The children continue to divide the bugs into those that need protection and those that are capable of causing harm: good vs. bad. When Silvana asked where the bugs go to protect themselves, the children continued to say and act out home and their habitats. Play in the block area and at the sensory table have revolved around this theme for months.
Since it was discovered that the children associated protection with harmful attributes: poison, biting, pinching, scales, Silvana asked them to draw how a ‘good’ bug would would protect itself.
Lena: “Butterflies blend into stuff to protect themselves.”
Georgia: “Ladybugs fly away.”
Declan: “The centipede goes into the ground to protect himself and he adds dirt to the top to hide the hole and then he puts grass on top of the dirt so the predators don’t know it’s there. It’s hiding home.”
The teachers summarized that the children are working with ideas of ‘good and bad’ or ‘safety and danger’ through their consistent scenarios of finding homes for the good bugs while the bad bugs attack. We wonder how to provoke them further into this investigation and have planned three possible strategies:
1. Introduce a persona ‘bug’ (puppet for the classroom) to draw out discussion of feelings.
2. Offer representing self as bug to observe self protection ideas, revealing personal concerns.
3. Provoke the children to collaboratively create a habitat for protection to reveal through discussion and negotiation their ideas of safety.
What would you suggest? Leave a comment in the box here after this blog.