Superheroes and ICT

A couple of weeks ago, the superhero play at kindy has moved to an interesting direction. The children have gone beyond capes and masks. It's no longer about dressing up and running around. As the kindy has a culture of using the medium of art as the tool of exploration, we put out pens and paint, and also pictures and magazines of superheroes for children to represent their understanding of the superheroes.

When we looked up pictures of superheroes on the internet, the teachers noted that a few children have a lot of knowledge and interest in the ninjas of Lego's Ninjago. While the teachers are not familiar with this set of Lego toys or characters, so alongside with the children, the teachers have been actively researching on Ninjago on the computer. Through research, the teachers are able to draw the children's attention to the positive attributes of the Lego ninja. Instead of talking about fighting and battle, they discussed about what each character likes to do, what their weapons are and their means of transportation. The children filled each other up with the story plot, and their narrative is sophisticated and full of details. Thanks to Lego!

While we think we know something about the classic superheroes like Batman and Spiderman, we won't do any research about them when planning the learning experiences. Whereas we know nothing about the Lego ninja, so we are keen to read more about them from the internet. In the end, the children's learning is enriched with greater understanding of the lego ninjas. Their drawing is more complex; and the ninja heroes are depicted in action, and sometimes with their plane or motorbike at the background...

We love to see children moved beyond dressing up and chasing each other, and we let them play games on the computer as well. The more experienced children help the less experienced ones use the touch pad to scroll the screen; click and select and so on. A lot of peer tutoring is happening.

How amazing is ICT in supporting teaching and learning! I've been thinking if we did research about Spiderman and Batman, would the children's play be more complex? Recalling a child who used to dress up as a Spiderman and jump, crouch and climb around kindy, if I had used internet to research about Spiderman with the children, they might focus their attention on the languages of body movements and drama, which is a valuable means of communication in the early years.

However, for a much younger age group - infants, what does technological literacy mean? Check out what Anita of Victoria University, New Zealand has found out.

Blogging with Children 2

There are many reasons to get children involved in blogging. In the last post, I talked about it as a strategy to get families interested about the blog. All parents love to look at the photos and hear the voice of their child. When I bog with the children, I let them choose the photos and record what they say in their own words. Families will feel more connected to the teaching and learning happened at the kindergarten.

Equally important, children are contributing to their own assessment through blogging. I view children as competent learner, and they have opinions and views of their own. When they revisit their earlier work and related photos, they are able to make their own judgement about their achievements; and they are trusted with the decision of choosing what is recorded on the blog. It's also a way to gather data about children's learning from their perspective, which effectively helps the teachers develop relevant programme for individual children.

Moreover, blogging with young children empower them to be a competent and confident communicator. There are really a hundred languages to communicate; and in the digital age, which definitely include the web tools. To grow up as a responsible digital citizen, children need to have the opportunity to use the computer and internet responsibly at a young age.  Computer is not just for gaming and watching You Tube.

Just like today, I talked about the kindergarten gala and looked at the photos I have taken. With the photos, a child recreated what she was most excited about through the language of art/drawing. Her perspective of the BIG fire truck is vividly expressed through the dominating color of red, big ladder and many wheels it has. When she was choosing the photos of her drawing for posting on the blog, she noticed the missing siren, and then she added that bit on her drawing. So, the child was shifting her perspective from the artist of the drawing to the perspective of a viewer, and she made modification and improvement on her own. So, blogging is a tool for self-review or assessment for young children.

 Interested now? You may want to read more about early childhood and blogging in New Zealand.

Blogging with young children

My interest in blogging started when I set up a blog for my kindergarten earlier this year. From an ICT symposium facilitated by the Core Education,  I learnt that using ICT in the early childhood programme is the way to recognize and acknowledge the ICT experiences children are having at home. With an aim to 'make learning visible to our families ', the kindergarten decided to have its own blog. We are aware that some other kindergartens have great sucess in communicating learning with parents and their extended families overseas through blogging,  and similarly my kindergarten community reflects a diversity of cultures, probably the blog will become an effective forum for the teachers to share the learning happening at kindy; and equally important, families will be able to give us feedback, share their views, add a different perspectives, and enrich the teaching and learning experiences.

The path to launch the blog has not been smooth. We organized a parents' evening to explain the reasons to have a blog and how to read and make comments. Despite the turnout rate was low, the parents who participated gave use huge support, so we determined to go ahead. As parents are a bit concerned about opening up the blog, we agreed to have a closed blog, and the kindergarten will invite only families to our blog. As we have chosen to use Blogger, which requires a Gmail account to read the blog; the response from the parents has been disappointing. Even though it's free to open a Gmail account, few parents took the time to do it. We've launched our blog for over 10 months, and only 15% of our families are reading and commenting on our blog. Are the families really so busy that they don't bother to acquire a Gmail? So, recently, we relaunch the blog and switch to WordPress. See how it will go!

Another strategy I suggested is to put the child's voice on the blog. I will regularly compose a post with the children and then send a personal invitation to their parent to go to the blog. Hopefully, the parents will develop a habit of reading the blog. I'll talk about the value of blogging with children next time.

Programme Planning in partnership with Parents

In New Zealand, the Early Childhood Curriculum Document highlights the strong partnership with families. My kindergarten has always had a strong commitment to work closely with the parents. We regularly communicate about individual children's learning through learning stories and group's learning through wall display and blogging. 

When parents are aware of the current interests or learning experiences at kindy, they are able to give us feedback and ideas to further enhance learning happening at kindy. We believe in teachers and parents working together to extend the learning opportunities for children. When home and centre are in sync, the teachers are able to develop better plans to build complexity into children's learning experience.

All along the team knows we have been doing okay with planning for the dominant group. But we're not so sure about small groups. It seems all our energy are invested in planning and documentation for the dominant group, whereas the interests of the small groups are insufficiently supported. Just like currently a large number of children are making weapons and the play theme is about the superhero; and the learning experiences and outcomes are acknowledged, documented and communicated with parents. But superhero play does not appeal to everyone, and a few children are simply not interested in it. For example, while most children make weapons with ice pop sticks, a couple of children spent long periods of time to create 3D objects in intricate designs.

From Ann Pelo's workshop, we learn that Ann has supported and documented the interest of a group of five girls in learning cartwheel over a year. It was amazing and inspiring. The team thinks we should challenge ourself to devote time and efforts to extend the interests of small groups. Most important of all, we want to have parents'  input, so we decided to start a folder to document the experiences and interests of small groups. The folder will be updated weekly and displayed near the entrance where parents could have a quick look when dropping off or picking up their child. 

On the cover of the folder, we write: this folder encompasses how we at kindy are learning together. It's a collection of events, moments and thinking that is shaping our current quests with our learning community. 

Better Planning to Extend Children's Interests

Yesterday we had a planning meeting, in which the team as a whole agreed that we could have done better to extend children's interest. The major thing we picked up was the lack of opportunity to revisit learning experiences. We tend to follow the children current interest and accordingly provide resources and plan for the environment to support the dominating interest at the moment. When we noted that majority of the children are doing superhero play, we organize dress-up; make props; bring in comics books; provide blank ComicLife template for children to create their story; purchase Lego Knights, Mobilo for construction and so on. Initially, the children were kept busy, and we did witness the developing of construction and drawing skills.

Lately, however, the children seem to regress back to boisterous play.  Is that because we have not addressed the underlying ideas that they are exploring, such as the good vs the bad; the power/ control issue; the emotion of fear and so on. We recall that Ann Pelo talked about what's most worthwhile to work on is the ideas behind the play. Perhaps, we should slow down and encourage children to revisit their previous learning experiences, and then they will be able to consolidate their learning.

So, today I used iMovie to collate photos and short videos that I have taken, and I plan to show it to the children on the next kindy day. When reviewing the movie, I noted that a small core group of children are really driving the superhero play. The children shown are wearing their favorite hero's costume; sawing wood and hammering to make swords; climbing up high and then making a leap of faith; designing complicated Transformers; acting out battle scenes with Lego Knights and so on. The movie makes the learning involved visible, such as extending imagination; developing physical strengths, enhancing creativity; and promoting verbal communication skills.

I also add a few photos here and there of real heroes in the community, such as policeman and firemen; parent helpers; and a girl who helped watering the kindy garden. My intention is to prompt the children to think what are the significant qualities of a hero; and what heroes do.

Hope the children will enjoy the movie! I certainly do.

Birthday Celebration

The first week back from the holidays had been extremely busy with several children turning five and going to school. We have a tradition of hosting a birthday mat-time to farewell the children. The families of the birthday children are invited to the mat-time too. The routine includes looking at their learning story portfolios and art folders; reading out a birthday card signed by everyone, children and teachers; blowing candles on a play dough birthday cake; and playing a party game.

The idea of reading the portfolio is to involve the child to revisit and reflect his learning journey, which hopefully helps the child to get ready for the next step of his growth and development. I love to draw the children's attention to their first photo, pointing out that they have grown up physically. As I'm a petite adult, whenever I comment that they have grown taller with long legs and long arms, the child tends to agree and proudly suggests that he is nearly as tall as I am.

When browsing their learning stories portfolio, I will let children choose a few stories of special importance to them to read out loud. It's a moment for the child to assess his learning and achievement. I feel good when the child picks out projects in which he has invested lots of time and energy.  But when the child says his favorite moment is the christmas party or the trip to the museum, I will start questioning whether the teachers have done enough to support the child's learning. I know I'm a bit silly. Who doesn't love Christmas with Santa giving out presents?

For the birthday cake and card, the teacher usually involve the birthday child in making and decorating them. It is a nice moment of one on one, and the child will also learn the little poem to be glued on the birthday card. Later during the mat-time, some confident children choose to read out (from memory sometimes) the poem, or everyone will help reading out the poem together. The birthday child and his family really enjoy the opportunity to show off their 'literacy skills'.

Since the kindy community has become diverse in ethnicity recently. We worry that families of other cultures may feel uncomfortable with the way we celebrate, so we wrote up a note to parents with children turning five, explaining what we are doing at kindy and that it is up to them whether they want to involve their child in the celebration. So far, no parents opt out. It proves that we are worrying too much. It worths the trouble though, as we respect parents as part of our programme.

Professional development with Ann Pelo

During the term break, the whole team attended a professional development workshop organized by Reggio Emilia Aotearoa New Zealand. It was a presentation by Ann Pelo from America on the language of art.

What impressed me the most is how Ann defined art. She described art as an experience with emotional engagement, which involves thinking, feeling and expressing. Specifically, she suggested that art is a verb rather an a noun. So, we should be 'doing' art, instead of 'creating art', the focus of which is the product, an object. What an inspiring way to say the process is more important than the product.

As the process is so important, have we as teachers been doing enough to show respect and support? I ponder. I think, sometimes, we might need to stay around and listen to children when they want to talk about their work. And what else can we do to prepare the environment? Perhaps make sure it is away from busy foot traffic, with lovely music in the background; keep it tidy regularly, and present the art resources neatly alongside plants, natural resources...

Furthermore, Ann believed that art should be more than visually pleasing, and it should also be intellectually provocative, showing the curiosity, confidence, rigor and passion of the artist.

I can relate Ann's ideas with many episodes of children doing art at my kindy. Just like the collage picture on the left. It illustrates a new way of seeing art as a combination of textures, colors, lines, and patterns through collage and drawing. The artist is curious and he plays about with artistry and ideas with confidence. He spent long periods of time to complete the work, thinking, reflecting and adding details, which demonstrated his passion. This is what art is about.


In particular, I like Ann's encouragement to teachers to develop skills and experiences together with children. While art teachers at school specialize in art, early childhood teachers may not have the necessary skills under their belt. But we can competently support children as long as we are committed to learn. Many years ago, I had written an article investigating various ways to support art in the early years. I'm glad that Ann also believes that art is more than the art techniques.

Be courageous next time when being confronted with a blank piece of paper!