The young child learns about their world through their senses, they use these experiences to create relationships with their environment. Children are active learners when provided with rich learning experiences that embrace and engage their senses.
Through conversation and dramatic role play within our doctors office, we noticed that the children continue to show an interest in health. Educators have extended this learning and play by providing experiences that embrace and challenge the children’s senses. Over the past few days the children have discovered many new scents throughout our classroom, such as peppermint in our wet sensory bin, cinnamon in play dough, flowers on each table and cinnamon scented pine cones for our discovery table (thank you Ida). The children were also provided with an activity that would challenge their sense of smell and promote literacy. Four jars containing four different smells; vanilla, peppermint, cinnamon, and lemon were placed on our inquiry table for the children to explore and discover. This became an exciting activity for the children and throughout the day most ventured over to put their nose to the test!
The buzz within this area of our classroom was delightful! So much discussion could be heard about what each child thought the smell might be, discussion about what a smell may have reminded them of, and what they were certain it was. While Little Mr. P took a sniff of the vanilla bottle he excitedly announced “It smells like ice cream!” while little Miss. E shared “I think it smells like Fruit Loops”. Children were encouraged to record their findings using their sounds and share with one another during our sharing time.
For more information about inquiry in the classroom please visit our website at;
http://www.journeytogetherfdk.com/play-4/inquiry-and-teachable-moments/
Journey Together FDK 