On 8th June I had a chance to listen to Ph.D Jenni Vartiainen's presentation "Learning Science Through Play-based Methods" in Finnish Early Childhood and Education International Innovation Forum.
Jenni talked about a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics) approach that educators can use to introduce science to young children.
Why is science important for young learners?
Children are masters of wondering! They ask a lot of questions every day and many of their questions are science related. Can I walk on the clouds? Why do zebras have stripes? How do we get rainbows?
When it comes to designing a course or planning a lesson, it is important to remember that science is very complex and requires abstract thinking. This means that even though children want to know why rainbows appear in the sky, they might not find the answer to the question. However, they will get some new knowledge around the topic they are interested in (What colours are there in the rainbow? What is the order of the colours? What kind of circumstances do we need to have to get a rainbow?) They can learn some concepts without scientific explanations.
How can we use STEAM with young learners?
Research and practice show that play is a natural way to learn for children. At the same time, play is a powerful tool to make STEAM meaningful for children (Vartiainen & Kumpulainen, 2019).
Jenni highlights that play always includes some sort of imagination. So if we use play to help learning, we also need to embed imagination into learning situations.
What basic science-process skills do children develop through STEAM activities?
All of these basic-level science process skills (observation, measurement, classification, prediction, interpretation, conclusion) are connected to communication, and it is important to remember that young learners should be encouraged to communicate their observations both verbally and non-verbally.
The slides are taken from Jenni's presentation.
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