Pooja Dubey worked at the Oberoi International School, Mumbai, India as the Grade-level leader for nursery (three- and four-year olds. Her passion lies in early childhood education. She is in the process of relocating to Canada to pursue higher education.
“The title is quite an oxymoron for people like me who believe that inquiry in the early years is about play. In the early years classrooms, children are seen playing all the time. With the right kind of resources, time, planning and keen eye for observation, play can become the most authentic form of inquiry in a classroom.
Inquiry in a PYP school looks like play. I have had parents come to talk to me and tell me that when they ask their child what they did in school, their child responds with “Nothing. I played.” It has taken a while for parents to understand that that is an appropriate answer. When I hear this kind of feedback from parents, I know I am doing my job right.
Play has, however, earned itself a frivolous tag and something that stays in the domain of the house so schools have to work very hard in communicating its importance to child development. The International Baccalaureate endorses learning through play as a mode of inquiry and this comes as a huge relief to early childhood educators.
Assessment in the early years requires a keen eye and being in a constant state of alertness, while keeping the learning objective in mind and making quick notes for future references. Setting up the environment to facilitate guided learning through play can be tricky too. For me, ‘post its’ and little note pads that I carry with me in a sling bag, that also has my camera in it, works well as I jot down notes to review for later.
I have worked on units that run year long and it truly takes that amount of time for children to collate, organize, design and display their understanding. Very often, I see or hear children talking about our first unit of inquiry in the second semester of the school year. The learning is happening and if presented with the resources and time, children are able to flourish and not feel rushed as they go about doing their ’work’ throughout the year.
I would like to share with you some pictures of my current unit where we are looking at taking care of our body. While books in the library area had an obvious focus on the body we set us a doctor’s clinic in the classroom. The first day began with only a few children experimenting with the tools in the bag but within a couple of days children began to question the use of different things like the thermometer. Teachers are often invited to be a part of their children’s world and, very often, children make the connection to a doctor they might have gone to see.
Using a dramatic play, we tied in a pre-writing learning activity where every child took turns to be the doctor and sat down to make a prescription for the patient. The children practised writing and this made it obvious to us which child was at which writing stage, developmentally. Measurement in mathematics is tied in with the unit as we explored concepts of tall and short; hot and cold; big and small; and too much and too little.
The opportunity to act out real life situations helps children make a sense of our world while letting us take a peak at theirs. Play provides the platform for children to make connections, make theories, test them and revisit them after testing to derive their own conclusions. Without play, young students would be sitting at desks, rote learning and losing out on the best tool that nature has given them- the gift of play.”
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This article comes from the inaugural edition of PYP Mumbai Network newsletter.
