This week rather than documenting the play of the children in the k/1 room, I set up a provocation for them and observed the way they interacted with my offering: there were several baskets, each full of a different natural material, and black pieces of felt for each child to design on. Additionally, I included some small images of artwork created with natural materials as inspiration for them.
Initially Ender, Jake, Lilly, and Juliana joined me. They were excited about the materials and began to build right away. Ender’s design was in a constant state of transformation. “It’s some kind of tower…I’m making a green background…Hey look! I made a tree. I’m gonna add more to it…it’s a giant tree. It’s basically a bush.” He started with one idea and it transformed as he added more materials. Juliana’s work was also flexible. “Look what I made! I made a castle…a world. I made a world. These are the people.” As I wrote down their words and took pictures of their work, they became interested in photographing their own work. As someone who LOVES child documentation, I happily handed over my phone and Ender and Lilly engaged joyfully in photographing their designs. As the first group of kiddos wandered away, Emma and Sol took their spots. They seemed to have plans in mind before building, perhaps because they had the opportunity to explore the materials beforehand. As they came to the table, I was deconstructing the previous designs and sorting all the materials back into their original baskets. The girls happily helped me with this, so they had the chance to look at and touch the materials before beginning their designs. “I’m going to make my backyard!” “I’m going to use some rocks to make a flower.” Emma and Sol stayed at the table for a while, playfully negotiating how many materials each of them were using – working on sharing while each of them also had what they needed to continue. “Sol, You’re taking too much!” Emma declared as both girls laughed. They were also very engaged in sorting and organizing the materials after each design. They built and then cleaned up at least three times in the short time I was there. Though I don’t share all the details within this narrative, during this short time with a simple offering of five materials, these children engaged in design/construction, exploring temporary artwork, material sorting, digital documentation, negotiating sharing, scale, memory, balance, and numbers!
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