“Hey, that’s cool. I like your guy!” says four-year-old Jaheem, peering over Michelea’s shoulder as she plays with her pattern blocks.

“It’s not a guy; it’s a flower!” Michelea replies, tilting her head to try to see the “guy” that Jaheem is referring to.

“That’s the stem and the leaves,” she explains, pointing to the green triangles. “And these blocks at the top are the flower.”

Then James weighs in, laughing as he sits down next to Michelea to join in the block play. “I thought it was a guy too—and you forgot to make the other leg!”

“Did you think these were arms?” Michelea asks, giggling. “They aren’t arms; they’re leaves!”

The friends continue to banter good-naturedly as they design with their pattern blocks. The beauty of block play is that it’s hands-on—which facilitates deeper learning and creates a more enjoyable and memorable experience.

We have many different types of blocks in our early childhood classroom, but the pattern blocks—introduced by the Education Development Center in the 1960s to help children develop the spatial reasoning skills they need to master math—have been a part of our play rotation for the past few weeks.

A set of pattern blocks typically consists of six different shapes in six different colors: a yellow hexagon, a red trapezoid, a green equilateral triangle, a blue rhombus, an orange square, and a tan or white thin rhombus. Except for the trapezoid, the lengths of the sides of each shape are the same, which makes it easy for children to fit the pieces together when creating pictures and designs.

Pattern-block play builds inventive and imaginative thinking. These blocks seem to unlock a particular kind of creativity that isn’t always evident in other forms of block play.  

This morning, Jaheem, Michelea and James seem to be creating stories with their pattern blocks while collaborating and mentoring each other in a relaxed and playful way.

“Look!  Michelea tells James, pointing at her latest pattern-block creation. “This is you walking your dog in the sunshine. It took me a long time because I had to figure out how to make the legs. I had them turned in the wrong direction!”

As children discover that they can rotate, flip and rearrange shapes in different ways, they become increasingly aware of two-dimensional shapes. Block play also promotes fine motor skill development as children manipulate the blocks to create their designs.

I watch as Jaheem, James and Michela learn how to measure heights, lengths and areas. Geometric shapes are a kindergarten common core standard, and when children engage in hands-on play with shapes, the learning becomes deeper, more intentional and more relevant.

Geometry is the area of mathematics that involves shape, size, position, direction, and movement. In early childhood education, geometric skills include identifying and comparing shapes, differentiating between shapes, and creating shapes.

The research backing up the importance of spatial skills in early learning is extensive and well-documented:

• A 2009 Vanderbilt University review in the Journal of Educational Psychology looked at over 50 years of longitudinal research on spatial ability and concluded that “spatial ability plays a critical role in developing expertise in STEM.”
• In its Learning to Think Spatially consensus study report, the National Research Council underscored the importance of spatial skills, stating that “underpinning success in both mathematics and science is the capacity to think spatially.”
• A 2017 study from the University of Toronto looked at a spatial-skills intervention implemented in grades K-2. Students were presented with activities that targeted spatial skills, such as finding lines of symmetry, proportional reasoning (the number of tiles needed to fill a space), composition, and visualization. The study found that participating students showed improvement in spatial language, visual-spatial reasoning, 2D mental rotation, and symbolic number comparison.

During today’s pattern-block play session, the three preschoolers are actively exploring combinations of shapes in their constructive play. I watch as they discover that they can combine two squares to make a rectangle and investigate what happens when they turn a shape upside down. (It’s still the same shape even if it looks different!)

Research shows that young children’s spatial skills, rather than their numerical abilities, predict their overall mathematics achievement: The key skills are visualizing what shapes will look like when they are combined or rotated (Young et al., 2018). Working with shapes and spaces may provide a more accessible route to math proficiency for some children than focusing only on numbers.

Pattern-block play also promotes creativity and problem-solving—with no rules or guidelines to stop the flow. Children have the freedom to create their own designs and structures without having to worry about “getting it right.”

So dig out those pattern blocks and watch the spatial awareness blossom and the creativity flow!

Today is one of those magical winter mornings when snow blankets the ground and clings to the trees around our center.  The sun is shining and the world looks so sparkly and irresistible that we head outside in spite of the freezing temperatures.

“Hey! Who has the smiling boot?” Jacoby calls out to the group. He scans the play space, which looks like a snowy white canvas dotted with boot prints.

“Do you have the smiling boot?” he asks Maria.  

Maria looks confused as she glances down at her boots. “No, my boots are pink.” 

“No, no…on the bottom!” Jacob points to her boots. “Does your boot have a smiling face on the bottom?” 

Even I am confused by Jacoby’s question—until he points to the clue in the snow. 

“Look!” he declares. “Somebody has a smiley face on the bottom of their boot.”

Ah-hah! Indeed, we do have a smiley face boot print staring up at us from the snow-covered ground. Well, this will warm us all up!  Let the STEM investigation begin!

After a fresh snowfall, it’s so much fun to find and follow animal tracks. But we’ve never really paid attention to the patterns on the soles of our boots until now.

One by one, Maria and Jacoby begin to check the bottom of each friend’s boot. This simple moment of exploring patterns leads us to measurement, reasoning and comparing attributes.

Young children instinctively seem to notice attributes. It may be the shape, size, color, length or some other characteristics of an object, such as today’s smiling boot face.

Children develop their understanding of matching and patterns through experience. Because it’s difficult to consider a lot of attributes at once, children often begin creating sets by finding exact matches.

When children create pairs of boots or find an exact match to the smiling boot face, they are creating sets of items that are exactly alike. Maria and Jacoby are using rudimentary math, science and engineering skills as they observe and ask questions—all while solving the smiling boot print mystery!

Suddenly, everyone is stomping their boots and comparing and analyzing the shapes and patterns that their boots are leaving in the snow.

“I have zigzags!” announces Liam.

Sure enough, as we all run over to look at Liam’s boot print in the snow, we see row after row of zigzags.

“They look like mountains!” laughs Rokia. “That’s so cool!”

 “I have rectangles!” announces Rachel. “If I turn around, it looks like a house with a roof. Look!  See, at the bottom of my boot print?”  

Our focus is now very intentional and the mood has shifted from playful curiosity to deep observation and concentration. 

This is what child-led learning looks like. For those of you who believe that “child-led learning” can only lead to chaos, I urge you to put on your winter wear, head outside and see how effective and wondrous it can truly be.

“I have diamonds!” shouts Julio, “Oh and triangles at the top and bottom. Wow! Look at my boot print, it has really cool patterns.”

We are working on spatial reasoning, direction and positional vocabulary. This is the deep learning that takes place when children have ample time to explore and investigate.

Every day, children learn something new.  Every day, they deepen their understanding of STEM principles and share their insights and theories with their fellow STEM explorers.

Time is the key to deep learning!

“I have snakes!”  Josie shouts.

“Snakes?” 

Everyone comes running to see the newly discovered boot-print pattern. And, yes indeed, Josie’s boot print really does look like snakes.

But Isaac sees it differently. “I think it looks like waves,” he counters. “You know, like when you throw a rock in the river and it makes those lines?”

Then five-year-old Maya reorients the group to the smiley-face boot prints that started the morning’s STEM investigation.

“Where did that smiley face boot come from?” she asks, putting an end to the snake-shape and wave-shape discussion.

“I don’t know!” retorts a frustrated Jacoby. “That’s what I am trying to figure out!” 

“No, I mean, where did the smiley face boot print start?” Maya clarifies, assuming the role of lead investigator. “Where did you find it? Did you follow it, like we followed the cat paw prints last winter?” 

Jacoby pauses and I can see the wheels turning as he considers Maya’s questions. This is a lightbulb moment when the children suddenly recall a forgotten game from winters past. We have plenty of wandering cats in our neighborhood. For years, we have engaged in follow-the-cat-print expeditions on snowy days, following the tracks and trying to figure out the exact route that the cat took and why. Today has ushered in a new season of snow—and now we are rediscovering the game all over again.

Five-year-old Maya has had a few more years of brain development and a few more years of winter play, so she has retained more memories of those snowy-day games than the younger children who started the smiling boot print investigation.

Suddenly we are tracking movement, direction and the changes in how the boot print is left. We don’t have paper and pencils to collect data outside today, but our friends are forming hypotheses and making deductions as they piece the clues together and abandon the ideas that don’t pan out.

Maya continues as the lead investigator. “Look at the size of this boot track. It’s much bigger than our boots. See? I think it’s an adult boot print. Look how far it is between the foot prints. It takes me three steps to their two steps.”

“Maybe it’s the mail carrier,” suggests Lois.  “She brought a package to the door yesterday.”

“It can’t be the mail carrier,” reasons Maya. “She doesn’t walk on this side of the center.”

“It must be a parent!” shouts Jacoby. “Who has a parent with a smiling boot?”

The question is met with dead silence. No one knows the answer.

Suddenly, Maya turns to me and asks, “Do you have a smiling boot? You are an adult.”

Much to my disappointment and the chagrin of my young friends, I am not the owner of the smiling boot. We are getting cold and our investigation has hit a dead end. We decide to go indoors and warm up with some hot cocoa and banana muffins.

At pickup time, the children check the boots of every parent for a smiling face, but no one has the matching boot. Many weeks later, we discover that the smiling boot belongs to a grandparent of one of the children at our center. By then the thrill of the hunt is over. But the learning has not been lost. A great morning of STEM investigation is tucked away safely in the developing brains of our early math explorers.

Ready to start your own Snowy Day STEM Investigation? Check out Show Me Your Shoe, an Early Math Counts lesson plan that can be adapted for your own boot-matching investigation!

“Evie, come look! I’m a superhero! I have superpowers!” calls Jamie from the foyer.

Curiosity piqued, Evie leaves her blocks behind to see what her best friend is up to now.

“Rainbows!!!” Evie shrieks as she spies the colorful light pattern on Jamie’s wrist.

Everyone within earshot dashes over to see the rainbows. And, just like that, our morning activities morph into a joyous exploration of light and color.

Squeals are the soundtrack for this sudden spasm of joy as the children dance around the room “catching” rainbows.

The rainbows that have inspired this impromptu STEM investigation are coming from the leaded-glass windows on our old schoolhouse.

During the winter and early spring, the sun hits these windows at just the right angle and we find these refracted-light rainbows on our walls, the floor—and even on the faces of napping children.

“I know the colors of the rainbow!” Noah sings. “R is for Red, O is for Orange, Y is for Yellow…” 

A chorus of little voices joins in, along with requests for our favorite “ROY G. BIV” song from the children’s CD, Here Comes Science (see image below).

The song is used as a mnemonic aid to help children remember the colors of the visible light spectrum in order of increasing frequency: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet.

Color recognition marks an important developmental milestone.

Color identification helps children strengthen the cognitive link between visual clues and words.

Noah is singing the ROY G. BIV song while pointing to each color. As I watch, I make a mental note to check off color recognition, vocabulary and sequential ordering on Noah’s upcoming learning assessment.

I attempt to explain that the rainbows in our classroom are created when the sunlight gets “split up” as it passes through a cut-glass window that bends the light.

“Red tends to bend the least, so it appears on the top of the rainbow, while violet bends the most and ends up on the bottom,” I state.

My jabbering is met with silence. The children are deep into their own investigations.

“The librarian told us that rainbows are actually circles, but they look like arches when we look at them from the ground,” says Owen.

Heads pop up. Owen’s comment is met with quizzical expressions as the children try to process this information.

“If we dig down into the ground would we see the rest of the rainbow?” Roberto asks. 

“I don’t know,” shrugs Owen, glancing around at the rainbows in the room.

“What’s an arch?” asks Thali.

“You know, that part of the circle that looks like this,” says Jamie as he creates a half-circle with his hands. “It’s like you cut a circle in half!”

Thali nods and the focus of the group returns to the rainbows in the room.

This interaction prompts us to bring out our prisms and inject a bit of STEM into our hands-on play. Throughout the day, we experiment with other materials and sources of light.

First, we add Magnatiles to the windows in our block area (above).

Then we grab our liquid tiles (below) and place them in the window frame. We love these tiles and play with them often, but this is the first time we’ve tried to place them in the window. The colorful liquid in the tile is reacting to the pressure of Sally’s fingers, stimulating her sensory, perceptual and spatial pathways.

I offer a large liquid floor tile to our younger learners. Some of the older children immediately join in the exploration, adding enough weight and pressure to move the liquid and stimulate the senses of our younger friends.

If you don’t have cut-glass windows, a simple window film can bring about the same results. We added this film to the window below, and we are greeted with rainbows whenever the sun shines!

When these spontaneous moments of learning land in our classroom, my goal is not for the children to completely comprehend or master a topic.

My goal is to learn with them, to pique their curiosity with investigative opportunities and to allow them to engage in scientific inquiry while playing with light.

The act of playing with light, reflection and color invariably evokes a sense of wonder.

So seize the moment for some impromptu STEM play when a rainbow spontaneously appears—and expand the options for color and light exploration with a few new prisms and props!

Our moment of silent concentration and focus is interrupted by Parker ecstatically showing off her geoboard.

“You made a house?” asks Linnea, looking a little wide-eyed and confused. “How did you do that?”

“I just added shapes and it worked!” Parker answers, equally amazed by her own creation.

“I want to try that!” shouts Rowen.

“Me too!” echoes a chorus of four-year-old voices. “Show us how you did that!”

Geometry has entered our world today—and what better way to learn about early math and science concepts than through play?

I have come to believe that geoboards are one of the ultimate learning tools for peer mentoring. I watch as the four-year-olds follow Parker’s example and create their own versions of her rubber-band house.

I am a huge fan of these little powerhouses known as geoboards. Hands-on activities with these simple learning tools get children’s brain synapses firing like crazy and stimulate the development of new neural connections.

The boards, with their colorful rubber bands and infinite possibilities, also make math and engineering fun!

Our geoboard play tends to occur in cycles. Today, the geoboards have resurfaced after long hiatus.

Because the children haven’t used the geoboards in a while, I notice how much their brains have developed since the last time the boards were in play. Seeing these leaps of brain development is one of the great joys of teaching.

Geoboards are always developmentally appropriate in the hands of the creator. Some children simply work on stretching the rubber bands onto the nails. My “artsy” early learners—who are happy designing anything and everything—can play with these boards for hours. And there’s a child in every class who insists on attaching every single rubber band in the bag to the geoboard, persisting long after the other children have moved on to new activities.

Geoboards enable even young children—and those who may have difficulty drawing shapes—to construct and investigate the properties of early geometry without a pencil in their hands.

I see geoboards as a chance to level the playing field for those who struggle with grasp, fine-motor or visual-motor skills.

Children begin to notice shapes before they have the language to name those shapes. Geoboard play acquaints children with simple shapes—as well as more advanced concepts such as symmetry, angles and fractions—as they engage in activities such as measuring, counting or investigating 2D shapes like Parker’s rubber-band house.

Look at those little fingers and hands going to work! With just one geoboard and a bagful of rubber bands, children can create and learn about shapes while developing their hand muscles, fine-motor skills, spatial skills and math skills. This is why geoboards have been a part of our classroom curriculum for more than 30 years.

Children can use their rubber bands to create squares, rectangles, triangles and other “sided” shapes. They can also explore number concepts as they try to stretch a single rubber band around a certain number of pegs. They may try to stretch it around three or four pegs—or maybe even all of the pegs. This early math exploration evolves quite naturally as the children engage in geoboard play with their friends. 

When I introduce geoboards to new students, I leave the lesson plans and benchmark checklists for later and let the children simply play with their boards. I want them to engage in geoboard play at their own level of development.

It’s important to give the children ample time to engage in this process. It can’t be rushed. For my young learners who love to make shapes, letters and designs, a longer play period gives them time to get their creative juices flowing. As their brain development continues, you will see their shapes and designs become more intentional.

Young children develop ideas and concepts about science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics (STEAM) naturally. They think about size, shape, quantity, order and speed throughout the day as they play and explore. As teachers of young children, we need to tap into their natural curiosity with intentional STEAM learning opportunities such as geoboard play.

Intentionality is acting with knowledge and purpose. It is the opposite of chance because it is planned and thoughtful. In order to become intentional about math teaching, we need to think about math the way we think about literacy.

By making shapes on their geoboards, the children are actually developing important pre-reading and pre-writing skills too.

Here’s how it works: When Linnea sees a shape on the geoboard and names it, she is preparing herself to identify letters and numbers and then naming and eventually writing them.

Simply by placing a basket full of geoboards near a table, we can encourage children to experiment with shapes, sizes and direction through hands-on play.

We can call this math, science, engineering, art or literacy because it’s laying the groundwork for the STEAM disciplines, as well as language development.

But in our hearts—as early childhood educators—we simply call it play.

“Do our shadows look like the monsters in the book?” asks James.

I glance over and see James and Noa connecting their shadows by overlapping their arms. When we engage children in outdoor shadow play to support active exploration and discovery, their creativity is endless!

James and Noa are playing out their version of the book, The Dark, Dark Night by M. Christina Butler. This charming children’s tale follows a frog heading home to his pond after a long winter’s sleep. Along the way, he stops to frolic with his friends Badger, Hedgehog, Rabbit and Mouse. As darkness falls, Frog borrows a lantern from his friend, Mouse, to light the way home.

But, as Frog approaches the reeds at the edge of the pond, he finds himself face to face with a HUGE pond monster with enormous claws. Terrified, Frog hightails it back to his friends. Each friend returns to the pond with Frog—only to flee when the monster reappears. But the friends ultimately realize that the fearsome “pond monster” is not a monster at all—just some scary shadows created by light from the lantern.

Our four- and five-year-old students love this tale. But we had to read The Dark, Dark Night many times before the shadow storyline finally sank in for the younger children in the group. It also took a bit of time and investigation for these younger learners to observe that, when we move, our shadows move too!

When we’re outside, we often engage in body-shadow play with the sun as our light source. Exploring the ways that shadows change as we move our bodies is a great way to get kids engaged and excited about learning. Our road is often closed to traffic during the winter months, and we always take the opportunity to grab tape measures to see how long our shadows are.

I often challenge our friends to see if they can disconnect from their shadows. After a few minutes of contorting our bodies to see if we can separate from our shadows, we decide that we can’t, but that never stops the fun and silliness of trying!

We create math shadow games by calling out different shapes and encouraging the children to do their best to create shadows in these shapes. Movements like standing on one foot, reaching up high to touch the sky and walking on all fours all help children develop body awareness.

Here’s a great way to practice fine-motor skills during shadow play: Use the sun, a projector light or a flashlight to create shadows of tiny hands on a wall. The children can work on finger isolation (e.g. pointing with the index finger, counting out the fingers on their hands and wiggling all of the fingers individually); thumb opposition (e.g. touching the thumb to each finger); and other hand positions to create different types of shadows, an activity that helps build dexterity while laying the foundation for later STEM learning. We also play “Follow the Shadow Leader” and encourage the children to recreate the leader’s shadow by duplicating his or her movements.

Shadow play also helps children develop a rudimentary understanding of cause and effect as they observe what makes a shadow and where the light needs to be to cast a shadow. By moving their shadows around, they can investigate different shapes and sizes.

“Look how dark my shadow is today! Yesterday, we could not see it very well.” Owen is the first to recognize that sunnier days and brighter lights create darker shadows. Observations like Owen’s are often followed by other STEM activities such as creating hypotheses, developing theories and collecting data as the children continue their investigations and deepen their understanding of the nature of light and shadow.

Your students may also notice that their shadows are different sizes at different times of the day. Depending on the amount of sunlight that illuminates our play space, their shadows can be longer, shorter or nonexistent.

You can also show the children how to change the size of a shadow. Move an object closer to a light source and the shadow becomes bigger. Move it away from the light source and the shadow becomes smaller.

Light and shadow play is an amazing way for children to explore their world. If the sun is shining, why not meet your Illinois Early Learning Standards for math and science while playing with shadows. Have fun!

“Look!” squeals three-year-old Eleanor.  “I can pick up these two balls! It’s magic!”

Have you ever seen young children playing with magnets? The “magical” properties of magnets never fail to captivate early learners and spark a play buzz!

Children learn by investigating, observing and figuring out how things work. Magnets fuel that curiosity in a way that is simple and accessible.

As they explore the properties of magnets through play, children develop a deeper understanding of scientific principles by asking questions such as “why” magnets stick together and “how” magnets work.

Magnetic play helps lay the foundation for further investigations as we guide the children through activities such as developing hypotheses and theories, solving problems and making predictions. By observing and studying cause and effect, our young STEM explorers can begin to develop a basic understanding of concepts such as magnetic attraction, magnet strength and magnetic forces and fields.

Playing with magnets is a great way to introduce STEM into a child’s life. If you need to record observations, this is a great time to take a seat and watch as children incorporate predictions and conclusions into the learning experience.

To set the stage for magnetic exploration, I put out a wooden tray filled with magnetic wands and magnets in a variety of shapes and sizes. Then I give each of the children an aluminum tray to define their play space and keep the magnetic balls from rolling off of the table onto the floor.

When children add magnets or remove them from the tray, they are learning about math concepts such as more, less, off and on. They’re also learning about patterns, shapes and sizes.

I also fill simple sensory bins with colored rice or coffee beans. Then I add magnetic and non-magnetic objects, as well as a magnetic wand for finding the “treasures.” I set two baskets nearby to encourage the children to sort their objects.

“Is this magnetic?” asks one child. “This should work,” says another. “It’s silver!”

Making a prediction means focusing on what we think will happen next based on our prior knowledge. It’s considered a guess if we have no prior knowledge. We can help children develop their prediction skills when we are playing with magnets, reading a story or finding our way home on a walk.

When the children at our early learning center play with magnetic wands and balls, they love to “catch” the balls on the wand and count how many they have. Sometimes I will see them intentionally create patterns.

Playing with magnets is a powerful math and science activity in early childhood classrooms because it fosters conversation and exploration and provides a fun and engaging incentive for children to make predictions and observe outcomes.

If you can, give the children a long period of time to investigate the magic of magnets and work through their theories. This extended time to conduct STEM investigations and learn through focused play is a gift that they may not be given in their future academic lives.

It will amaze you when you see the amount of time that children will spend exploring the magnets on their tray. It’s a calm, quiet and very, very focused activity that slows down even our most frenetic friends.

As we continue to play, we engage in a discussion about the forces that pull magnets together. We keep it pretty basic. This young group hasn’t shown any interest yet in the whys and the hows of magnetic forces and fields. They are too enchanted by the magic of it all. I have been down this trail before. When the brain is ready, the questions will be asked and we will have the resources available to answer their questions and push the experiments and investigations a wee bit further out of their comfort zone. There will be many more experiments for extended learning. But, for now, exploring the magic of magnetism suits us all just fine! 

A few words of caution. Magnets are dangerous if ingested. We hope that our students no longer put everything in their mouths, but we can’t count on it. You know your students better than anyone. It is best to err on the side of caution and use large magnets that cannot possibly fit into a child’s mouth if you are at all concerned. It will make the day of magnetic play more enjoyable for YOU if you don’t have to worry.

Stay safe and take care!

After months of sequestering and social distancing to stop the spread of COVID-19, we could all use some fresh winter air! Nature is just what the doctor ordered to stimulate our senses while we meet our early learning standards.

The winter months offer an abundance of STEM learning opportunities, so don’t let the falling temperatures and snow chase you inside. The changing seasons lead to so many discoveries that incorporate STEM language and learning. Let’s take a quick look at just a few of the STEM learning adventures that we can provide for our early learners as we explore the winter landscape.

SNOW MOLDS

When the forecast predicts the first snow of the season, be sure to grab the toys out of the sandbox before they freeze in the sand. Then repurpose your sand molds as snow molds. It’s a great way to introduce shape and dimension into winter play.

This cold-weather activity introduces early learners to engineering design and the scientific practice of modeling as they work through their ideas in this new medium. By actively investigating, exploring and communicating with their friends, our young snow sculptors are laying the foundation for a future understanding of core scientific concepts.

When children have access to simple sandbox tools, they can explore and reimagine activities that work with sand, but may or may not work with wet or powdery snow. This leads to more investigation and more opportunities for learning. Muffin and cake pans of all shapes and sizes will also work—and open doors to endless hours of creative outdoor play. 

ICE AND ICICLES

There’s a lot of science and math in those icicles! Every winter, I grab the longest icicle that I can find and let it melt into an empty glass. This enables the children to observe the melting process while we discuss the difference between indoor and outdoor temperatures. We can also discuss why our body temperature is warmer than the outdoor temperature and why we can see our breath in the cold winter air. When the icicle has completely melted, I point out the dirt and gunk that was frozen into this seemingly pristine piece of ice. But that won’t deter our experiential learners from sucking on “nature’s popsicles.” Children learn through their senses—and I gave up the battle of trying to stop them from sucking on icicles and eating snow years ago. It’s all part of the magic of winter STEM learning.

IGLOOS

Building an igloo is easy—and there are so many learning opportunities in engineering and physics that come into play. We use large plastic bins to mold the snow into big blocks, and the igloo-building process proceeds more quickly than you might imagine.

If you’re lucky enough to get packable snow early in the season, there is a good chance that your igloo could last for a month or more. One word of caution: This lovely source of wind protection also takes a while to melt, so build it in a location where it won’t interfere with other activities. Because igloos become softer in the afternoon sun, we often redesign our igloo during the day, adding colors and water before leaving it to refreeze overnight. An igloo is well worth the investment of time and energy.

HIKING

Take a hike! Even in familiar places like your neighborhood or a local schoolyard, life looks different during the winter months. When we head out for these winter walking adventures, I introduce new vocabulary words such as “hike” or “adventure” or “excursion.”

Research shows that vocabulary building at an early age fosters future success in reading and narrows the achievement gap. As you hike with your early learners, your efforts to introduce concepts such as patterns, reflections, black ice, hibernation and wind-chill factors will lead to later learning opportunities back in the classroom.

  

SLEDDING

Oh boy! What a bonanza of science vocabulary we have here, with “speed” and “force” and “distance“! For younger children, we introduce simple vocabulary words such as “up” and “down” the hill.  Who went the “farthest“? Who wiped out the “fastest“?  We gather and analyze data as they try new routes, techniques and combinations of sled buddies. We don’t always have access to real hills—and there have been years when my class just couldn’t handle a walk to the park and sledding!  But don’t rule out that large pile of snow that the plow has pushed up at the end of the school parking lot.  It may be man-made and it may be small, but it’s a hill nonetheless! Kids just love taking small risks such as climbing up and sliding down. Last winter, I watched a three-year-old and a four-year-old spend 20 minutes trying to stay upright while sliding on their boots down an 18-inch “hill.” It doesn’t take much of an incline to open doors to STEM learning!

ANIMAL-TRACK INVESTIGATIONS

We often discover animal tracks in the snow during our outdoor investigations. We occasionally find paw prints from a raccoon or hoof prints from a deer, but most of the tracks that we find are made by neighborhood cats and dogs, as well as squirrels and birds. This tracking activity never gets old. We can try to follow their routes while making observations and forming theories. Curiosity, persistence, questioning and problem-solving are the traits of a true scientist. These real-life adventures that put science in context represent age-appropriate learning at its finest.

SNOW SCULPTURES

I’d love to tell you that we were the designers of the impressive Snow Dino below, but the truth is that we found this expressive fellow while sledding at the neighborhood park. We have some very creative college students in our neighborhood and we often observe their winter snow sculptures to get our own creative juices flowing and learn new sculpting techniques. The smiles on the faces of the children below show that they didn’t need to build the Snow Dino to enjoy the end result! If you missed our own STEM Snowman adventures earlier in the month, you can find the blog post here.

After the cold-weather fun, finish up with a comforting cup of hot cocoa, apple cider or mint tea. When the weather is warm enough to stay outside for long periods, a hearty cup of soup after you head indoors will chase away the winter chill and refuel your STEM explorers.

Thank you for sharing a year of STEM learning adventures with me and stay tuned for more in 2021!

We have been seeing an abundance of artistic expression lately as our friends, neighbors and the children we care for embrace the pause necessitated by the pandemic and let their creative juices flow.

At times like these, I like to bring Andy Goldsworthy’s books back into our lives. I use Goldsworthy ‘s examples to teach my early learners and their families about ephemeral (pronounced ih-fem-er-uhl) art. Ephemeral art is short-lived. The children often refer to it as “earth art” or “land art,” but ephemeral is such a great word that I often introduce it to broaden their vocabulary.

Andy Goldsworthy is an ephemeral sculptor and creator who specializes in crafting art from natural and found materials. His books have inspired and challenged my budding artists for years. Goldsworthy’s goal is to celebrate and study nature by interacting with natural elements as intimately as he can. He generally works with whatever is available at the site of his design, including stones, twigs, thorns, muds, snow, icicles, brightly colored flowers and leaves.

So what does this have to do with math and science? Plenty! As we explore ephemeral art this month, you’ll be amazed by the many STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) learning opportunities that ephemeral art projects can provide—and the many early learning standards or benchmarks for math and science that you can meet through this amazingly fun art form.

When we begin to experiment with ephemeral art, we use natural resources (sticks, stones, leaves, ice, shells, sand) to create our own original designs. For the children, this involves collecting, sorting, grouping, designing and often patterning. This hands-on learning can be used to deepen children’s understanding of the aesthetic qualities of natural materials, to enrich their vocabulary and to get their creative juices flowing. Earth art is creative fun that can be done by everyone!

When children engage in design, they often use nonstandard units to measure length and capacity. They use vocabulary that describes and compares length, height, weight, capacity and size. They express wonder and curiosity about their world by asking questions, solving problems and creating art that may change course in the middle of their design process. Land art allows children to develop and use models to represent their ideas, observations and explanations through their designs. All of these creative endeavors will meet Illinois Early Learning Standards—and will very likely meet your state or institution’s early learning requirements as well.

We love to create our own earth art using whatever natural materials have made their way into our program. Sometimes, to get the children’s creative juices flowing, I will do the collecting and sorting. I will often model the process for the children by sitting quietly within sight and starting my own design. Sometimes the children will work on individual projects and, at other times, they will collaborate on group projects. We never know quite when the inspiration will kick in or where the design process will take us.

Our students understand that their creations are a gift to all who see them. But they also accept the reality that their art is ephemeral and may not be there when we return to the sites of our creative endeavors.

I feel that this concept comes rather easily to children who spend many hours outdoors. They understand that the seasons, weather and wildlife are ever-changing. The plant that they could jump over yesterday has literally grown overnight. The tree stumps that they balanced on yesterday are now slippery from the overnight rain. Growing up with these daily changes and challenges allows children to understand that their artwork, their building projects and even the vegetables in their garden may disappear overnight. We have some mighty hungry rabbits and raccoons in our neighborhood. Snapping a picture to document the learning and sharing it with friends and family helps to remind the kids that everything about nature is ephemeral.

This month, I have a challenge for you. Currently, as we spend the majority of our days closer to home, wouldn’t this be a great time to share earth art with our neighbors? To create visual offerings on the sidewalk, in the park or in the forest for passersby to discover and enjoy?

So embrace the pause! Bring joy into the lives of strangers by creating ephemeral art and fostering the development of early math and science skills in our youngest learners!

Out of the corner of my eye, I am drawn to the persistence of three-year-old Saaliha. She is calmly and patiently working her way through a rainbow puzzle.  Her friends are busy in other parts of the classroom, but Saaliha is problem-solving her way to mastery. I sit down next to her to observe her skills. She is so deep in her learning that she doesn’t notice.

Open-ended materials such as these often create learning scenarios that allow long periods of deep concentration, and today is no different. Although this puzzle often lands in the block area as a snake, a tunnel or a flowing river, today Saaliha is trying to fit it back together the way it is stored in the tray.

Puzzle play is a great time to build cognitive and fine-motor skills. Besides finding the correct sequence of sizes, Saaliha needs to evaluate which directions the blocks sit so that she can complete the puzzle. I watch as Saaliha flips, turns and rotates the pieces to figure out where they go and in what order. This is spatial transformation. I love watching her learning style and seeing how it corresponds to her developmental level. I see her set aside pieces that are not needed at the moment. Saaliha’s spatial awareness is growing with each try.  

Watching Saaliha play with the puzzle, I can see her choices and strategy change. She begins to recognize and understand how the pieces fit together to complete the puzzle. I watch her sorting and testing pieces of different sizes and moving them in different directions until one piece fits properly. Through this task, Saaliha is developing small-muscle movements and dexterity in her hands and fingers, along with critical-thinking and problem-solving skills. This creates a learning adventure in which the eyes, hands and brain are working together to make the puzzle pieces fit. 

Saaliha is soon joined by her two-year-old buddy, Eleanor. These two best friends are 11 months apart in age—with different learning styles and levels of brain development. They work together to fit the yellow arch into the puzzle. There is discussion as they describe their strategies to one another. The collaboration is delightful as Saaliha patiently watches her younger friend try to master the same issue that she is having. Saaliha never reaches over to remove the piece from Eleanor’s hand. She is observing and reasoning as deeply as she had been moments earlier when the puzzle piece was in her own hand. Eleanor quickly loses interest, but Saaliha perseveres!

Saaliha tries new pieces and new directions. I can see the wheels turning in her head. She is collecting ideas and working out theories. She is not rushed or agitated.  She is riveted to this learning opportunity. She doesn’t ask for assistance. She just keeps trying new patterns and new pieces. 

Suddenly it all clicks into place. The lightbulb of understanding goes on in Saaliha’s mind and I can see her confidence surge as she fits the pieces together more quickly. She’s got it! She’s figured it out! There is no celebration, just a smile of satisfaction. She studies the finished project. Before I can capture her expression of satisfaction, she disassembles the puzzle to do it over again.

Saaliha continues to struggle and I continue to observe her strategies and methods of choice. Her perseverance continues to reward her with success and a better understanding of the puzzle in front of her. She is a finely tuned machine, working on all cylinders as she masters the task at hand with patience and confidence. 

Puzzles offer a wide variety of developmental benefits and enable children to learn important skills as they play. From critical thinking and problem solving to concentration and attention span to spatial awareness, playing with puzzles adds layer upon layer to our strong math foundation! 

It’s November and, here in Illinois, that means cooler temperatures and winter outerwear. Getting the children dressed for outdoor play is one more way that you can meet your math standards while engaging in everyday activities. Outdoor play in the winter months includes snow or rain pants, boots, coats, hats and mittens. Getting my young group dressed for outdoor play is a challenge in itself. This is when math—specifically sequencing—comes into play.

By breaking this dressing activity down into smaller steps, we find success within the first week. This is getting ready for kindergarten. This is routine and patterns and sequence. This teaches our students to be self-sufficient. This makes our students every kindergarten teacher’s dream child! 

By learning to dress themselves, children strengthen developing skills such as coordination, memory and body awareness. This process takes TIME—and we have a lot more time than working parents trying to make it to an early-morning meeting. I embrace this activity as an important part of our curriculum. We have time. We need fresh air and play. Trust me, this will improve your winter sanity!  Here’s how I do it.

I make the following stations:

• Bathroom break
• Snow or rain pants
• Boots (preferably slip-on or velcro—easier to deal with the boots BEFORE the coat goes on)
• Coat
• Hat and scarf
• Mittens (preferably waterproof snow mittens, although car mittens will work fine if you’re not engaging in water play or traversing wet terrain) 

I place these stations in a row from our cubbies all the way to our exit door. Allow plenty of room between each station. One teacher I know uses all four corners of her classroom. If you have not been taught the “firefighter flip” for putting on jackets, I will let two-year-old Jonathan show you the steps:

Toes to the tag…                              hands slip into the armholes…                        and…FLIP!

All the way, over the head…                      and down sink the arms…                        and…ta da!

We love the firefighter flip and use it all year long. It takes a few practice sessions, but I guarantee that successful coat flipping is in your future if you are not already using this method.

At the exit door, I provide some last-minute help with hats, scarves, zippers and mittens. 

For some reason, removing the cold-weather gear seems to go more quickly. I use laundry baskets as stations for removing the gear, which allows me to quickly and easily place the wet gear in the proper drying places.

Sequence. Routine. Pattern. It’s all there. It’s all math!  Regardless of the season, find a sequence in your everyday classroom activities and break it down into little steps. During these crisp, beautiful late autumn and early winter days, put on your own hat and coat and join in the fun!