The Playful Brain – Children collaboratively problem solving in active play

A small group of children are playing together in the nursery garden. They are trying to solve a problem.

Good for looking at

• The power of play
• Problem solving
• Active play
• Play outdoors
• Collaborating

Notice

• How they use language to define the problem and how they go about solving it collectively.
• Their objective is clearly to put the pieces together, they try vertically, then balancing one ladder on top of the two others.
• Notice the joy when they manage to make a structure that holds briefly, and then go about deciding what they can do with it.

Reflection

• Would it have helped if an adult had engaged in sustained shared thinking with them when their structure collapsed, asking open ended questions like ‘why do you think that happened’ and ‘could we put it together another way’ and if there are any clips on the ladder ‘do you think these might help?’
• Why wouldn’t it be so helpful if an adult just breezed in, put the ladder together, gave it to them to play with, and then moved on without any discussion or joint problem solving?

What next – planing

• Watch if they play with the ladder pieces tomorrow, offer some more Sustained Shared Thinking support. Also, if they are playing with other toys that have pieces that clip together, remind them of what you all did with the ladder yesterday, help them to build a schema of ‘things that clip together’.