Syed Muhammad Umer Rafiq

 ASSESSMENT COVERSHEET Contents 1. Context3 2. Analysis of the children's interests3 3. Learning Experience Plan4 3.1. Experience Information4 3.2. Learning Strategy - STEM4 3.3. Expected EYLF Outcome5 3.4. Experience Plan Requirements6 3.5. Implementation Procedure6 3.6. Review Plan7 4 Evaluation of the teaching and learning7 5 Personal Reflections8 References:10 1. Context I am working as an early childhood educator and Centre Manager at Daystars Kcc. My job is to introduce children to the learning environment while play. At Daystars Kcc, Children are supposed to learn maths and understand the concept of science and technology. I plan and carry out different games and learning activities, in the safe and comfortable environment to develop children’s creative skills. Also to teach them the moral and ethical values such as sharing and caring. As a pedagogic educator, I have to observe their behaviour, learning outcomes and shortcomings of lea rning processes. The aim of this early learning centre is to create a sense of technical knowledge, analytical and mathematical skills among children through play. Children group of age ranges from 2-5 years is selected for this study. The chosen age group consisted of children of different nature and skills, to made comprehensive analysis on their behaviour. This pedagogic age group has been selected as these children have high tendency to learn from environment and surroundings. Verbal, written and practical activities help smart children of this age to adopt changes and new techniques to strengthen their intellectual qualities. Children of this age are also new to out-world and need guidance and support in order to connect with others. 2. Analysis of the children's interests Children are motivated to explore mathematical and scientific concepts, encountered in their everyday interactions with the world (Geist, 2008). They appreciate the appealing and inspiring place for learning. Attractive environment and wide space retain children’s interest in games and activities. . My two weeks’ observation concluded that process of learning new skills becomes faster with the inviting and attractive place. For learning the purpose, children get involve in different math and science activities with the support of their teacher. For learning mathematical skills, six categories of activities have been described by Bishop; playing, measuring, explaining, designing, counting and locating (Orey, 2011). These are most commonly known as Bishop’s six mathematical activities. Activities at the school were based on these categories which have taught finger counting, matching, numbering puzzle, comparative study and shape extraction (Lind, 2005). Children are also found to be more creative and smart for arranging toys and using toy tools. Toy crane, dumper and other vehicles visual introduce technology to them. Also, they show their enthusiasm for learning and understanding scientific process such as colour laboratory, sugar solution and learning the solar system. These learning were visual based, though children enjoyed learning them as this was a new way for them but to memorize it they must practically examine their practices. The impact of cooperation and interaction with other children were observed when isolated children start sharing their belongings. They started learning from other’s actions and this developed the sense of caring, respect and cooperation. Children in an organised environment learnt about the social engagement with people, object and representations. It was also observed that children usually engaged in their own naturalistic, self-directed play. Hence educator needs to communicate and incorporate them with others to bring awareness of socialism and sharing (French, 2007). 3. Learning Experience Plan 3.1. Experience Information Considering the children interest in early learning I have planned an experience using Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) activities. STEM is an approach involve creative technology about daily routine activities (Brenneman, Stevenson-Boyd, & Frede, 2009). It includes the learning of science through a natural world which is further classified into four categories (Aitken, Hunt, Roy, & Sajfar, 2012). Technology is to show human innovation to meet our need. Engineering for them is to design any process to solve problem and maths to learn about quantity, number and shapes. Some simple activities are planned for the preschooler of age group 3-5 years. 3.2. Learning Strategy - STEM In the tenure of two weeks, I observed the activities of children and found them creative and active towards the natural and physical processes. Research suggested that educator must first observe children and then plan the strategy and experience setting depending upon their knowledge and skills also evaluation (Copley, Jones, & Dighe, 2007). Also, the teacher must possess the ability to alter the activities with changing behaviour and interest level of children children. Also, some recommendation given for pedagogical practice involve the engagement, encouragement, knowledge, respond and certainty (Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers & Early Childhood Australia, 2006). Considering their attitude, I have planned activities to engage them in physical practices of science and technology matters. These activities will help small children in building and developing their creative skills. Will further use bishop’s mathematical activities (Orey, 2011). Children till now at preschool have learnt about some ethical behaviour and attitude. They now play with other and like to share their toys and other belongings. Oral and verbal learning of numbers, colour and shape recognition along with visual learning of scientific phenomena such as tank filling, mobile games, shape matching, number arrangement, solution making, and motor running are known to them. Therefore, planned policy is now designed considering the need of practical implementation these mathematical and scientific processes. To experience these processes and further build their development skills I have planned some STEM activities which are beyond counting and visual learning of technology and science (Piasta, Pelatti, & Miller, 2014). Constructivism quality of children for math, science, technology and social construction dependent on surrounding people, freedom of using material and space to learn and discover new finding (Chaille & Britain, 2003). The chosen activities for mathematics learning planned are learning through abacus. The children will find this interesting using beads and will learn more advanced maths operation such as multiplying and division. Also, use of daily purpose activities liking counting cookies, sharing them with friends, colour and shape segregation using candies and bounties will make them learn number operations more rapidly (Knaus, 2013). Learning science through activities such as bubbling, planting and floating experiment (Harlen, Reed, & Schilling, 2003). For their creative development games using block stack, building, play dough activities, car track design, jigsaw puzzles, sand art, some paper activities such as making paper objects and paper cup transceiver are planned. Reliable learning is initiated when children find learning a task and associated activities to be meaningful and interesting. For advance technology use of iPads, interactive white boards and computers can benefit the learners which develop their interest in learning. For technology learning, I have planned to learn through keyboard typing, iPad games such as finding hidden objects, hunt and racing games. Intellectual activities seem to as a vehicle for the development of smart skills in early learning. According to a research, the educator must first analyse the behaviour of children and determine their need to plan an effective experience for their learning (Copley, Jones, & Dighe, 2007). From the observation of last two weeks, I experienced that children are more attracted towards activities that involve their physical participation. Also, research on early learning suggested that preschooler learn more rapidly with these activities. 3.3. Expected EYLF Outcome While designing any plan its outcome and risk factor must also be determined. Determination of these factors at the initial stage can help to avoid negative outcome before visualisation of its effect. The expected outcomes for this plan are supposed to be the part of Early Year Learning Framework (EYLF). Major outcomes of this framework provided by Australia’s early childhood educators includes children have a strong sense of identity, children are connected with and contribute to their world, children have a strong sense of wellbeing, children are confident and involved learners and children are effective communicators (Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, 2010). However, for the recommended experience it is expected EYLF’s fourth learning outcome will be developed. Children will be confident and they will be able to create and innovate things. The curiosity of learning and performing the task will help in building their confidence, creativity and commitment. Children will be able to solve daily science and mathematical problems further they will adopt the behaviour of their circle by learning through connected people and place. The SMART activities planned will help children to learn, investigate and experiment the natural and scientific process. 3.4. Experience Plan Requirements For the implementation of these activities, few arrangements are needed to be done since they demand physical experience. For mathematical learning apparatus and toys such as abacus will be required. For most of the scientific experiment-wide space and daily products such as play tools, dough, blocks and puzzles will be needed. Moreover, iPads, computer and smartboard will be used for the learning of technology. Some creative activities are designed by using a paper product such as floating experiment, art and object designing. The experience plan will be presented by adopting single learning activity. Involving of children and their participation will be the main concern plan execution (LUPU & Laurenţu, 2014). 3.5. Implementation Procedure Children are always interested in participating in activities which provide them freedom to use objects according to their will. The strategy I follow to develop the interest of the children will be mix implementation of activities based on their children behaviour towards the activities and their interest. Children are attracted towards creative and physical experiment but at times they want to switch to the methods with mental relaxation. So the activities will be implemented according to the nature of the activity and its learning outcome. Creative activities such as block building, track designing and puzzle games will initiate the process plan. Further to engage children in learning science experiment, activities such as bubbling, planting and floating experiment will be played (Seefeldt, Galper, & Jones, 2011. This will provide children with a large area and they will feel free to perform their actions. Air bubble activity is most favoured among the children hence it will be used as the breakthrough at different stages if the experience plans to intact the interest of children and their learning from a different aspect. However, children are intellectual and creative at learning centres but they still need assistant and demonstration from educators. Educators in this regard are supposed to be supportive and cooperative to help them in resolving design issues and math problems. Grouping of children can also help those having difficulty to learn from others. Regular assessment and progress of the plan will be analysed to review its success ratio. For any negative outcome, the educator will first try to resolve the complexity and find alternative ways to develop kid’s interest in learning from the activities. However, for no progress activities will be switched to verbal learning and games. Also, other more interesting activities will be used in replacement to make children learn techniques behind interest technology and science. 3.6. Review Plan Periodic performance analysis of plan will be made to review its progress and success. Key metrics to measure the outcome of experience plan will be the behaviour of the children, their involvement and participation towards activity, development of their skills and environment of a learning system (Brenneman, 2011). Creativity development of children will be analysed through their performance in a task such as building block and sand art. Further, their maths skills will be evaluated through their result of using an abacus and other tools. Conceptual, investigative and analytical questioning will help in evaluating their concept and learning from science experiment (MacDonald, 2015). The positive result of this evaluation will determine the acceptability ratio of respective activity. Also, different educators will be assigned for failure project to find out the impact of educators in its execution. The further behaviour of children and their relation with educator will help to analyse the effective communicator. If children do not respond to me or follow instruction as suggested, then I will try to train them through my practice and my involvement with them at the activity. 4 Evaluation of the teaching and learning The experience plan was implemented by setting up the large environment for physical activities. Children were first engaged with creative activity of blocks building. But most of the children did not respond well to this activity. The inspected reason for this found was the shape, size and colour matters a lot for children’s interest. Due to single colour blocks of small size, children lost their interest in building them. Furthermore, according to research children do not always enjoy the indoor activities, they must set free to learn from outdoor activities as well (Harlen, Reed, & Schilling, 2003). Therefore, the activity was then switched to other creative activity, a sand art which is supposed to be attractive for children. Open area, wide space and freedom to play with sand made them excited for this activity and every child took part actively. Moreover, the children were found interested in technology-based learning that was using iPads. During the experience plan, it was noticed that children prefer iPad and smartboard for indoor activities which lack their interest in other indoor activities. It is then suggested to alter the learning of technology for them with minimum or no use of smart devices (Brown & Harmon, 2013). Further to introduce the use of alphabets, playing keyboard typing plan was executed. The audio and visual effect of these keyboards help found to be very helpful for children, even children who were new to the centre and was not aware of the letters learnt them very quickly. However, the experiments such as floating and bubble games were most favoured by children. Floating of paper objects created by them was most interesting for them. It was observed that children enjoy their creation, also they like to teach other about their innovation which further improved the skills of other children. Bubbling activity as planned was found to be helpful to retain the interest of children in each activity. Learning of mathematics operation such as share and multiple numbers using abacus and other counting toys improved their calculation. Research also shows that use of calculating devices for children empower them to skills of fast calculation (Knaus, 2013). Also use of counting and numbering operations in daily routine task intact their interest and provide them with an easy way to learn mathematics operation. One example of such learning is the use of candies, cookies and bounties for counting. Assessment of children after experience plan learning also showed their enhanced verbal counting and calculation. The assessment was carried out by testing logical and operational skills of individual child for mathematics and scientific processes using calculating apparatus and conceptual investigation. As the investigation is suggested as one of the most powerful ways of measurement (MacDonald, 2015). 5. Personal Reflections When I step in this world of early learning as educators, I was unaware of the most impressive learning strategies to engage children. Dealing with children at the early learning centre and to develop their skills is demanding. It requires knowledge of child’s pedagogy and information regarding effecting experience plan. I as an educator must have good analytical skills and cooperative behaviour along with the flexibility to teach children (Hanley, Heal, Tiger, & Ingvarsson, 2007). This course has made me learn the ways to plan activities essential for the development of mathematical and technological knowledge of young learners. Two weeks’ period of my observation for the group of children showed that children are their mood dependent hence educator must be creative to make flexible changes in the plans to engage children with variation in behaviour. I do not discriminate among children and fully support them in learning new processes. These children are keen to learn but sometimes educators need to develop their interest in activities those are not favoured by them, to gain effective learning outcome. Open communication, investigation, cooperation and support develop the trust of children over the educator and give them the courage to take risk of initiating new processes (Hanley, Heal, Tiger, & Ingvarsson, 2007). This assignment has taught me that variation in activities is extremely demanded else children can easily lose their interest in learning. I tried to introduce fun learning in each activity. Learning with fun is the key feature to teach basic mathematics and scientific processes. If the child did not find the playing element in any activity he would be unable to develop his interest in the positive outcome. With the help of this course, I found myself appropriate for the position of early learning educator. I have enthusiasm for children and dedicated to teaching children from the scientific and technological aspect. Also, have patience and humour to deal with the children of different mentally and interact them to play and learn together. Since small children are unpredictable, also, tiredness, hungry and feeling of not well swinging their mood. For such cases, the educator needs to be patient to manage these issues (Teach Elementary Staff, 2014). Soft spoken is another quality required by educators for children of this age group. Although I have a passion for teaching them, my communication power is not good. During implementation of experience plan I also find difficulty in engaging children. I need to develop skills, to be frank with young children which will help to build their trust on me and will further develop their skills through my support. Cooperation, coordination and trust between educator and learners is essential for a strong bond between them. In future, I have planned to develop skills of soft communication along with improved patience to be a strong support for early learners. Also, I will introduce more inspiring and outcome oriented scientific activities (Harlen, Reed, & Schilling, 2003) for the young learner. References Aitken, J., Hunt, J., Roy, E., & Sajfar, B. (2012). The early years learning Framework in practice: Handbook for educators and families. Australia: Teaching Solutions. Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers & Early Childhood Australia. (2006). Position paper Early childhood mathematics. Retrieved from http://www.aamt.edu.au/content/download/722/19512/file/earlymaths.pdf State Government, Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. (2010). EDUCATORS BELONGING, BEING & BECOMING educators’ guide to the EARLY YEARS LEARNING FRAMEWORK FOR AUSTRALIA. Barton. Retrieved from http://files.acecqa.gov.au/files/National-Quality-Framework-Resources-Kit/educators_guide_to_the_early_years_learning_framework_for_australia.pdf Brenneman, K. (2011). Assessment for Preschool Science Learning and Learning Environments. Early childhood research and practice, 13(1). Brenneman, K., Stevenson-Boyd, J., & Frede, E. C. (2009). Mathematics and science in preschool: Policy and practice. Retrieved from http://nieer.org/resources/research/MathSciencePolicyBrief0309.pdf Brown, M., & Harmon, M. T. (2013). IPad intervention with at-risk preschoolers: Mobile technology in the classroom. Journal of Literacy and Technology, 56(2). Retrieved from http://www.literacyandtechnology.org/uploads/1/3/6/8/136889/jlt_14_2_harmon_brown.pdf Chaille, C. M., & Britain, L. (2003). The Young Child as a scientist, a: A Constructivist approach to early childhood science education: A Constructivist approach to early childhood science education (3rd ed.). Boston: MA: Allyn and Bacon. Copley, J. V., Jones, C., & Dighe, J. (2007). Mathematics: The creative curriculum approach. Washington, DC: Teaching Strategies Inc, US. French, G. (2007). Children’s early learning and development. Retrieved from http://www.ncca.ie/uploadedfiles/curriculum/ld%20background%20paper%20may.pdf Geist, E. (2008). Children are born mathematicians: Supporting mathematical development, birth to age 8. United States: Merrill/Pearson. Hanley, G. P., Heal, N. A., Tiger, J. H., & Ingvarsson, E. T. (2007). Evaluation of a Classwide teaching program for developing preschool life skills. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 40(2), 277–300. doi:10.1901/jaba- Harlen, W., Reed, K., & Schilling, M. (2003). Making progress in primary science: A study book for teachers and student teachers (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge Falmer. Knaus, M. (2013). Maths is all around you: Developing mathematical concepts in the early years. Albert Park, Victoria: Teaching Solutions. Lind, K. K. (2005). Exploring science in early childhood: A developmental approach (4th ed.). New York, NY, United States: Thomson Delmar Learning. LUPU, D., & Laurenţu, A. R. (2014). Parental Perspective on Preschoolers’ Leisure Activities. Journal plus education, 10(1), 194–202. MacDonald, A. (2015). Investigating mathematics, science and technology in early childhood. Australia: OUP Australia and New Zealand. Orey, D. C. (2011). Bishop identifies six. Retrieved September 16, 2016, from http://www.csus.edu/indiv/o/oreyd/acp.htm_files/abishop.htm Piasta, S. B., Pelatti, C. Y., & Miller, H. L. (2014). Mathematics and science learning opportunities in preschool classrooms. Early Education Development PMC, 25(4), 445–468. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC-/ Seefeldt, C., Galper, A. R., & Jones, I. (2011). Active experiences for active children: Science (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson. Teach Elementary Staff. (2014, May 13). 6 traits of effective kindergarten teachers. Retrieved September 16, 2016, from Effective Teaching, http://www.teachelementary.org/effective-teaching/6-traits-effective-kindergarten-teachers/