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Early Childhood Education

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Amazing artists and educators

Froebel’s Gifts and Isamu Noguchi’s Playgrounds

Noguchi's Playground Moerenuma Park in Sapporo, Japan.

The folks at 99% Invisible have created some fab new podcasts and articles on the relationship between children, play and the material world. And because I am a massive nerd, I have created summaries of them to share with you! I highly recommend listening to the podcasts (links are included below) as they are entertaining, well-researched and only around 25-minutes long. Isamu Noguchi (design) and Shoji Sadao (architect). Moerenuma Park, Sapporo Japan. 1988-2004. ©The Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum, New York / ARS Play Mountain: A podcast on the work of playground designer Isamu Noguchi Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988) was a Japanese-American sculptor, designer and landscape architect. After working for numerous years as a sculptor in New York, he came up with the idea to construct a ‘playground’ that had no rules or obvious way to play in it. Instead of having swings and slides, Noguchi wanted to the playground to…

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Amazing artists and educators

Ben Quilty: Art in childhood series

I recently had an article published in the Weekend Australian that looked at different artists’ experience of art in childhood. You can read the original article in full here: ‘Why teach kids art?’, published in The Australian, September 12, 2020 The article features the stories of four esteemed Australian artists -Patricia Piccinini, Djerrkngu Yunupingu, John Wolseley, and Ben Quilty- who share their experience of art while growing up. Something that I found so interesting when doing the interviews was how the artists talked about the important role of parents and teachers in supporting their artistic pursuits. Over the next two months, I am going to share the extended stories of these artists’ experience of art in childhood… starting with the amazing Ben Quilty! Ben is one of Australia’s most esteemed visual artists. His paintings explore ideas around masculinity, colonization, and political activism. He was also awarded the 2011 Archibald Prize…

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Learning

How to support children’s creativity at home

Tips for supporting children's creativity

I talk a lot about the importance of creativity and materials in children’s learning on this website. Most of the posts I have previously written have been aimed at teachers and creative professionals working with children. However, parents also play an important role in supporting children’s learning. To be honest, nearly every parent I have met has been incredibly interested in hearing about what they can do to help to support their child’s creativity. So, I have decided to start writing some posts especially for parents. Kicking off with this one. I have put together five hot tips for supporting children’s creativity with materials. These ideas build on a podcast I recently did for ‘Rial Talk .In the podcast I talk about the importance of art and children’s play with materials in education. More specifically, I argue that both art and materials play a critical role in encouraging creativity as they…

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PhD Research

New year, new job, new continent

Happy new year Art Play Children Learning followers! I hope you have all had a wonderful break. 2020 is well underway for all of us and if you are like me, you will have lots of hopes and ambitions for the year ahead. Sometimes these can be exciting and sometimes these can make one feel overwhelmed. My attitude is to always try to do my best to keep one foot moving in front of the other, even if they are just little steps and always stay open to the unexpected things that happen along the way. I have some exciting news to share with you all! I am starting a new job this year. I will be working at Harvard University as a Post-Doctoral Fellow in Early Childhood Education. I am really excited about it and will be moving to Boston next week to get started. I have never lived…

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Materials

The importance of woodwork in the early years

This post features a review of Peter Moorhouse’s book ‘Learning Through Woodwork’ – a wonderful publication for practitioners that outlines the importance of woodwork in the early years. Image credit: Peter Moorhouse Back when I was attending kindergarten, in early 1990’s regional Australia, the only cross-cuts saws and drills in use were imaginary ones that I would get out to cut off the boys’ arms. A lot has changed since those days and woodwork – as a creative activity for children to learn – has witnessed an exciting resurgence in preschools around the world. Peter Moorhouse’s recent book‘Learning Through Woodwork: Introducing Creative Woodwork in the Early Years’is a fantastic practical guide for teachers and practitioners working in early years’ settings. Peter is a real-life, professional sculptor who also has 25 years’ experience working as an art educator in schools and kindergartens. In this book, he shares his expert knowledge and tips…

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Learning

How to use suggestions to support creativity

Adults can play an important role in supporting children’s creativity by interacting with them in ways that open up new possibilities for learning. This post talks about what a suggestion is and gives four tips for how they can be used in children’s art education. These ideas may be especially handy for parents, carers, educators and artists working with young children under the age of ten. What is a suggestion? To suggest something means to present an idea for consideration (1). A suggestion can be used to give children choices about how their learning can proceed in an education environment (2). Choices are important as they open up different creative possibilities. Suggestions can draw children’s attention to a particular problem, assist them in exploring a topic encourage them to reflect on an experience in a deeper way. Suggestions are different from direct instruction as they imply there are options (2). If…

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