Everyday Play in the Ruth Washburn Basement
- January 30, 2017
- filed under Everyday Play
Everyday Play in the Ruth Washburn Basement
BY SUKIE JACKSON
Everyday Play in the Ruth Washburn Basement.
Have you ever been down to the basement of the Ruth Washburn Cooperative Nursery School? It is a marvelous place filled
- An entire wall filled with process art materials including a set of baby bottles filled with colored water, fly swatters, sea sponges, golf balls, strawberry baskets and all kinds of brushes including scrub and toothbrushes.
- Shelves filled with recycled items. Corks, baby food jars, aluminum trays, paint samples, tiles, scoops, wire pieces, sytrofoam sheets, smooth stones, cardboard squares, egg cartons and so on. Parents in our cooperative are the perfect source for these materials that get used by children for tinkering, building and creating.
- Science bins including Weights and Measures, Pulleys, Bubble Wands, Sight and Sound, Beakers and Test Tubes. There is a bin with more than ten bird’s nests. Amazing! Shells, rocks, antlers, even a coconut can be unearthed from the many natural objects stored offering children the opportunity to study real objects.
Ann Epstein in The Intentional Teacher recommends that teachers provide “sturdy, open-ended materials that children can use in many ways and reflect the diversity of their homes and communities.” This is just what we do with basement STUFF.
“Children are particularly fond of haunting sites where things are visibly worked on.
Sincerely,
Sukie Jackson, Teacher