Entry 1
I noticed that two toddlers were playing with the baby dolls in the family corner. One of them is a boy and the other one is a little girl and I noticed that they always play together. I saw them wrapping the dolls in small blankets and talking about their babies at the same time. I heard the little girl saying “puke pepe” in her mother-tongue which basically means that the “baby is sick”. The little boy replied “eh, puke pepe?” The girl said “yes” and grabbed the stethoscope from the shelf and put in on before starting to examine the baby doll. The little boy started to say something but the little girl cut him off “ssh, ssh” while looking at the baby doll very seriously.
The little boy stopped and kept quiet until the little girl finished examining the baby and confirmed to him that “pepe puke” or “baby is sick”. The little boy looked sad and took his baby doll from the doctor and he went to explain to the children that were playing on the side that “ta mahaki puke pepe” which means that the “doctor in the hospital said, baby is sick”. The children came up to the baby doll to see how she was and they looked very interested. Some of them approached the doctor and started to talk to her and the doctor put on her stethoscope immediately and examined the children one by one.
I observed the children playing and I took some pictures so I could do a learning story for their portfolios. The children could revisit them later and share their learning with their friends and families.
Looking back at this learning experience, it is obvious that technology plays an important role in children’s learning and development. Technology or the “use of practical and intellectual resources to develop products and systems (technological outcomes) that expand human possibilities by addressing needs and realising opportunities” (Ministry of Education, 2007, p.32) is a very important teaching tool for me as well as an effective learning tool for children. The use of the stethoscope in the family corner highlighted how technology supports children’s learning and playing, as they try to make sense of their play and their world (Ministry of Education, 1996). When it was established that the baby was sick, they instantly thought of the hospital, doctors and their roles and responsibilities to sick people. Therefore, they reached for the stethoscope to find out and to confirm whether the baby was sick or not.
The children role played really well and it was obvious that they had seen and experienced being sick and going to the doctor before. The stethoscope is used confidently because they had seen it used to tell their physical conditions. This shows that children’s development is further extended through “experiences and understanding of people, places, events and things” (MoE, 1996, p. 21).
Technology helped the children to develop their language and communication skills, as they tried to explain what happened to the baby dolls. Language is so important to children to express their feelings and thoughts and to communicate to others. Therefore, as teachers we need to support them in shaping their language development to become good communicators. We also need to respect the image of the child and develop good communication skills in order to understand what they are going through. If we continue to respect them and the challenges that they are going through in developing their language skills, then children will prosper as they will feel secure and confident in their language abilities (MoE, 1996).
When they found out that the doctor said the baby was sick, they went and shared this information with their friends and families and they were encouraged to see the doctor as well. This shows how important it is to know the context of the children and to understand their diversities. These children are pacific islanders and they live collectively, so anything that is happening to anyone in their community is shared with the rest of the community. The use of technology encouraged children to share information because “through responsive and reciprocal relationship with people, places, and things” (MoE, 1996, p.43) children are empowered to go further in life.
References
Google Image. (2012). Image of child girl doctor. Retrieved from
Google Image. (2012). Image of stethoscope. Retrieved from
Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whāriki, he whaariki mātauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa : Early childhood curriculum. Wellington: Learning Media.
Ministry of Education. (2007). The New Zealand curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.
