CREATIVE CURRICULUM and PLAY BASED learning doesn’t come home in a back pack…
Uncategorized Dec 21, 2019
CREATIVE CURRICULUM and PLAY BASED learning doesn’t come home in a back pack…
Our students have been there with us for almost a term now, but yet everyday, their back packs have gone home pretty much empty.
If the parent community of Pallikkoodam didn’t know us well, they might think that their child isn’t learning anything.
The reason being — it is hard to send home anything in the back pack because nothing fits.
We cannot send home what we developed during their yoga and outdoor physical development time as their little muscles were developing gross and fine motor skills. The results only visible during their development stages. The loco-motor development during running , climbing , jumping is only evident when their bio-mechanics are in place with well- developed hand eye co-ordination, using of small and large muscles; and it is already time to hold a pencil and have the right posture.
We can’t send home how we learned to find our own name at the class every morning , we can’t send home how we learned to serve our own snack, tidied up our classrooms . We can’t send home our comfort and confidence through the daily routine — every single day filled with exploration, creativity , independence , discovery and learning . We cannot send home their skills of following instructions and learning the magic words of ‘happy morning’ , ‘thank you’ , ‘sorry’ and ‘some more please’.
We can’t send home the beautiful forest our children built together. I can’t send home the large wall painting all the children painted so beautifully together as a community.
We can’t send home the giggles of the children when our puppet/ story comes out to speak to us.
I can’t send home the making of butter and cottage cheese experiments our students have been exploring along with the theme ‘farm products’ that is introduced to them.
No, the things we have been learning are WAY TOO BIG to fit into our back packs.
Yes, if you looked inside our backpacks, it would seem like we haven’t been learning. You’d probably need to look outside the backpack.
Although, we have been sending home wet sleeves from the water table, sandy rocks in pockets, paint speckles on faces, and many questions put forth to parents.
I presume a few rhymes are being sung on the car ride back home, with a story on ‘Who is the king of the jungle?’ which also translated into another question — Who is the king of Pallikkoodam?
So look out of the backpack to see cooperation, friendship, independence, collaboration, discovery, testing, questioning, trial & error, confidence, exploration, and play.
By the end of the day the back packs are empty, there’s too much to accommodate. All their learning is alive and running — in their little minds.
Prompt them with questions to inquire about the weekly themes and there you go with lots of answers and further questions that you must be ready to probe ..
Author:
Swetha Krishnamurthy, M.Ed,
Founder, Pallikkoodam Coimbatore.