A Moment in the Building Area

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This week I spent a moment in the Building Area observing a small group of children experimenting with ramps, tunnels and balls. Below are a few of the children's conversations with one another and with me. 



Raegan: Look Teacher, I made stairs! Look this is where I roll the ball right here. At the top. 
And then I put these blocks right here to stop the ball from rolling away! 


Rian: The dinosaur catch the ball. Ball go down, dinosaur catch here. Stop! 

Ynez: Watch this guys! My ball is the purple one. Make this higher here to make the ball go down fast! 


Kara: Where my ball go? Oh! Arden, that's my ball. Pass the ball to me, please!
Thank you! 


From these little moments, we can observe that the children have different ways of interacting with the materials. They are learning to communicate with one another by sharing their ideas and asking for what they need. They also must share the materials with each other while being flexible if something isn't going their way. Through block building, they are working on important cognitive skills like shape recognition, counting, prediction, cause and effect.