Children are encouraged to bring fruit to the setting and a bowl is provided for them. This encourages a healthy attitude towards fruit.
Children’s names are place on one board and as they arrive at the setting they are encouraged to take their own name and put it on the board that shows they are at the setting. This encourages recognition of their names, allows them to feel part of the setting and encourages independence.
Children are encouraged to wear plimsolls or trainers as they will be running around so they need footwear with good grip so they won’t slip on the surface of the floor.
9:25am – Child ‘A’ is brought to the setting by his mother. Child ‘A’ is greeted and made to feel welcome by the staff and other children at the setting. Child ‘A’ picks his name and places it on the board. Child ‘A’s mother then sits him down and puts on his trainers, she kisses him and says goodbye and child ‘A’ runs off towards the climbing frame.
9:35am – Child ‘A’ is playing on the climbing frame along with 4 other children, the large scale equipment provided for the children encourages and promotes gross motor and locomotive skills through play.
The large scale equipment provided is age and stage appropriate for the children and also sufficient supervision is ensured whilst children are playing on the equipment. There are also padded mats under the equipment to ensure safety is the children fall off the equipment whilst playing. The large scale equipment consists of a slide, a bridge to walk along and also a net wall for the children to climb up.
Child ‘A’ walks along the bridge and then sits down and slides down the slide.
9:50am – Child ‘A’ walks over to the painting area and stands there as another child paints. When the other child finishes, child ‘A’ collects an apron and walks over to a member of staff and gets them to put it on him. The member of staff changes the paper and hangs up the previous child’s painting to dry, she then writes child ‘A’s name on the top of the paper and encourages him to begin painting.
A painting activity is a valuable learning experience for a child of child ‘A’s age, as it encourages and promotes recognition of colours, imagination through the use of different colours, exploration of colour and texture and allows them to express and communicate their ideas, thoughts and feelings.
A variety of colours and brush sizes encourages children to explore.
10:05am – Child ‘A’ finishes painting and takes off his apron. I walk over and encourage him to wash his hands explaining to him that I will hang his painting to dry as he does so. Child ‘A’ washes his hands and then walks to the home corner which is set up like a house; it contains chairs, sink, cupboards, shelves, washing machine and a cot. He asks me if I would like a cup of tea and I say that it would be very nice as im very thirsty. I participate in the role play activity, drinking tea that is made for me, eating food made for me by the other children who have joined in the play. Child ‘A’ asks me if I would like a plate and spoon, he then tells another child to get him the teapot. He tells me to sit down and says he’s going to make my tea on the oven. When child ‘A’ hands me the tea, I pretend that it is really hot and it burnt me, child ‘A’ and the rest of the children find this hilarious and child ‘A’ hands me another cup and says “Its really hot isn’t it!”, I repeat my first reaction and the children laugh again. I encourage socialisation between the children and also encouraged an extremely shy child to participate; I played alongside her until she felt comfortable to play alongside the children without my encouragement. The setting has provided props and resources from different cultures and religions and dolls of different races and religions to promote the children’s knowledge and awareness of a multi-cultural society. The setting also provides the children with clothes from different cultures and religions and also uniforms such as police and firemen. The clothes provided encourage self-help skills through large buttons and Velcro.
10:25am – A staff member tells all the children to stop playing as it is break time. The children are asked if they would like to go to the toilet and a member of staff supervises at all times, the toilets have booster steps to enable children to be able to sit on the seat and reach the sinks properly.
The children are lined up and are brought into the room where break is held. The room is set up with a semi-circle of chairs with the children’s names on individual chairs; these are randomly placed on chairs. This encourages the children to recognise their own names. Child ‘A’ walks around looking at all the chairs and then he picks his name of the chair and sits down.
10:30am – The children are then encouraged to count the number of children present along with the staff. The two members of staff sit in front of the children and the children are called up two at a time to pour their milk or water. This encourages independence and self-help skills.
Once the children finish their drink, they are encouraged to bring up their cup and then sit and wait quietly for the other children to finish. Once all the children have finished, the staff call up the children to at a time and ask them what fruit the want. The children are told the name of the fruit is they are unsure, this encourages and develops vocabulary.
All staff participating in break where gloves at all times and when I prepared the fruit; gloves were worn at all times to support and maintain health and safety.
Once children have finished their fruit, they are encouraged to bring up their bowls and then sit quietly whilst the other children finish. When all the children have finished the tray is taken back into the kitchen and the bowls etc are washed up.
10:55am – The register is taken whilst still in the break time area. The children are taught how to answer to their names in different languages to promote and develop awareness of the different languages different cultures and religions speak in.
Today they are answering in Spanish.
When the register is taken the children are asked to look up out of the window in the roof, they are asked about the weather; if it looks cold outside, if the sun is shining and if they can see any clouds etc. The children are then asked what day of the week it is and the date. This encourages the children to remember and follow the days of the week, recognising which day comes after which day, e.g. Tuesday comes after Monday.
The children are then asked if they would like to share any news, this encourages self-esteem, concentration and listening skills.
The children are then taken back to the hall to continue free spontaneous play.
11:00am – The children are back in the hall and are encouraged to continue play. The puzzles are changed to maintain children’s interests. There are two tables for puzzles; one table has simple puzzles for the younger children and the other more difficult for the older children. This differentiation means that all children’s needs are met and the activities are age and stage appropriate for the different ages of children.
Child ‘A’ is now on the drawing table, there are crayons and felt tips for the children to use, the variety of colours and drawing equipment encourages exploration. Drawing is creative and therefore allows children to express their thoughts, ideas and feelings through drawing. This also develops fine motor skills and handling the equipment suitably.
11:25am – Child ‘A’ leaves the drawing table and walks over to the play dough table. The play dough is kept in an air tight container to ensure it is well maintained. The children are provided with play dough in a variety of colours, these change on a regular basis. The children are also provided with rollers, cutters of a variety of shapes, plastic blunt knifes and moulders. The knives promote fine motor skills and the other equipment provided promotes the use of the children’s imaginations and encourages the children to express their feelings, thoughts and ideas through playing with the dough. This is also promoted trough the variety of play dough colours.
The dough is made by the setting and contains no harmful ingredients even though the children are not encouraged to taste it.
11:45am – The children are told to stop playing and line up. It is now story time; this also takes place on the carpet area of the break time room. A member of staff takes all the children into the room and reads them a story from a big book and then sings songs and nursery rhymes with them. This promotes social, cognitive and language development.
Whilst the children are in the break room, the other members of staff are tidying up the setting. This involves folding up the tables, large scale equipment, home corner and placing the equipment from the tables in the cupboard. The setting has two large cupboards on either side of the hall, the equipment is packed away in the same order everyday, this way all staff knows where everything is.
The children who have done paintings or drawings have their work rolled up and secured with an elastic band. This makes it easier for them to carry home.
Once all the equipment is packed away, a semi-circle of chairs is set up by the door for the children to sit on whilst they wait to be collected by their carers.
12:00pm – The setting opens the doors for parents who have already arrived. The children are brought back to the hall and are sat down on the chairs. Their work and any other belongings are handed top them. Child ‘A’ is handed his paintings and drawings and he sits quietly waiting to be collected.
Parents are greeted and if they wish to talk to a member of staff, they are made to feel welcomed to talk.
12:10pm – Child ‘A’ mother arrives and he stands up and runs over to her. She greets him with hugs and kisses and he then hands her his work that he has done. She doesn’t unroll it but asks him what he has done and if he had fun today. She then tells him to sit back down whilst she puts on his trainers. She then puts on his jumper and tells him to say goodbye to everyone, he does and then they leave.
Staffs begin to sweep and mop the floor whilst waiting for any other children to be collected and then they leave to go home.
Linking the routine to the age and stage of the child:
This routine links to the age and stage of the child as:
- The large scale equipment is age and stage appropriate, a child aged 5 years ‘is able to use a variety of large equipment – e.g. swings, slides’ (Tassoni P et al, 2000)
Child ‘A’ is aged 4 years and was clearly able to use the large equipment including the proper use of the slide.
- When the children are brought in for break time their names are on their chairs to encourage them to recognise their own names. A child aged between 3-4 years ‘recognises own name in written form’ (Tassoni P at al, 2000)
- Child ‘A’ whilst participating in the role play along with myself and several other children, he demonstrated his knowledge of several household items such as teapot, spoon, plate and oven. Between 3-4 years ‘vocabulary is large, with children knowing parts of their bodies, names of household objects, animals’ (Tassoni P et al, 2000)
Linking the routine to a child development theory:
Thorndike and Skinner – Operant conditioning
Skinner states that pleasant experiences are positive reinforcement and that bad experiences are negative reinforcement.
Operant conditioning is very powerful; it means that if you have a pleasant experience you are more likely to want to repeat your behaviour.
‘When child ‘A’ hands me the tea, I pretend that it is really hot and it burnt me, child ‘A’ and the rest of the children find this hilarious and child ‘A’ hands me another cup and says “Its really hot isn’t it!”, I repeat my first reaction and the children laugh again.’
In practice this means because child ‘A’ and the rest of the children found my response comical, they wanted to repeat the experience by handing me another cup of tea and telling me that it was really hot so I would react in the same way to humour them.
Evaluation of my routine:
I feel my routine went very well. It met the developmental and care needs of the child, promoted development and met health and safety requirements. My routine was also age and stage appropriate for the child involved and met his individual care and developmental needs.
This was achieved through the provision of age and stage appropriate equipment, activities and experiences.
There is a recommendation for future practice which would develop the children’s knowledge and awareness of different fruits from different cultures and religions. I also feel that the children should be taught general information during milk and fruit time.
I feel my aim was achieved as I was able to show how to meet the developmental and care needs of a four year old child at a pre-school setting.
My routine is well presented, which is set out neatly and clear to read.
Recommendations for future practice:
For future practice, I would recommend:
- Providing the children with fruit from different cultures and religions. This would develop their knowledge and awareness of the different fruits and foods different cultures and religions eat. This would be a valuable learning experience for the children and would also encourage and maintain a healthy balanced diet.
- During milk time, information should be asked told to the children about the milk and water the children are drinking. This would educate the children in areas such as the fact that milk contains calcium and is good for healthy bones and teeth etc. This could also be done whilst the children are eating their fruit.
Bibliography:
Tassoni P, Beith K, Eldridge H & Gough A – 2000 – Diploma in Child Care and Education - Heinemann
Misha Laing Work With Young Children Pin No: 02/113918
Routine 2
