After observing children in the classroom, teachers realized they were really interested in balancing, stacking, and crashing down materials. Teachers continued to add various sorts of stacking ideas to watch this idea unfold. Teachers tried to stack several ideas around the classroom and let the young toddlers take the lead. This is where teachers took their opportunity to introduce new vocabulary words such as crash, wobbly, tall, and tumble.
Teachers quickly observed that round objects were harder to stack versus the flat ones for the children. They were able to stack books, mystery blocks, Legos, and much more. Children spent time counting each block as they stacked them adding math skills into the fun. The children also attempted to stack play food items, writing materials, and cars with little luck.
After noting the differences in the items, teachers decided to take the study in another direction and provided different spaces for the blocks to be stacked on. Teachers provided the use of the light table, a Lego board, outdoor spaces, ramps, and soft mats. It was fun to watch as children’s curiosity spiked trying to figure out why they could not stack as well on the soft mats and ramps versus the floor and table.
Participating in this ongoing project allowed children to meet Ohio Early Learning Standards. Standards that were met within this project were: social/emotional, approaches toward learning, cognitive and general knowledge, language development, fine motor, and mathematic skills.
