I have observed children interested in the family photos on
the wall and the broken cameras that we have around the under twos area. So I decided to talk to the team and get the
real cameras onto the tables for the children to use, taking photos of each
other so we could print and put up on a wall sharing their photos with families
and friends “children develop confidence in working with others to explore the
environment and make sense of the social and physical world” (Ministry of
Education, 1996, p. 98).
The children that were really interested in this type of product sadly within 10mins of the cameras going out they went over to the over twos area for transition and couldn’t investigate the cameras. The children that were left over I waited and they didn’t seem too interested in the real cameras, the one child that did come over to the table picked up a camera and pushed a button it turned on, as soon as the camera turned on he gave it to a teacher and walked away. I tried to engaged a few of the children to have a turn with the cameras but it didn’t seem to work, The child that gave the camera to a teacher I tried to bring back to let him know it was okay to use, but he didn’t seem to get the idea he could have a turn.
I have observed this could be the staff fault when children don’t want to give it a go as they aren’t given the opportunity to have a turn with a camera or ipad even with supervision. The staff that took the camera knew what I was doing but didn’t seem to support it. I find it really hard to understand as staff use the cameras all the time to document children’s learning “educators can utilise technologies to assist with the observation and documentation of children’s experiences” (Arthur, Beecher, Death, Dockett & Farmer, 2005, p. 214).
Sadly with me being ill I didn’t have much more time to try again or a different approach to it and the children that were really interested in the photos and cameras had gone over for transition or were not there on the day. It does show me that the children don’t get to use technology in the under twos area very often and I feel we need to start encouraging it.
The children that were really interested in this type of product sadly within 10mins of the cameras going out they went over to the over twos area for transition and couldn’t investigate the cameras. The children that were left over I waited and they didn’t seem too interested in the real cameras, the one child that did come over to the table picked up a camera and pushed a button it turned on, as soon as the camera turned on he gave it to a teacher and walked away. I tried to engaged a few of the children to have a turn with the cameras but it didn’t seem to work, The child that gave the camera to a teacher I tried to bring back to let him know it was okay to use, but he didn’t seem to get the idea he could have a turn.
I have observed this could be the staff fault when children don’t want to give it a go as they aren’t given the opportunity to have a turn with a camera or ipad even with supervision. The staff that took the camera knew what I was doing but didn’t seem to support it. I find it really hard to understand as staff use the cameras all the time to document children’s learning “educators can utilise technologies to assist with the observation and documentation of children’s experiences” (Arthur, Beecher, Death, Dockett & Farmer, 2005, p. 214).
Sadly with me being ill I didn’t have much more time to try again or a different approach to it and the children that were really interested in the photos and cameras had gone over for transition or were not there on the day. It does show me that the children don’t get to use technology in the under twos area very often and I feel we need to start encouraging it.
References
Arthur,
L., Beecher, B., Death, E., Dockett, S., & Farmer, S. (2005). Programming and planning in early childhood
settings (3rd ed.). Victoria,
Australia: Thomson.
Ministry
of Education. (1996). Te Whāriki: He
whāriki mātauranga mō ngā mokopuna o Aotearoa: Early childhood curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning
Media.
Your entry was very insightful for me to gage an idea of at what level other center value toddler play with technology. This is extremely relevant to my own entry as I used camera’s also in an under two room and your entry allowed me to see the activity from a different perspective where lots of other factors were involved in whether the children had a valuable experience with cameras. My constructive feedback for you is to be more verbal with other staff members and positively express when you feel they have interfered with the learning you are trying to provide for children, even if their interference was unintentional. At least that way, in the future, staff will make sure to remain more aware of the learning experiences going on around them and consciously help you to implement your activity with children. In terms of the experience ending rather quickly because of transitioning, you could have asked a teacher from that room to swap with you for a short period while you continue to engage and observe the children playing with the cameras. If this is not an option, another possible option would be to explain to the staff of that room what you are hoping for those children to gain from the experience and let them go over with the cameras anyway. On their return you could view and print the images taken and create a new wall possibly called “Our transitions to preschool”, a wall focused on transitions from the children’s perspectives rather than the teachers and tell their story through images. You also mentioned the use of iPad in your entry and these could be used as another way to aid the transition for children through skyping their transitioning experience to other staff and children in the room. This then creates links back to ways in which cameras can be used and builds the children’s knowledge of how to use each piece of technology.
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