Clocks, Cameras, and Chatter, Chatter, Chatter: Activity Boxes as Curriculum
An activity box is a container of everyday objects that have a purposeful relationship to each other in function, color, or material. We use activity boxes in the part-day, preschool, full-day, child development, and family child care homes components of Child Development Services at Fort Wainwright in the interior of Alaska.
We first learned about activity boxes when one of us saw them in use on Kibbutz Beeri during a trip to Israel in summer of 1986. Israel's latest education trend at the time, activity boxes are the brainchild of Malka Haas of ORANIM, a training institute for metapelets (caregivers). When a metapelet is busy with household chores, it’s “box time.” The caregiver gives the young children (aged 6 months to 3 years) one of several activity boxes previously prepared with related objects categorized by color, shape, material (paper, wood, cloth), or activity (threading, matching). Haas says that the children learn to sort and distinguish between colors and shapes at an early age, and also to put the right toy back into the right box.
Israeli caregivers use activity boxes to allow children the freedom to explore real objects that adults use. They feel that a child's developmental growth is enhanced by the small step into the world of adults provided by this opportunity to touch, compare, sort, and manipulate “real things.” All kinds of recyclable items are collected or shipped from factories to the child care centers-Diane saw an old PBX machine and lots of typewriters in use. As Hass (1986) points out, “Playing with the real thing is part of real life.”
by: Diane Suskind, Ed.D., Jeanie A. Kittel, A.A.
Fitting Activity Boxes into your Program
Inexpensive, easy to make and store, and flexible in composition and use, activity boxes can serve many functions in children's learning environments. Any child care setting can make a variety available.
Good inexpensive containers are shoe boxes and other old cardboard boxes with or without tops, small plastic dish pans or laundry baskets, transparent plastic storage containers, and lunch boxes. Parents and staff can contribute objects from home and from the workplace. Keep several boxes prepared for children’s use in an Activity Box Corner of your classroom or family child care home. Put picture labels on the boxes for the children and inventory labels for the adults.
Safety should be the first priority in compiling boxes. Paper products are unsafe for infants. Boxes to be used by infants or toddlers should not contain objects small enough to be swallowed or with sharp edges.
When introducing a box, we have found it is important to show respect for the children by allowing time for exploration to develop into role paying. Because the child is the explorer and chooses how she will examine and manipulate the objects, activity boxes provide for a wide range of interests and abilities. You can vary the selection of materials to increase in complexity as children’s abilities grow. When children become familiar with the idea of activity boxes, you might want to collect large quantities of different types of materials and to let children decide what goes in each box. Allow children to interchange materials between boxes or to combine two boxes.
Uses for Activity Boxes
Provide boxes as transitional activities to create an even flow from one activity to the next, turning what might be time wasted while children wait for the caregiver to set up an activity or prepare lunch into an additional learning experience.
Use boxes as portable learning centers to introduce concepts to children. Boxes can include objects with a single property in common (all soft, all round, all green), objects that vary in a single property, (fabrics of different texture), objects with similar functions (all cooking utensils), or objects with complementary functions (yarn, needles, and cloth).
Let the boxes spark language-developing adult/child and child/child conversations. Talk with children about what they are doing, introducing vocabulary about likeness and differences, uses, colors, shapes, and so on in the course of natural conversation. Name the objects to children not yet able to talk. Verbalize the child’s actions or repeat his vocalizations. With children who are capable of language, ask open-ended questions, such as “What do you think you can do with that?”
Encourage creative thinking and dramatic play. Activity boxes are an open-ended activity. The child sets the rules and the outcome of the play. Measuring spoons can become airplanes, coasters can be hamburgers, funnels can be hats. The choice is always the child’s.
Promote multicultural and nonsexist play. A fix-it shop where both girls and boys use tools and learn how gadgets and machines work expands options for all children.
Encourage children to initiate and explore, giving them the opportunity to develop confidence, gratification, and competency. Allowing children the satisfaction of figuring out solutions for themselves builds self-esteem and basic trust.
Strengthen home-school relationships. Parents can provide household items, broken appliances, clocks, locks, and so on for children to bring to school and add to the activity boxes. This home-program connection increases children’s self-esteem. Using activity boxes at home can provide a link between the child’s two worlds. In addition, activity box time provides an excellent observation time for visiting parents to observe cognitive, social, manipulative, and language skills.
Let activity boxes help you evaluate children's progress. Activity boxes provide the opportunity to observe children during uninterrupted play. Problem-solving skills, fine motor skills, language development, and social skills are readily observable. Tell the child, “I’m interested in what you’re doing and would like to sit and watch for a while.” Keep the records to help you plan appropriate activities and to share with parents.
A Learning Experience for the Entire Staff
We conducted a hands-on activity with caregivers at the Fairbanks and Anchorage Early Childhood Conferences in 1987. Caregivers selected items to make up an activity box. Each group then wrote what skills children could learn with these selected items. Within 15 minutes, they realized the unlimited possibilities. Try this with your staff. Frequently inventing and discussing activity boxes can aid in curriculum planning.
4 plastic coasters
4 wooden napkin rings
3 plastic cups
2 wooden spoons
3 round plastic dishes
1 round plastic bowl with lid
1 plastic pitcher with lid
The goals they created were:
Exploring and having fun
Sorting by color
Sorting by texture (plastic/wooden)
Sorting by shape
Stacking (cups, coasters, napkin rings)
Rolling (napkin rings)
Counting like objects
Dramatic play
Creativity
Language skills naming objects
Small motor coordination removing and replacing lids
Learning with Activity Boxes
Recently we introduced a writing activity box to the 3-year-old class at Fort Wainwright Child Development Center. The box contained spiral notebooks, notepads, envelopes, a ruler, pencils, a receipt book, scissors, and letter stencils. The 3-year-old children immediately assumed the roles of adults (symbolic play). Child’s play became serious business. A feeling of self-importance permeated the air as children wrote checks using the receipt book. One child discovered that an eraser could make her written lines disappear (physical knowledge).
The discoveries these children made when involved with their activity boxes may seem minor to us as adults, but to children every new finding is an exciting event. It is so easy to make children feel good about themselves, and self-esteem is at the root of all school success.
From Young Children – January 1989
