May Documentation - Babies!
By Nomculelo Nyathi | 11 May 2021
The children seemed very interested in the babies in the house center. They would speak to them, cuddle them, make food for them and feed them. I watched as they would walk around the room while rocking them and pretending to soothe them like parents do!
I noticed Nella standing by the sink with a baby in the sink. When I asked her what she was doing she let me know she was washing her baby. I also noticed Connor had a plastic knife in his hands, when I asked him what he was doing he said he was giving his baby a haircut!
Some of the words children I heard the children saying were:
"It's okay baby, I'll feed you now"
"You sit here okay"
"Don't cry baby"
Extention: Washing Babies
To extend their play, I decided to put the babies in the water table for them to wash. As soon as the children saw the babies in the water table they came running!
The children used soapy sponges to scrub their babies. After scrubbing them they would use watering cans to try and rinse off the soap. I watched as they worked diligently with serious expressions on their faces!
Learning Opportunities:
We know that children learn through play, they sometimes recreate everyday experiences during pretend play to make sense of the world around them! “During pretend play, children create an imaginary situation that allows them to act out chosen roles and follow a set of rules determined by those roles” (Thelen, 2012, p. 4). While playing with babies, the children engaged in parallel play. They played side by side and allowed their own thoughts and imaginations to dictate the direction of their play without trying to influence each other’s behavior. “Pretend play can engage many areas of the brain because it involves various domains of learning, including emotional, cognitive, language, and sensorimotor development” (Thelen , 2012, p. 12). In this case, emotional and cognitive development were very present.
Possible extensions:
Guess the baby – ask families for baby pictures and have children guess who the baby is.
Have an open-ended discussion about babies during circle time.
Invite a parent with a baby to visit the Centre.
