Observation of An Early Childhood Environment
Introduction
The Reggio Emilia approach identifies three educators in the classroom: the teacher, the child, and the environment. In educational discourses, the word “environment” usually refers to the physical environment, inside and outside (Callaghan, 2013). By seeing the environment as an educator, as the Reggio Emilia approach does, we can begin to notice how our surroundings can take on a life of their own that contributes to children’s learning (Strong-Wilson & Ellis, 2007).
The purpose of this article is to explore the role of the environment in the pre-school education as well as provide implications for early childhood educators. Specially, this articcle discusses the environment in early childhood education based on personal observation in a formal care setting in Canada.
I paid two forty-minute visits to a licensed child daycare center in early and mid-February respectively. The center provides daycare programs for children aged from thirty months to five years old. The first visit took place in a sunny afternoon when the children were having playing time, and the second one happened on the fifteenth of February, a day before Chinese Lunar New Year.
The Environment Is a Teacher: The environment invites investigation, lingering, conversation and collaboration.
There are several kinds of inviting toy blocks and bricks on the shelves close to the windows in this child daycare center. Before playing time started, the teachers asked each group choose their bricks. During the playing time, the teachers let the children play freely without interfering them. After the playing time, the children were asked to display their works of art on the shelves and to put away the rest of the toys by themselves.
I observed a group of children who were trying to construct objects with legos. At first, they were working individually. One boy was building a long object; one girl was keeping piling up and tearing down several colorful lego bricks; the other two children were jointing lego together while murmuring at times. At this moment, I had no clue of what they were building until one of them said “Why not put them together and make a bigger one?” The other three children reacted with big smiles and gathered their objects together. They talked and contributed their ideas upon what could be built. Meanwhile, they tried to put the three separate parts together. After fifteen minutes, they finally jointed their objects together and made them into a tall pyramid-shaped object. “A tower!” All of them were cheering and giggling happily.
Such playing environment which enables children to work on cooperative construction projects is conducive to building children’s problem-solving ability, communication skills as well as team spirit. By manipulating the toys’ colors, sizes and structures, children’s curiosity and imagination are piqued, and through try-and-error method with their peers, they learn how to cooperate and collaborate. Children learn the value of individual contributions in building the strength of the group (Fraser, 2002). This basic set of social skills is the key to future educational success in kindergarten, elementary school, and throughout life.
The aesthetic design of the environment enables children’s voice to be heard.
Tarr (2001) says that the children in the Reggio schools are learning to value their rich visual heritage and to become perceptually aware through the support of the environment designed for multi-sensory learning. The programs in this daycare center also value children’s aesthetic development through the design of the environment.
The art education was carried very well in this center. On the shelves at the corner of the classroom, there were several clay sculptures made by the children. Some of them were recognizable, such as dogs, turtles and people, while some clay works were very abstract and distinctive. On the wall there were several drawings of children’s self-portraits with their childish signatures. From their drawings, I could tell that the children were from Africa, Asia and India. Notably, there were several hand-made Christmas cards, a framed picture of indigenous totem-poles, a Salish weaving fabric and a cartoon world map on another wall.
Outside the classroom was a big garden with a playground and a sandbox in it. In the garden, there were several flowerpots with children’s name tags on them. I assumed they were brought or planted by the children. Some children dug a shallow hole in the sandbox, and scattered several cobblestones in the hole. They looked like some symbols left by outer space creatures. Next to the sandbox was a house-shape “art work” built by several wooden blocks.
Children’s plants and works of art in the garden, the handcrafts, drawings and pictures in the classroom heighten children’s awareness of the natural, physical and social environments in which they live. This awareness helps to strengthen children’s self-identity awareness and sense of belonging in their world. The environment also shows the inclusiveness, diversity and multiculturalism in preschool education in Vancouver.
Risk-taking environment enables the children to discover and develop their capabilities.
Reasonable risky-taking play such as climbing, sliding, balancing, swinging, jumping from heights can be regarded as risky, but they are necessary for children’s cognitive, social, emotional, and physical development (Kennedy, 2009). However, children’s safety is what teachers are anxious about which may prevent some children from having the opportunity to engage in such activities. Therefore, it is important that teachers provide children with an environment where they can engage in risky play that is as safe as necessary.
When some children were playing on the 1.5-meter high slide and exploring other playing equipment in the playground, anxious warnings like “Stop doing that!”, “Watch out!” or “Do not do that!” were seldom heard. I also noticed that at least two preschool teachers were present, observing the children playing.
Risky play gives children the opportunity to extend their limits and learn life skills. Success and failure provide children with the motivation to try again and work out different ways of doing things. ------ Tovey, H. 2007
Reasonable risky-taking play not only increases children’s physical and motor skills, but also enables them to know about their own limits and how to deal with risks in the future. Risky play gives children the opportunity to extend their limits and learn life skills. Success and failure provide children with the motivation to try again and work out different ways of doing things (Tovey, 2007).
Implications and conclusion on children respond to the environment
The preschool teachers value diversity and inclusiveness as well as the opportunity to enrich each child’s life through collaborative relationships with other children and their families from all circumstances. Thus the children who are educated in such environment hold an open and positive attitude towards diverse materials and events.
The second time when I visited this daycare center, they were having a Chinese New Year celebration. The classroom was decorated with a red couplet, some Chinese knots and other traditional Chinese decorations. Furthermore, the teachers were wearing red clothes and three Chinese children were dressing their traditional clothes “cheongsam”. Teachers introduced the history of Chinese Lunar New Year first, and then organized several activities, such as making Chinese New Year cards, writing Chinese numbers and tasting traditional Chinese desserts. Children of all cultural heritages were playing, charting happily and enjoying themselves in this event.
A recent study led by a Harvard scholar finds that the early childhood education environment has lasting effects on children’s development (Mineo, 2018). A good early childhood environment meets the children’s basic needs as well as supports and encourages them to engage in activities that implement the program’s curriculum (Wardle, 2018). The environment is also designed to enable preschool educators to facilitate the optimum learning for their children.
References
Callaghan, K. (2013). The environment is a teacher Ontario Government.
Fraser, S. (2002). Authentic childhood: Experiencing reggio emilia in the classroom. Albany: Delmar Thomson Learning.
Kennedy, A. (2009). I'm not scared! Risk and challenge in children's programs. National Childcare Accreditation Council (NCAC), 3, 9-11.
Mineo, L. (2018). Gauging how children grow, learn, thrive. Retrieved from https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2018/02/early-learning/
Strong-Wilson, T., & Ellis, J. (2007). Children and place: Reggio emilia's environment as third teacher. Theory into Practice, 46(1), 40-47. 10.1080/00405840709336547
Tarr, P. (2001). Aesthetic codes in early childhood classrooms: What art educators can learn from reggio emilia. Retrieved from http://www.designshare.com/Research/Tarr/Aesthetic_Codes_3.htm
Tovey, H. (2007). Playing outdoors: Spaces and places, risk and challenge. Maidenhead, Berkshire, England: McGraw-Hill/Open University Press.
Wardle, F. (2018). Creating indoor environments for young children. Earlychildhood News the Professional Resource for Teachers and Parents.
© Wenyi Gong 2018
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