A Unique Child: Practice in pictures: You're joking!

Dad and Maddi (just two years old) are sitting on the sofa looking at a book. They are close together and both are focusing on the pictures, talking about them and using them for pretend play. Dad draws her attention to images on the page and asks her to name them. He soon realises that Maddi is deliberately giving him the wrong answers, and he throws his head back as he laughs and playfully accuses her of teasing him. Maddi continues the teasing and seems to mimic dad's body language as she instinctively throws herself back on the sofa and she laughs joyfully at her joke.

1 In 1963, the Russian children's poet Kornei Chukovsky wrote about what he considered to be the amazing capacity of very young children to make verbal jokes.

He described in his book, From Two to Five, the inclination of two-year-olds to play around with reality and turn meaning on its head - 'No sooner does he master some idea than he is only too eager to make it his toy'.

This would seem to be exactly what Maddi is doing. She knows the correct names for the things in the picture - and she knows she knows them! Her confidence in her ability means that she can safely play around with that knowledge and tease her dad. She also knows that her dad knows she knows, which is why it doesn't take him long to work out what she is doing and share in her delight.

2 Observations like this can provide us with powerful evidence of what children really do know and understand. There is an important lesson for us here in our approach to assessment.

When children have really grasped something and are confident about that knowledge, they can use it (and abuse it!) in their play. If her father had needed proof that Maddi could recognise and name the images in front of her, then this was perfect evidence of how well that knowledge was embedded.

It was also much more reliable than if she had merely 'performed' a naming task. We need to keep this in mind when we attempt to assess children's learning. We learn more when we pay close attention to what children show us in their self-initiated play, and the ways in which they manipulate ideas they are comfortable with, than we do from 'assessment tasks'.

3 When you know a child well enough and they are relaxed and comfortable with you, you can do something non-sensical yourself.

Children love it when adults get things wrong and they have to correct them. This can also be another way to assess the embedded knowledge of a child. It isn't always about us asking them questions; sometimes, giving children the chance to put us right on our 'silliness' shows us just how much they know.

4 In his book Chukovsky challenges the notion that 'nonsense' rhymes and games might confuse children.

Chukovsky makes it quite clear that, far from interfering with children's awareness of reality, nonsense rhymes and games serve only to strengthen it. The urge to be subversive and play around with 'truth' can only come when you have worked out what those 'truths' might be.

Chukovsky believed that, for every 'wrong', the child realises what is 'right', and 'every departure from the normal strengthens his conception of the normal'. Think about the nonsense rhymes and games that you enjoyed as a child and try sharing them with colleagues and children. Encourage playing around with language and with rhyming words and phrases.

5 Make up your own nonsense songs with the children. When a child invents a new word or experiments with language, respond with pleasure and acknowledge their way of making sense of the world.

Build up a good collection of books of nursery and nonsense rhymes. Keep prompt lists handy for group times so that you can jog your memory and try less familiar ones. Play about with them and invent new endings, or add children's names into the rhymes.

You could also print and laminate individual rhymes on cards and let children take them home to share with their families. Ask the parents to share with you their own childhood favourites and the ones they use at home. Learn a few in different languages and practise them together with the children.

6 In this instance, Maddi is also showing us her developing sense of humour. Awareness of nonsense, exaggeration and slapstick all start at an early age.

Two-year-olds are quite capable of seeing the funny side of things - particularly when the adults around them are responsive and playful.

Although Maddi doesn't appear to be watching her father's physical response to the joke, she does seem to have instinctively absorbed his body language as she throws herself backwards in an exaggerated imitation of the way he throws his head back when he catches on to her joke. He only does it once, but in the sequence, she does it over and over again each time she tricks him. This euphoric, whole-body reaction is testament to the power of this joyous experience that unites both of them in good feelings. Dad takes pleasure in Maddi turning the tables on him, and Maddi delights in the feelings of empowerment and confidence that his responses give her. Both experience a flood of 'feel-good' chemicals (opiods) to the brain and so will be keen to repeat the experience again another time.

Think about the opportunities you make during the day in your setting for 'feel-good' experiences like this. Are there enough of them? Are there some children who readily seem to invite such interactions? What about those who don't? What do you think might be preventing you from engaging with them in intimate, playful ways that promote attachment and mutual pleasure? What do you need to do to make sure that all children get lots of opportunities to develop a sense of fun in the way that Maddi clearly does?

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING

- Kornei Chukovsky (translated and edited by Miriam Morton), From Two to Five (University of California Press)

- Helen Tovey, 'Time to Talk' (Nursery World, 7 May 1998)

- 'Making Kids Laugh - Taking humour seriously', GSLiS, University of Illinois http://www.lis.uiuc.edu/news/newsletter/GSLIS_Newsletter_2007.pdf

FURTHER INFORMATION

The stills are taken from Siren Films' 'Supporting Early Literacy'. For more information, visit Siren Films at www.sirenfilms.co.uk or call 0191 232 7900

Links to the EYFS guidance

- UC 1.1 Child Development

- PR 2.2 Parents as Partners

- PR 2.3 Supporting Learning

- EE 3.2 Supporting Every Child

- L&D 2 Areas of learning: PS&ED and CL&L