Play Hive

The implications for this in a yard, garden, atrium, park, or foyer are endless.  And all you need is scrap wood.  It does not need to be shiny and new - you're simply creating a structure.  I also love the fact that it is not permanent - it is flexible and changeable if you plan it to be like that, so it can compliment changing communities.

I came across this resource through Playscapes, a favorite source of wonderful play spaces.  These images came up on my Google Reader last week, and it drew me right back over there, as always:

It is always amazing to think about how wonderful play spaces like this can gain so much interest in a community and inspire sharing and use.  The creation of play spaces like the play hive or the play tent above can be a community event from planning to creation to installation.  And, again, changeable.

It is challenging to find non-commercial community play spaces right now.  From school yards to public parks, valuable budget money is spent on commercial structures.  It doesn't take much research to learn that the structure below costs almost $17,000.  

Any parent or teacher who has been in a meeting trying to decide how to spend school funds probably knows that $17,000 is a lot of money for a school to find, and deciding how it will be spent is a big deal.  Playgrounds are a place where money is often spent on unnecessary things - things that schools and communities think they need because it is the norm.  

I would love to hear stories of community play spaces that fought against the norm, and the journey of what it took to make a more natural, core community based play space happen.  I truly think that if a group of people who are stakeholders in a play space for the community truly thought about why they are creating or improving a play space started with conversation and brainstorming rather than play equipment catalogs, money would be saved, spaces would be more personalized, and the community would be stronger from planning, building, and using it together.

Place-Based Education

This is a new term for me - place-based education.  I was reading an article on edutopia about place-based education in rural schools in New Mexico, and although I am familiar with the idea, I did not know it had a name.

Some early childhood "curricula", like the project approach, place an emphasis on children interacting with the community and the world in a meaningful way.  So, rather than always going to the zoo every October, outings are planned to link to the curriculum and the children's interests and needs.  Place-based education is about the community and the educational goals are linked with the goals of the local community.  It is an interesting concept to think about in terms of both urban and rural schools like they mention on edutopia; but it really could be done anywhere.

 

image from relationalearning

I am enjoying reading about the initiatives in New Mexico - how a community can rally around education and both systems can benefit.  The Center for RelationaLearning is working with groups around the world using this concept - how many of them include young children?  How can young children interact meaningfully with their community?  What does a community need from its educational institutions?

I have been neglecting this space a bit and focusing on the classroom blog for the parents.  So here are two photos of our community mural that the children have been working on.  Our big, beautiful spread will be finished tomorrow.

Collaborative Drawings

One pen, two people.

New School Year's Resolutions

I am so glad to be in my classroom, getting ready for the start of the school year! I have a class list, and the children begin next Wednesday.

Getting back into my school routine includes reading -- and I've spent some time looking at blogs this week. I'm enjoying my regular favorites and discovering some wonderful new ones! I hope more and more early childhood educators document their teaching by sharing with a blog. There really seems to be a growing online community of educators ready and willing to share, contribute, and collaborate.

That said, I was thinking about my resolutions for the new school year, and getting them ready to share them here. But since this is a community, I want to know the resolutions of other teachers, too! So how about sharing them together?

Brainstorm and jot and think and wonder and reflect and look forward over the course of the next week. Then, next Friday, share your new school year's resolutions -- either in the comments here, or on your own blog. If you are directing a staff, perhaps you want to encourage them to do this, too. And a resolution can really be anything you dream up - from keeping the markers fresher to taking a workshop to cooking more with your students.

Let me know what you think today, and get ready for next Friday! I hope you participate.