Making Learning Visible

Last fall, 22 teachers from nine Rhode Island community and family childcare programs took a course called “Making Learning Visible,” in which they learned to engage their children in making how-to books. The books were a vehicle for 200 children to develop skills in literacy, sequencing (mathematics), language development and communication, and how to give thoughtful instructions for a step-by-step process.

This story of one child’s process and the learning that transpired as she presented her work to her classmates and teachers is on display on the documentation board in Discovery Studio. It shows how important their feedback was to her success.

 *****

Benedetta’s teachers began by asking the class what they were experts at. They named a range of abilities including soccer, scribbling, being silly and drawing. Benedetta responded that she knew how to make a pattern bracelet. Benedetta’s teacher, Jenah, asked her to explain how to make a pattern bracelet and transcribed her directions.

The directions were presented to the whole class for feedback. The group noted that Benedetta’s direction, “Put a purple, then a blue, then a purple,” was limiting. “What if someone wants to use other colors?,” they asked her.

Benedetta’s classmate Holden suggested, “Put a color 1 bead, then a color 2 bead, then a color 1 bead” as an alternative. Benedetta liked his wording and asked Jenah to add it to her directions.

Benedetta drew a picture for each step in the directions. When she got to the eighth step, Jenah asked, “How are you going to show that a color is bead one?” Benedetta’s solution: “Label a yellow dot (representing a bead) 1 and a pink dot 2.”

Prompted by Jenah, Benedetta recalled important moments from the book-making process: “I got feedback (from the whole group) and “how Holden told me color 1 and color 2 instead.”

When asked how she became a pattern bracelet expert, she said it was from watching her classmate, Orla, in the art area and learning the word ‘pattern’ from Jenah.

*****
 

Benedetta and dozens of other children and their families came to the Museum on Friday evening to see their how-to books on display and try out some of the activities. Benedetta was particularly excited to see her story!

Ready to Learn Providence posted one of our favorite books, How to Fly Like Superman, and here's another one of our favorites:

A selection of the children’s how-to books will be on display in Discovery Studio through February 17 – drop by and check them out!

Telling the Story of Play

This article by Early Childhood Programs Coordinator Mary Scott Hackman was also posted on Kidoinfo.

At Providence Children’s Museum, we know that the child at play is often the child at work. And for some time now, we have been documenting children’s play, trying to capture that “aha” moment when, after interacting with materials and experimenting in different ways, he or she suddenly understands something new. In this process, which belongs entirely to the child, he or she is learning.

We call capturing these learning moments “documentation.” At the Museum, we have videotaped children as they learn, described their process on the Museum's blog, and displayed work children have left behind. And now, in Discovery Studio, we are noting the stories of these moments on a documentation board, depicted in photos and words. In these displays, we share how a child’s learning is self-directed, focused, intentional.

One day a Museum educator noticed a 2-year-old girl playing with stones in Discovery Studio. There were several books on the shelf right at her height. Slowly, she turned the pages of one of the books, holding a stone in her hand. Watching the child, it was clear to the educator that she was looking for her stone. She was, in fact, doing research. The educator photographed the child and spoke with her about her process; the pictures and words went up on the documentation board. For a long time, the child returned to the Museum to see her photo and to revisit the story we had documented.

Because we are inspired by these moments, we want to share them with our visitors, both children and adults. We think they will be inspired, too! Further, we believe that when we notice what children are doing as they play, they feel validated and become more competent as learners.

A few years ago, when I directed a childcare center, we documented children’s process in a similar way. It soon became apparent that our premise was correct: if a child feels his work is important, he will be eager to present it to you. One morning as I entered one of the classrooms, a child took my hand and led me across the room, saying “Mary, don’t you want to see what I’m working on at the easel?” And of course, I did.

We want to show the world, one story at a time, that play is as vital to the health of our children as food and sunlight. We invite you to join us in building a society of confident learners. Be a witness to your children, notice and appreciate their play. Know that they have a process and that doing something over and over again to gain understanding is the stuff of play – the serious work of childhood.

Cultivating Creativity

This article, by Museum Executive Director Janice O'Donnell, was originally posted on Kidoinfo.

Creativity – like play and love – eludes definition.  We have a common understanding that artists – painters, sculptors, poets, composers, designers – are creative.  Sometimes overlooked is the creative thinking that goes on outside the arts.  Every good teacher creatively makes learning meaningful for students with a range of abilities and interests.  Parents find creative solutions to the challenges of raising children all the time.  And kids are incredibly creative.

Creativity is inventive, imaginative and, above all, playful.  It has to do with “what if…” thinking, with trying new ways to solve a problem, and very much with looking for new problems to solve.  When considering the human face from a very different angle – or from every angle at once – Picasso was wrestling with a problem he posed himself.  That’s the way scientific inquiry works, too.  Science couldn’t move forward if scientists didn’t ask “what if…?”  And that’s the way children’s play works: “What if I put this board across this stream?  Could I make a bridge?” “What if I were a lion and you were a mouse and I chased you?”  That’s creative thinking.

A classic exercise to get adults’ creative juices flowing is to take an object and ask, “What could this be?” – the point being to come up with as many possibilities as you can.  Kids need no such exercise.  A wooden block becomes a microphone, a cell phone, a little car to zoom along the floor.  A stick becomes a magic wand, a sword or a boat to float in a stream.  Children’s thinking, especially when they’re very young, is so flexible and fluid, they’d far outscore most adults on any creativity test.

I’m concerned that for so many people, creativity diminishes over time.  That’s a shame, but not a surprise.  Schools, teaching to the test, give kids the idea that there’s one right answer.  Push-button toys and increasing amounts of time spent in front of screens – passively watching or interacting with pre-programmed games – are creativity killers.  In the Alliance for Childhood’s important report “Crisis in the Kindergarten,” authors Edward Miller and Joan Almon call this a tragedy:

"No human being can achieve his full potential if his creativity is stunted in childhood.  And no nation can thrive in the 21st century without a highly creative and innovative workforce.  Nor will democracy survive without citizens who can form their own independent thoughts and act on them."

We need to nurture childhood creativity and ensure it extends into adulthood.  One important way to do this is to provide plenty of opportunities for open-ended play and exploration.  Sticks and blocks.  Markers and paper.  Clay.  Magnets.  Water, sand, mud.  Flights of imagination.  Let’s resist the creativity-killing trends and encourage and rejoice in our children’s capacity for creative thinking.  Let’s learn from them to become more creative ourselves.  Maybe join them in a mud pie making session.  There sure isn’t only one right way to make a mud pie.

Creative play abounds in the Museum’s new Discovery Studio, a vibrant art and science exploration space.  Create with natural and recycled materials; investigate light, color and textures; tackle engineering challenges; and much more.  Discovery Studio is open for self-guided exploration most days from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM, with some facilitated activities. Try a different theme each week!  Click here for program details.

PlayWatch: Discovery Studio

This post was contributed by Museum intern Sara Sargent.

Recently in Discovery Studio, I witnessed a young boy’s excitement as he explored bridge building using colorful puzzle blocks.

After forming several shapes with the blocks, he turned to me and asked, “What else can you make with these blocks?” I gave him a few suggestions but he already had his own idea of what he wanted to do. He proclaimed, “I’m going to build a bridge!”

As he played with the blocks, he found that his bridge wouldn’t stay up. I offered a challenge for him to find another material to help support his block bridge. He immediately brought over the triangle blocks from another table and started to stack them, but he said, “It’s kind of hard with the triangles.” I told him that triangles are actually one of the strongest shapes and that engineers use triangles to build bridges in real life. “Oh!” He exclaimed, “I could stack them on top of each other! I’m going to make a pyramid because triangles are strong.”

After placing the triangle blocks on top of each other and realizing that his plan was working, he proclaimed to his mother and siblings who were watching and helping him, “So that’s why they call this the discovery room!”

He placed the last block on the top and placed the original puzzle blocks over the triangles to form the bridge. The bridge held for a little while and then tumbled down, but he had a huge grin on his face. His mother said that it was time to leave the studio. As they left I asked if they had been to the Iway exhibit. The boy excitedly told his mother that he wanted to go there next so he could continue to discover new ways to build bridges.

This moment captures a window into the learning that goes on in an open-ended play environment and how children who visit Discovery Studio understand what it’s all about: discovering through hands-on exploration.

Click here to learn more about Discovery Studio and how it was created.

And the winner is...

Congratulations to Marcela and Yael from Lexington, MA for suggesting Tortellini, the winning name for our Discovery Studio tortoise! And thanks to everyone who entered the contest – there were so many fantastic suggestions, you've left us wanting more pets to name.

We were eager for Tortellini to have a name and, like visitors to Discovery Studio, curious to learn more about tortoises. And so was Tortellini, as it turns out.

Tortellini "reading" a book about tortoises.
(No, this was not staged!)

So here are some excerpts from our tortoise fact sheet:

What kind of tortoise is Tortellini?
Tortellini is a sulcata tortoise, also known as an African spurred tortoise (Testudinae family).  African spurred tortoises are found in hot, dry scrubland areas in a large swath across Northern Africa, south of the Sahara Desert.  They live in deep burrows in which they seek refuge from the heat.  

How big will he grow?
They grow fast and can grow very big!  A tortoise can live over 50 years and its carapace (shell) can grow to be 18 inches across.  Tortellini is 2 ½ years old.

What makes a healthy tortoise diet?
Tortoises like to eat grasses (buffalo, bermuda, orchardgrass, little bluestem, and western wheat grass).  Tortellini enjoys lettuce leaves and carrot peels. Food treats are strawberries (with greens intact), hollyhock, roses (flowers only), chickweed, dandelions, hibiscus and geranium (leaves and flowers). 

What about water?
Once a week, we dip Tortellini in an inch of filtered water and if he’s thirsty, he will drink.  Otherwise, he gets all the hydration he needs from food.  He is a desert tortoise so he holds all the water he needs in his body.

Thanks to Dave Marchetti of Animal Experiences for providing us with our tortoise and to Marcela and Yael for giving him a name!

Discovery Studio Finishing Touches

We're finally ready to open Discovery Studio tomorrow! Here's a look at what's happened over the past week.

New sinks were installed, adult and child sized.

Graphic Designer Valerie Haggerty-Silva painted the Discovery Studio entryway – the portal, as we've come to know it!

Program coordinators Carly Baumann and Mary Scott Hackman began moving materials into the Studio, including program supplies...

as well as plenty of artful, inspiring objects to decorate the room.

We worked on the initial documentation wall display, which documents the process of creating Discovery Studio.

And Exhibit Designer Chris Sancomb and Exhibit Technician Hillel O'Leary installed panels and a canopy to create a cozy nook.

Activity supplies are ready to go!

A view of the full room - compare to the concept drawing!

Join us to celebrate the opening of Discovery Studio tomorrow and all weekend! Drop in from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM to sample a selection of imaginative activities that will be offered throughout the summer. Build with colorful blocks and prisms, create crafts that catch the sun’s rays, and explore the art and science of water, color and light.

We look forward to sharing it with you!

Discovery Studio Takes Shape

Discovery Studio opens in one week! Now for a peek at the process of putting it together...

For months, Chris Sancomb (exhibit designer) and Hillel O'Leary (exhibit technician) have been hard at work in the Museum's shop building beautiful new cabinets, shelving and other Discovery Studio components.

Chris cuts materials for the entryway signage.

Hillel carves the "smock tree."

Meanwhile, program coordinators Carly Baumann and Mary Scott Hackman have been developing activities and getting supplies in order, while Valerie Haggerty-Silva (graphic designer) has been planning and prototyping Discovery Studio signage.

Prototype of entry signage.

Then came the work to disassemble the activity room,

get it painted with vibrant new colors,

and install new cork-patterned flooring.

This week, the cabinets and shelves were moved into place and the space is just about ready to be set up and stocked with an array of fabulous materials.

Also, our Discovery Studio tortoise arrived, courtesy of Dave Marchetti of Animal Experiences! More on this adorable creature later.

Check back for a look at the finishing touches!

A Conversation with Carly Baumann & Mary Scott Hackman

Meet the educators responsible for Discovery Studio and other Museum programs: Education Programs Coordinator Carly Baumann and Early Childhood Programs Coordinator Mary Scott Hackman.

What’s your background?
Carly: I first came to the Museum to be part of the 2003-04 AmeriCorps team, from a background in education, and worked with Learning Clubs developing hands-on activities and after-school programs. After my AmeriCorps year, I worked in Providence after school and taught elementary school and returned to the Museum in 2007 as a staff member.

Mary: My background is in early childhood. Prior to coming to the Museum in April 2008, I spent a year teaching Head Start teachers at Ready to Learn Providence how to weave literacy into their curriculum. Before that, I was training early childhood educators and teacher assistants in the Providence school system.

Describe your role(s) at the Museum.
M: My focus is bringing information about early child development and things that appeal to children ages 1-6 to the Museum. I plan programs, oversee the AmeriCorps team that works with Head Start (ages 3-6) children, and think about what’s best for our youngest visitors.

C: Both Mary and I help shape the learning experiences children and families have at the Museum and identify learning targets. I design programs for kindergarteners and up and mentor our AmeriCorps members working in the after-school community to develop hands-on curriculum to Museum standards and philosophy while guiding their growth as educators.

M: Carly and I have also have a responsibility to the wider community of sharing the Museum’s philosophy about the ways children learn with other educators.

C: And with other staff, too – Experience Coordinators, Play Guides, interns. Not just procedures of what we do but the why.

In general, what’s the role of Museum programs?
C: Museum exhibits are designed to be handled and experimented with by thousands of children. Programs allow us to take the same philosophy of hands-on learning and expand it to materials and tools that are messy, risky, small, delicate in ways we couldn’t do in exhibits. They allow us to be more spontaneous and try out new ideas while offering activities, challenges and support for children to be independent and creative.

What’s the goal of having a dedicated program space like Discovery Studio?
C: We are creating an environment specifically designed to be an inspiring place to hold our programs. Currently we have flexible rooms that can be anything. Flexibility has been important to maximize our space, but it means hauling materials from the basement, moving tables and stools for every program. We want the experience to be more efficient for staff while giving visitors access to more materials. It’s really a learning space. It will always there – we can put things up on the walls and keep them there, or change it over time.

M: Components of the Studio that will help all of us are opportunities to store things there, to have sand and water tables available at any time as well as manipulatives and books. We’ll have a tortoise and living plants, to give children opportunities to observe. And a nook, a place to retreat to – a quiet space for a family to read a book, with comfy pillows.

C: We’ve thought about how design works with different ages. We wanted to play with levels in Discovery Studio – higher tables for activities designed for older children, lower tables for toddlers and preschoolers. When visitors walk in the door, they’ll instinctively know what’s appropriate for them. Of course anyone is allowed to explore any area of the Studio, but it allows us to better respond to the needs of visitors.

M: We’ll also have areas in the room where children’s work is displayed so visitors can see what happens there and the types of experiences they can have.

C: We also have the opportunity to try something new, to have ongoing art or creative projects that children can continue to come back to. Another piece of our learning is giving visitors access to these experiences as long as the Museum is open. Sometimes experiences will be facilitated, but other times they will be self guided, with hints and ideas.

What inspiration did you draw on in planning the space and the programs?
C: Primarily we drew on what we’ve learned from the programs that we run, that we respond best to visitors when we offer multiple ways in, when we invite them to experience materials in different ways.

M: And when we give a longer window in which to explore – we designed the space and program time so that children can drop in and leave and come back, that there’s no pressure to complete or finish. Open-ended time is important to the child’s process. I’ve also been influenced by the words of [Reggio Emilia founder] Loris Maliguzzi, who said that rather than teaching children anything, giving them materials to interact with is the way we should be educating. Children need the time and the space to manipulate materials.

C: Immersing ourselves in other studio environments, from art studio spaces designed for children to nature labs. Each of us involved in this project has drawn on spaces where we find inspiration.

Why and how are you documenting what happens in Discovery Studio?
M: The Museum is already documenting, through the blog and collecting great stories. The visitor experience has always been elicited, via exhibit “talk-back” boards, the “show-off” shelf in Shape Space and directly from the visitor. We want to continue that in Discovery Studio by capturing a moment a child has and making it come alive.

C: We’ll have a permanent place to show children’s work, photographs, quotes and tell the story of the learning happening in the Studio. It gives us a chance to develop our own professional practice, to talk deliberately about the kinds of learning we’re supporting and how we can do better.

M: Documentation also shows children how much we value what they’re thinking, and that’s a really important message we want to give our visitors.

Documentation wall prototype.

What are you most looking forward to once Discovery Studio is open?
C: For me, seeing where the visitors take it. We can only plan up to a certain point. What’s really going to make this space magical is what children bring to it, and we can learn from them.

M: I am so excited that the room will appeal to a very wide range of development and age – to see an 11-year-old alongside a 2-year-old in the same space, each doing an activity and being industrious, and that so much of an exchange will go on because of that.

C: Learning Clubs will also be held in Discovery Studio and I’m so excited to see this space used for the hands-on activities our AmeriCorps member develop for children who have such limited access to beautiful materials in their classrooms or community centers.

Discovery Studio is Coming SOON!

Yesterday marked the closing of our second floor activity room (next to Littlewoods) for the installation of Discovery Studio, opening July 7. What was once an unadorned room will be transformed into a vibrant new space for children's open-ended art and science exploration over the next several weeks!

The painting crew hard at work.

Although the installation just started, the work has been under way for some time – many months have gone into planning what this new program space will look like and what activities will be offered, as well as fabricating new cabinets, shelving and other components.

Here's a look at the Discovery Studio inspiration boards created by the "X-Team" – the team that plans and designs the Museum's environments – for a prototyping meeting last fall (click to enlarge).

Program coordinators Carly Baumann and Mary Scott Hackman have a meeting to plan Discovery Studio activities.

Director of Education Cathy Saunders tests out some of our new blocks.

And a gorgeous concept drawing by Graphic Designer Valerie Haggerty-Silva.

Learn more about Discovery Studio in the Museum's summer newsletter, and stay tuned for a peek at the process of bringing the space to life.

And join the Thrive Drive, a new online fundraising effort, to support the creation of Discovery Studio!