“What Is She Making?”
I sent these couple of pictures from today’s sensory play with Miss 15mo to my family and my dad’s first question was “What is this? Is it modern art?”
I sighed inwardly and wondered what to reply. To be honest, I get that a lot, from what I do with Miss 15mo and even from my days as a kinder teacher. Most adults looking at a child’s play tend to view it from the perspective of “What is the tangible product/achievement that the child has accomplished today? What did he/she make, build or create today?”
Well, for one she is making marks, prints and impressions.
She is making observations of the properties of paint, how it’s applied to surfaces and how it feels on the body.
She is making links and connections between colours.
She IS making new colours.
She is making a mess for sure 😂.
She is also making memories.
And this is largely the reason or the motivation behind me starting this account and this blog – to advocate for unstructured play that is valued for the process in itself and not a glittery frame-worthy end product, to tell the story behind a seemingly normal/ run-of-the-mill play experience, the amazing learning that goes on with or without a masterpiece at the end, and finally that EVEN IF there was absolutely no learning whatsoever, (though you would be hard-pressed to not find even a single one), that’s perfectly ok too.
Just let them play 🙂
