts or on the floor instead of the paper...
We finished off with a drizzle of white glue so they could shake some glitter all over it... as they all LOVE glitter.

Part of me wanted to give up on the artwork - but I also knew that no matter where we were these children NEEDED to have this discussion - they needed to talk about what's mine, who am I, my rights, collaboration and sharing... it was going to happen... it might as well be during this artwork where I was better able to support them, to hear them and to mediate when necessary - and being part of the process means I know when I can let them steer the conversation, even though at times heated, and when to help keep things cool enough to be productive.

There is a LOT of emotion in this art work.

It will be interesting to see how they reflect on it... what will THEY remember of the process...?

sensory materials - coloured sand

As the preschool I work at, Filosofiska, sponsors children to attend school, linked with Filosofiska in Nepal, I think often about how they could do the same sort of activities as us over there...

I believe that sensory play offers children a gateway to all sorts of learning - and many of the sensory activities we have at preschool use food of one sort or another - flour, salt and oil to make play-dough, coloured rice, oats, beans, pasta etc etc - but since for many children in Nepal food is not something to play with, as there is not ENOUGH food... so I have been on a mission to work out sensory materials that can be found, but are STILL a little different and tickle the senses!

Today we were at the beach and Michael, my son, was delighting in the the sand with his bare feet - so we collected some to take home with us. I sifted the sand to get rid of the small stones and other rubbish... I then used some food colouring to create red, green and black sand - as you see the original sand was quite grey.

The sand could be used on trays with fingers or brushes to create letters and pictures just like this image of salt, coloured green, mixed with glitter...

 It could also be used to create art by gluing it onto card or paper, or just in a big box with cars and trucks, or figures of animals or dinosaurs - hiding the figures, making tracks etc etc... or mixed with water to create a kind of coloured mud - and experiments to see how the colour would change as the sands got mixed together. It did not require so much food colouring to create a difference...

So should I ever find myself on my way to Nepal, or any other country where foodstuffs are simply not an option as sensory materials - I will remember to pack a variety of food-colouring with me...

ice-cream spoons... and ice-cream play-dough

With BIG thanks to Nicole at STIKKINIKKI we now have many many beautiful spoons (maybe not beautiful for our environment - but now they are washed these spoons can be recycled and upcycled).

PLENTY to test - not just to sort by colour, but also just to move around in the box and make a good old noise... I have an idea for an art project, but I am going to chat with the children first before we dive into that... and my mind is thinking glue gun too...

I have seen "ice-cream dough" online - the latest by Ghost Writer Mummy, which I posted on my FB-page. Being more aware of children with eczema these days I wanted to see if I could make it a bit more friendly for children with skin issues... so this dough is mixed with rice-flour (I was fresh out of cornflour, so I thought I would give rice flour a go - its a bit more grainy than cornflour, but it does add to the sensory experience, I mixed it with handcream which had a coconut smell - I am now thinking along the lines of mixing it with coconut oil for an even kinder and more natural experience - that would EVEN be OK to eat.... not that you would want to though... It was quite messy to mix, but once it was a good firm combination it felt really nice and formed well..

it also looked lovely with the ice-cream spoons - toy could smooth it out, or pull it apart - or just stick them in as decoration...
Now I just need to think of how to make a fake sauce - I know coloured rice makes great sprinkles - and as the rice mixes with the dough it will create a new sensory experience....
looking forward to testing it out at work - my children at home LOVE it already....

Art, children, reflection, children... everyone?

Today we have visited Färgfabriken (The Colour Factory) with five of our children to experience some prototypes for an art exhibition for VERY young children...

There were strict instructions - that we teachers should become "invisible" to allow the children to experience the art "their way". The concept (as I have interpreted it) is to see how children view art - are adults adapting art to make it "child-friendly"? Does art need to be simplified for art to comprehensive to children...

I think that one of the main things that I have come away from this experience is that maybe this is not about children... maybe in reality children NEVER have an issue with art, or their ability to interpret the art... but that it is the adults that have a problem...
The more I observe children the more I see that they can take delight in just about EVERYTHING - and given the chance they can reflect and imagine in just about EVERYTHING... the problem comes as they grow up - as Picasso says "all children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up"... so my reflection is... maybe this is an exhibition for adults THROUGH children - yes it is the children that access the art, that experience the art, that play with the art... but this allows the adults accompanying them an opportunity to access art in a different way. Sometimes I think art is made inaccessible...

I remember HATING modern art - I just didn't get it... now I view it in a different way (although there is some I STILL just don't get) - now I view possibilities from a child's perspective - I have abandoned my adult eyes and see it through new eyes... through possibilities to recreate new stories through the hands and hearts of young children... modern art is SO forgiving in that sense, it really can be just ANYTHING.

A week ago I ended up in a discussion about art with a friend (who has artist friends) and I was somewhat shocked about the snobbery in the art world (I have now viewed art through children's eyes for such a long time... with wonder and amazement with fantasy and stories and with imagination...) - but to hear that in the art world there are those who say unless you exhibit in certain galleries you are not a serious artist - it is just snobbery beyond belief - and for me is NOT art (although a part of it)... sometimes I feel that art has lost it's soul... as its not representing the artist, but the artist is trying to be as tricky as possible... "how can I be complicated  - how can I appear intellectual?"... don't get me wrong, I like art that makes you think... but do we have to think HARD all the time? Can't we just feel?
So somehow I think that this art experience... this prototype might just allow us the chance to FEEL art again - to not only give children the confidence to enjoy art, but more importantly be a gateway for adults to open for their children to the arts... by allowing the adults to see their children appreciate art, to hear their appreciation, to hear their interpretations, might be the key to children remaining artists until adulthood.?

this was the very first thing that greeted the two 3.5 year olds that I was with (3x 2.5 year olds were in the other group) - this eyeball moved in the jar, it made a sound - and the sound and the movement definitely caught your attention. I did as I was asked - and made my self as invisible as possible - so I was somewhat surprised at how much the artist was involved in the children's experience - but there again this was HIS first experience with young children (which makes for a VERY exciting recipe of ideas)... in a sense there was too much eagerness to show everything and not enough of a pause to allow the children to see and to move to each item in the room - especially when some of them were a little frightening... In the end I interfered with the eyeball - I had to point out the sound "listen... what does it remind you of" "the underground train" was the reply - and yes I could understand that, there was a rhythm that certainly reminded you of a train... eventually the eyeball was taken out of the jar and allowed to roll around the floor - now THAT was really exciting - not only from the point of view of the eyeball's unpredictability but also fro a teacher's point of view of watching how these children interacted with each other... The eyeball was VERY hard to get in and out of the jar - so not something a child would do on their own.... I was also fascinated by the fact that neither of the children had picked up the jar before the artist himself did...

the same was for the case of these hands with ears (on the photo you cannot see the ears)... when I walked into the room my first feeling about the hands were that they were a little creepy, and that they looked far too fragile for young hands... Neither of the children were keen on approaching these hands and the artist encouraged them to touch them ("you first" said one of the children). The artist picked up the hand and allowed the children a closer look....
later, one of the children picked up one of the hands as the artist did, and dropped it, breaking 2 of the fingers clean off (at this stage I have to admit I was GREATLY relieved by the fact that I was supposed to be invisible - and that in a way that my gut feeling about the hands had been right). The child tried to repair the finger back onto the hands - calmly, but interested in the process, trying to work out which finger belonged where... the artist responded that "it doesn't matter"... this I have reflected upon all day and I find I simply cannot reconcile with it... it was not OK, the child WANTED to repair the hand, she felt responsibility, and I felt that this was a GOOD thing - perhaps by saying that it didn't matter we feel as adults we are not harming the child's self -esteem - but what message are we sending "its OK to break other people's things"? I hardly think that this is the message we want to send... WHAT IF this hand IS used in the final exhibition (and it can be mass produced) what about having a station for "broken hands" that if hands get broken the children can take them to  a place to try and fix them - different materials can be at "hand" to do this... then there could be a table/stage for all the broken hands that maybe grows over time and becomes its own piece of artwork... what would this story tell us? When I started thinking about this it made me think of Etruscan medical votives (OK way back in the day I did a degree in history and ancient history - and the Etruscans were one area I focused on!!)

here is an image of the Etruscan votives - images of a body part that the Etruscans wished to be healed, left at the temple with a small offering... if you ever have the chance to look at this artwork you will also notice there are an awful lot of wombs (fertility obviously being high on the priority list)

it took a long while for the children to move to the hair that could be moved up and down, but once they saw they could control it they were all into it... It moved and flowed wonderfully, made me want to have a hairdryer or a fan and to be able to blow the hair in different directions, to see it flow. This was not the only hairy item in the room... both hairy items did not attract the children at all - which made me think of the number of children I have met over the years that have been afraid of beards... is it the fact that you don't know what is behind the hair that makes it scary? Is this something that could be used as part of the art?

here is the other hairy item... a mouth - or a... well my mind saw something completely different... The child behind is squeezing a bottle connected to a tube that connects to the work of art - which causes the "mouth" to exhale. I could see that both squeezing the bottle and feeling the puffs of air coming out were fun... but personally I just did not like how it looked, I think this was the piece of art I understood the least today... IT was though a great way to see children taking turns....

mirrors with this age are just brilliant - they LOVED looking at their distorted reflections and laughed and laughed.

Then it was time to leave the first room and go into the second room with another artist. I don't have an image of the first part as it was just too dark. BUT after allowing the children to simply experience the BIG echoing room the children were then ready to look at her things...
The first thing to look at was a big sheet of white material hanging - and a small hole in the window was left open, EVERYTHING else in the room was blacked out... this meant that onto the material an image outside was projected - the children were calm, they were, for the first time, able to reflect on what they were seeing. They talked about turtles and a balloon (the image was of a balloon in a tree) . On our way back to the preschool we were reminded to look for the ballon and the tree - which we found of course...

next we went to a kaleidascope (for want of a better word) where the children could go inside and experience the light and the reflections in the mirrors - as all the walls were mirrors. At first we were in there together the children, the artist and myself ... the children noticed there were many people in there - many of everyone, they mentioned the patterns and made reference to "twinkle twinkle little star" - but it was hard to focus - they were laughing giggling and tickling each other...
we adults left the space and through the crack I could see there was more exploration of the mirrors... but one of the children repeatedly opened the door to see if I was still there. So I became "visible" again and said that I wasn't going anywhere and would remain just outside while they were inside. BUT the door-opening continued, but now it felt different - now it felt more of a control thing... the sense that she could open and close the door and decide when I was allowed to see her or not... in the sense it felt like the other room... not so much experiencing but testing the limits of control, testing and trying out how they affect the world around them... these are just as valid responses as those of watching and experiencing - BUT I think it is harder for parents to accept this - to allow their children to test test test when there is a sort of expectation that they should be experiencing and reflecting... maybe for these three year olds (and many other like them) there needs to be time to just test and be a part of - and to later have a time to sit and reflect - may be another calm light experience without so much stimulus for reflection to occur? OR simply a table to sit around to talk... ooo imagine a table with a screen in the middle that could have images of what they have just seen and experienced to aid their memories and deepen their reflection...

on top of the mirror room was this sort of light projected and moving, reflecting in all the mirrors.

The final piece to see was light being reflected by a mirror so that the children could chase (it felt like watching kittens) but they both laughed with great delight

every once in a while it paused long enough to put their foot on it

they also got the chance to try using the mirror themselves - not so easy when you don't really understand the principal behind it - but it is a great lesson for learning it....

on the way back to preschool on of the children noticed that her shoes made light reflections - and I helped her to link up with what she had done with the mirror.

It was a very interesting morning. When we asked what the most interesting part of the morning had been - there was the reply of the underground train that had taken us there...
to me this simply signals that children see art and appreciate life in completely different ways that what we adults do... (I also reflected on this during the afternoon when we were creating art with stones, shells and pine-cones  on some material; the pinecones were not what I would call attractive - they were munched on, squashed and in general not the finest cone specimens ever - but they had been collected by the children and they considered them beautiful... which makes me think, how much are we restricting children by imposing our own values of beauty upon them?) I  do think that an exhibition of this kind allows parents to allow their children to explore art more - it also allows children to open a door to the arts to adults that might have forgotten about it or felt it beyond their reach... this I feel can allow children to maintain their own artistic feelings for longer by being surrounded by adults that support and encourage them to explore, and will explore with them, and not because they feel obliged to, but because of their own new interest in it...

or maybe I am reading too much into this...?

pedagogical philosophies and methods

Why is it that when you are just about to drop off to sleep you think of the perfect things to write, but you are just too tired to get up and write them down... and then the next day you simply cannot remember that turn of phrase and how ideas linked together...

Anyway I was thinking about writing about schemas and how looking at the patterns of the children's interests can support what activities to provide... for example a child in the middle of a transport schema is not going to be able to learn maths by sitting down... but if the maths is provided by allowing the child to deliver a certain number of blocks across the room and work our how many blocks remain in the wagon/pram/trolley then we are helping the child and supporting the learning in a more meaningful way...

BUT I realised that I do not follow schemas THAT in depth - that in fact I find I do not follow any philosophy or method "in depth"... and this is what I got thinking about last night (I will though get round to schemas one day...)

I have found that I prefer to learn about all sorts of different methods and different philosophies and have them in my "rucksack" waiting for the right moment, the right situation for them to be pulled out and used ...

I want my focus to be the CHILD - and if I put my focus into the method or the philosophy then the child is no longer the focus...

Methods and philosophies are there to guide us, to use as tools so that we can scaffold the child. Maybe it is because I am looking at the child and not the method/philosophy first that I dared to write about templates as a positive part of children's learning and not as an "evil" - BUT only if used as a tool to support the child and not as a method... if I "hear" a child need templates as a sort of "training wheels" to allow confidence before daring to get truly creative on their own - then this is what I will provide... because daring to be creative is what I want to offer them... and not just to dabble with it, but to feel the freedom to totally immerse themselves in it. I am not for templates at all - I find that the pedagogical philosophy I lean on the most is The Reggio Emilia Approach and for me there is not so much room for templates there... but if I choose to listen to the RE Approach and not the child then I feel I am not doing my job properly...

I like the fact the RE is based on listening ... of which I have written about several time before, linking up listening with Reggio Emilia. Listening is also key to philosophy too, and this is why I am so eager to embrace this new method/technique that allows me to support the children by listening to them and supporting them to listen to each other... as well as to express their own ideas and opinions and to learn to see that everyone can have a different perspective...

There are some amazing pedagogical methods and philosophies to read about, to try and are being used around the world... I just hope that these methods do not restrict a pedagogues ability to see the child...
I found I could not work in a Montessori preschool because I was not allowed to follow the children with their need to explore the mats as stepping stones (they were work surfaces only) and that the routines were too arranged by the teacher and not flexible enough (in my eyes)... there are MANY parts of the Montessori method that I think are absolutely wonderful, and I have used the inspiration I gained by working at a Montessori preschool ever since... when the child/ren require it.

As well as RE, Montessori and Schemas I take inspiration from other blogs from around the world...
I have read the EYFS and taken inspiration from there
Developmentally Appropriate Practice
High Scope
Heuristic Play and Treasure Baskets
Gender Studies
Head Start
Theories about Play
Mosaic Approach
Brain Development
Steiner-Waldorf
Special Educational Needs/Rights
Te Whariki
Bank Street
Forest Schools
Swedish curriculum

various papers written by aspiring preschool teachers and peer reviewed thinkers of pedagogy and play from both Sweden and abroad

 there are all the individual thinkers throughout history that influence me too...
Malaguzzi of course, but also David Hawkins and Vygotsky, Comenius, Pestalozzi, Fröbel, Dewey, McMillan sisters, Isaacs, Piaget, Skinner, Erikson etc etc etc there are far to many to really list... they have all had their effect one way or another and they have supplied me with a foundation of understanding... how I apply that understanding is through what method or mix of methods I choose...

and if I am paying close attention - if I am truly listening to the child I will know what method will allow the child to bloom...