Creative Spaces Pt. 2 - A Sensory Rich Environment

This next series of photographs shows Celia, Jordan, Matthew, Landon, and Boone playing in the classroom "fort". This is another space in the classroom that seeks to draw children into playful and collaborative interactions with one another. Additionally, this space is one among several attempts in the classroom to create a sensory-rich experience for the children to interact with. The developmental psychologist Jean Piaget refered to the cognitive development of infants at this age as being in a "Sensori-Motor" period, meaning that there is much brain activity and development focued around sense perception and the use of the senses, as well as motor development. It makes sense when you consider the way infants and toddlers love to feel materials, exploring the properties of a piece of paper as the crush and crinkle it, or deligting in the soft and weightless properties of a feather. The fort's walls are covered with sensory experiences, noisy bubble wrap and tin foil, fabric that glows orange in the right sun light- but the most popular part of the fort by far was the overhanging network of paper flags. (Funny side story- the inspiration for the flags came one evening in a Mexican bar in San Francisco as another preschool teacher friend of mine and I admired the paper flags overhead- we came to the same conclusion simultaneously: "Those would look great in the classroom!" Always on the look-out for new ideas.) In the pictures below, you can see Landon and Boone pulling on a string attached to the fort. When the string is pulled, the entire network of flags above shakes, which is then attached to chimes in another corner of the room, which begin to ring. The kids loved feeling like they could manipulate such a vast space above their heads with a simple tug. It was a fun way to learn about action and response.