Child's Question

Child's Questions:

Can a stuffie be a friend?

The children shared stories of the special stuffed animals they have at home and noted that while they had many.... "I have hundreds!" (Simone)..... "I have millions and millions in Trinidad!" (Rocco).... everyone shared a description of the ones that were most special to them.

We played a song game "Daddy Loves the Bear" where everyone took turns holding a very special bear from Creative Minds that has been with us for more that 16 years! We substituted our names in the song...

Daddy loves the bear, 

Daddy loves the bear,

Daddy loves the bear and takes it everywhere.

Julia noted that she is not allowed to take her special giraffe blanket everywhere and often has to leave it at home.

Reading a chart
The children charted their response to the questions "Can a stuffie be your friend" and practised reading their names and how to use rows and columns on a chart to find the spot for their sticker goes. Everyone agreed that a stuffie can be your friend and when asked why some responses were

"Because they're soft"

"Because they're special"

"Because I love them"

Everyone took a moment to draw a picture of their favourite stuffie. Simone was hesitant, thinking she couldn't draw stuffed animals but was a risk taker and tried and was pleased with her results. Julia took her time carefully drawing her giraffe blanket checking for details and colours so her picture matched. Alfie is very much into drawing letters right now and helped Bela write his name noting he was very good at making l's.

"I'll help you write your name!"

Paying attention to detail

Wanted: Best Friend

At the beginning of the unit Oga, the Hobbit, asked the children how she could get a friend. Today she came and asked again to check for growth in the children's understanding....

Oga the Hobbit

The children made two lists to help Oga understand:
If you want to be a friend...

• be caring (Pauline)
• no punching (Julia & Lysander)
• take care (Orin)
• no pushing (Alfie)
• no kicking (Rocco)
• play princess (Tai)

Adding our ideas to the list

If you don't want to be a friend...

• don't care (Rocco)
• be away (Pauline)
• don't play (Esme)
• don't play at the park (Sofia)

The children added other ideas to the "don't list but after some thought and discussion they came to the conclusion that even if you don't want to be someones friend you still should never

• kick
• bite
• push
• trip
• punch

After reading the story "Wanted: Best Friend" the children helped to create a board game that helped a boy reach the end of the path to find his best friend. On the squares were the children's ideas of what we need to do to be a friend (move one space forward) and what doesn't help us be a friend (move one space back)

Self Assessment: Sharing Ideas in Friendship

A common conflict that I have observed children needing adult support with is when one person is too controlling in a game and the other person doesn't get to add their ideas.

I used puppets to tell a story of two situations, one where one person is too controlling and another where both characters get to add their ideas. The children articulated what kind of feelings they observed in the characters.

I drew faces on their little fingers and they took turns re-enacting these two scenarios.

What it looks like when we share ideas.

What it looks like when we don't share ideas

After watching a short video of Franklin Is Bossy the children reflected on how it feels when someone is too bossy in a game and how often they include the ideas of others in play.

self assessment

Creative Minds is a Fighting-Game-Free Place

Responsibility is a concept the children are exploring in depth this unit.

A learning opportunity has come up recently that is helping the children to deepen their understanding of rights and responsibilities. In the past several weeks many children have been engaging in fighting-themed games, especially in the forest, the result is that some children are feeling scared by the aggressive actions in the games or are feeling upset at being "shot"at or being identified as the "bad guy".

This morning the teachers and the children had a big meeting in the forest. The children all agreed that everyone at Creative Minds has a right to feel safe. I explained that the fighting games were interfering with people's right to feel safe. There are 4 teachers who care for (and play with) the 25 children as they move through their day.  If this type of play were to continue we would need more adults to help them learn the skills they need to play safely and respectfully of everyone's feelings and needs.

Everyone has a right to feel safe so we have asked the children to save the fighting-themed games that have pretend weapons or fighting actions, for play time at home where their parents can help guide them and be mindful of that play. The children agreed to keep Creative Minds a fighting-game-free place.

Today as we left the woods Aiden said to me "Thank you Wendy" (referring to the "everyone has a right to feel safe talk") I asked him, "Did you feel safe in the forest today when there weren't any fighting games?" and he smiled and said "Yes!"

Our Responsibility in Friendship

The Expectations of Friendship 

The three concepts for this unit are function, responsibility and connection. Many of the children have retained an understanding of the concept function, today we focused on the meaning of responsibility.

When you're finished playing with toys, what's your responsibility?

"To clean them up!" Simone

When your mom says go to bed, what's your responsibility?

"To go to sleep" Sofia

When we think of friendship, if we expect our friend to play with us, to help us, and to be kind then what's our responsibility?

I used the story "Hello" as a launching point - the children looked at a picture of a group of children playing Ring Around the Rosie and coloured of the children they imagined was themselves. We played the game and then read the story till it came to the part where there is a boy left out. What's he thinking? wanting? feeling? What should happen in this situation? What would YOU do if you were a child in the group - what's your responsibility?

Choosing a character

This brought up a question by Rocco "What if I don't want to play with my friend?" (when they ask me) Wanting to play on your own or with someone else is okay, but we have a responsibility to deliver the message in a kind and caring way. How could this sound? "I don't want to right now but I'll play with you later" "I'll play with you when I'm finished this game."

Noticing someone is left out

Being left out makes me sad

"Would you like to join us?"

The children recognized they should include the boy in the story and thought of some words

"I'm sorry we left you out."

"Would you like to play?"

Simone added that the boy had a responsibility to ask if he could play "Can I play too?"

Drawing how it feels to be included

How did it feel to be included? Happy! Good! Nice! The children drew pictures of images that felt happy, good, and nice to represent how they felt when they were included in the game

The Expectations of Friendship

Line of Inquiry:

The expectations of friendship

Question:

Are there rules of friendship?

The children expressed their opinion to these three questions:

• Do you expect your friend to play with you?
• Do you expect your friend to help you?
• Do you expect your friend to be kind and caring?

Everyone answered yes to these questions with the exception of these responses:
"Sometimes my friend plays with me and sometimes they don't and that's okay" - Rocco
"Sometimes my friend will help me and sometimes they don't." - Simone
"I don't want help, I like to do it myself." - Alfie

Expressing an opinion

Do friends ever get mad at each other? Most of the children thought friends do not get mad at each other. The story of Matthew and Tilly illustrates how two friends can play along happily and then sometimes things go wrong and they feel angry and can even say hurtful words. I wish I had a picture of the children's faces as Tilly and Matthew yelled names like stupid, stinky and mean, all showed expressions of sadness for these characters. Sometimes friends do get mad at each other, it happens, what can be done about it? They gave ideas of what Mathew and Tilly could do next - say sorry, give hugs, give kisses.

If we expect our friend to play with us, be helpful and be kind then we have a responsibility to include our friend, to be helpful and to be kind ourselves. This is an idea we will explore further. The children made puppets of themselves and finished the sentence "I am a friend when...."
"I play with someone." (Alfie, Simone, Roy)
"I'm happy with someone" (Rocco
"I help." (Sofia)

I am a friend puppets

Function of Friendship: To Love and Be Loved

As a teacher it never amazes me how I can come with a group time plan in mind and then the children present their own opportunities for learning and making connections!

For the past week I have been taking photos of the children that illustrated the three functions of friendship as identified by the children: to have someone to play with, to help and be helped, to love and be loved. The children's task was to stick the photos onto a web that organized their ideas.

The children initiated an opportunity to further understand an unexplored aspect of friendship: friends listen to each others ideas. My idea was to give the children a picture to stick, their idea was to express how they wanted to receive the picture "I want Simone to pass it to Bela and pass it to Sophia and give it to me" Everyone had an opportunity to express how they wanted to receive their photo and and to be listened to by their friends.

Sticking the photos onto the web

Deciding how to receive the photo for your turn

I picked the story "A Kiss For Little Bear" to illustrate how friends might show love to one another. I didn't expect the wonderful discussion amongst the children as they debated this idea.
"No kissing at daycare, right?" Rocco
"Only kisses at allowed at the big school." Simone
"No fair!" Rocco
"You can't kiss because germs will get on your lips, you can only kiss people in your family." Julia
"And in the big school too" Simone
"You can kiss at the playground." Julia
"Can friends kiss?" Wendy
"Yes!" Sofia, Esme, Bela

The hen passed the kiss to frog "Mmmmwah!"

The performance of A Kiss for Little Bear

After hearing the story the children made a puppet of one of the characters and acted out the play. The children initiated the idea to present the play again and invite the other children and a performance was held! Be prepared Debbie! This was a hit and the Fire Group would like to present more plays this week!