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Much of children’s learning is accomplished through encounters they have with interesting people, places, and objects in their environment. Depend on numerous child-directed, teacher-guided play activities to enable children to develop concepts about their world. and/or stamps. For even more personal involvement, plan for children to wrap handmade gifts for someone they love. Play matching games. Children cut pictures of gift boxes from magazines and glue them to cards. Encourage them to find different colors of bows. Children then use their visual discrimination skills to match pictures, such as finding all of the packages with blue bows. As children became proficient with matching cards, introduce a memory game so that pairs or small groups of children can play. Older children can draw their own illustrations, taking care to make pairs of each different package. Art Explorations Roll a design. One process-oriented art activity involves printing with a rolling object (such as a marble or Ping-Pong ball) in a box. Ask children to measure and cut their chosen color of paper to fit in a box. They choose a paint color and painting object. Children place their paper in the box and add a small amount of paint. They then add the rolling object and tip the box so the object rolls back and forth in the paint. This creative, interesting art experience could also be classified as a fine-motor or math activity. Stamp patterns with boxes. Children use large pieces of paper, two colors of paint, and various boxes to “stamp” designs. Pour a thin layer of paint in a larger box, dip the smaller boxes in the paint, and then press them on the paper. Box tops, edges, lids, and bottoms can be used. Stamping can be done with the base or the edges of the boxes, creating many visual patterns. Clean up is a snap, because the painting tools are disposable! Decorate boxes. One art activity evolved spontaneously when Mrs. Keenan placed a box on an easel for children to paint as if it were canvas, much like famous artists. She shared some famous paintings by Cubists (Juan Gris, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque) who used box shapes. Rippled prints. To create interesting prints, children can peel the paper from one side of a corrugated cardboard piece. Press designs into the bumpy surface with the wooden end of a paintbrush or other hard object. Press the corrugated side into paint and print the rippled designs on plain paper. Build sculptures. Much like building with hollow blocks, children can glue or tape boxes together to create massive sculptures. They might choose a theme in advance, such as a pirate ship, or may just see what emerges as they create. Boxes can be painted and decorated with a variety of craft items such as paper, streamers, recycled items, or natural objects. Art activities present many opportunities for vocabulary and math concept development as children design, draw, measure, and construct. Talk with children about the shapes, colors, techniques, and their imaginative process. Create Games and Books Boxes have a variety of uses in an integrated curriculum. These are just a few examples. Food-box puzzles. To enhance young children’s awareness of environmental print, while they are using fine motor and visual discrimination skills, Mrs. Keenan placed two separate, teacher-made puzzles inside a cereal box. (Any clean, familiar box could be used.) Mrs. Keenan backed these puzzles with adhesive foam to make them sturdy enough for multiple uses. Cover the box with clear self-stick paper to increase durability and longevity, too. Place a box on an easel for children to paint as if it were canvas, much like famous artists. Share some famous paintings with them that use box shapes, from artists such as Cubists like Juan Gris, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque. 14 Volume 35, Number 1 DIMENSIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD Winter 2007
Figure 4. Children’s Books Carter, D. (1994). Alpha bugs. New York: Little Simon. Carter, D. (1995). Feely bugs. New York: Little Simon. Carter, D. (1999). Giggle bugs. New York: Little Simon. Carter, D. (1998). Glitter bugs. New York: Little Simon. Carter, D. (1998). How many bugs in a box? New York: Little Simon. Carter, D. (1993). In and out. New York: Little Simon. Fleming, C. (2003). Boxes for Katjie. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Lillegard, D. (1992). Sitting in my box. New York: Puffin. McLerran, A. (1991). Roxaboxen. New York: HarperTrophy The green puzzle had only six pieces and was made from the more familiar box front. The red puzzle contained eight pieces, and included much more print, created from the back of the box. These puzzles can be worked on the floor, tabletop, or even on the box itself. Box books. Mrs. Keenan remembered Sitting in My Box (1992) as an anti-bias book that is perfect for preschoolers. Adding a box full of miniature animals to the book corner enables children to retell the story at their leisure. The book and the box of animals is an ideal language extension activity. As the children’s interest in box books emerged, she found many other books related to the topic (see Figure 4). All kinds of boxes. As the children explored boxes, other ideas emerged and were shared by families, such as these: • lunch boxes (and box lunches) • button boxes • jewelry boxes • music boxes • tool boxes The children came to see boxes as a safe place to keep special mementoes, so they each made a keepsake box. The father of one child worked in a nearby bank, so he showed them a safe deposit box and they made pretend money, pictures, treasure maps, and other items to keep in the box. Children are often more fascinated with boxes than they are with their contents. Boxes enable children to climb in and out of them, push them, pull them, decorate, build, cut, and even smash them if they wish. As children learn and build their skills, they thoroughly enjoy learning about boxes with their families and friends. References Feeney, S., Christensen, D., & Moravcik, E. (2006). Who am I in the lives of children? Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education. Henniger, M. (2005). Teaching young children, an introduction. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education. Wardle, F. (2003). Introduction to early childhood education. Boston: Allyn & Bacon. Warner, L., & Sower, J. (2005). Educating young children from preschool through primary grades. Boston: Allyn & Bacon. Thank You Reviewers! SECA expresses its appreciation to these content experts who reviewed the articles that appear in this issue of Dimensions of Early Childhood. Denise da Ros-Voseles Rebecca M. Giles Stephen B. Graves Mary Langenbrunner Nancy Mundorf Boyoung Park Peggy Pearl Jean M. Shaw Marie Sloane Early childhood professionals who are interested in becoming SECA volunteer manuscript reviewers are encouraged to request an application. Send your request to editor@southernearlychildhood.org. Winter 2007 DIMENSIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD Volume 35, Number 1 15
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