Enabling Environments: Let's explore ... Reflections

Children come across reflections in many ways: looking in the mirror, seeing puddles on rainy days, or noticing the light bouncing off a shiny toy. They may not make connections between all of these things, but as young children experience a wide range of reflections (including mathematical reflections, in the form of symmetry), they will make some connections and observations if they are supported by a challenging learning environment and practitioners who let them have time and space to pursue their own investigations.

The way in which you set up or introduce a new theme or centre of interest will affect children's motivation, learning independence and exploration of the theme. You can enrich the play and the learning in a theme on reflections by taking the children into an imagined world using dramatic incident and storytelling.

For example, use a hand mirror to reflect the sunlight. You could get the 'sun spot' to dance around the room and at the same time describe where it is: 'Look, it's on top of the book shelf. I wonder where it will land next?' Notice which children use precise positional language to describe where the 'sun spot' lands and those that just point or say, 'It's over there'.

Children become very involved as they try to guess where the 'sun spot' will appear next. Give out small hand mirrors so the children can experiment dancing their own 'sun spot'.

You need to set out to encourage children's inquisitiveness and curiosity and interest in reflections by showing how to explore mirrors and use other reflective materials creatively. You can do this by:

- modelling the use of different mirrors to create and change reflections

- wondering aloud and inviting speculation and suggestion, 'I wonder what happens if you move the mirror slightly.'

- playing alongside and showing how to use resources such as kaleidoscopes and hinged mirrors.

The areas of provision that are particularly suitable for exploring the theme of reflection are:

- role play
- science workshop
- sand and water play
- creative workshop
- maths workshop
- outdoor area.

Interactive display

- Cover a table with metallic fabric and use small mosaic mirror tiles as the backboard. Resource with hand mirrors of different sizes and plastic mirrors that are hinged together along one edge with sticky tape. Add kaleidoscopes, mirror boxes containing sparkling jewels and other shiny objects. Provide mirrors on sticks and car rear-view mirrors. Make a cylinder using mirror paper and reflect objects in it. Provide a telescope to look through. Put out a spoon, a saucepan and lid, and some small plastic mirrors.

- Discuss how each object reflects the children's faces, and which ones distort reflections, and how. 'My face is upside down in this spoon! What does your face look like?.'

- Encourage the children to contribute to the display and to handle, play with and investigate all the objects.

- Play 'I spy' in the mirror. Show children how to use a mirror to reflect what is happening behind them. Play 'I spy' looking at reflections, 'I spy something red,' 'Yes, it's Jack wearing a red jumper.' 'What can you spy?'

- Enhance the experience by providing mirrors, boxes and tubes to enable children to construct simple periscopes.

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Seeking new experiences
Using language for a range of purposes
Exploring objects and materials

Using an overhead projector

- Station near the display an overhead projector with sheets of paper taped to a nearby wall. Invite children to choose a shape to place on the projector and project this on to the paper.

- Suggest the children draw around the outline of the projected shape and compare the size with the original.

- Introduce mathematical language such as corners and sides. 'What happens when you put two shapes together?' 'I wonder if you'll make a different shape next time?'

Role play

- Create a magic reflecting den that can be used for imaginative play.

- Use reflective papers, fabrics or line a small walled area with large sheets of cooking foil to make a magical cave. Provide torches and suspend a coloured mirror ball and small plastic mirrors in there for children to explore. Resource with foil blankets to wear as disappearing cloaks.

- Initiate discussions and invite comment and fantasy when the children are playing in the area. Encourage children to add to the resources to support their play.

'I wonder who lives here. Is it someone from space or a magician or a different person?'

'Is there anything in our resources boxes that you could put in the space den to make it brighter?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Developing empathy with others
Listening to, and retelling, stories; extending vocabulary
Making predictions; exploring objects and materials
Responding imaginatively to situations

Science workshop

- Make a rainbow by experimenting with mirrors to reflect sunlight. Reflecting light and colour is fascinating and fun and gives children an opportunity to investigate reflections creatively.

- Pin up a large sheet of white paper near a window. On a table in front of the paper put a tank of water, shallow trays filled with water and other containers with water in. Hold a plastic mirror at an angle in the water. The light will reflect from the mirror on to the paper to make a rainbow.

ADULT ROLE

- Demonstrate how to change the angle of the mirror to move the rainbow. Explore with the children the best place to hold the mirror in each container to make the widest rainbow.

- Listen for scientific language. Draw attention to the colours in the rainbow.

- You can add paints and paper to the area for painting rainbows or use fat felt-tip pens bundled together with an elastic band to make rainbow patterns.

- Help children remember the colours of the rainbow by singing together 'I Can Sing a Rainbow'.

- Create other colours by shining a torch through sheets of different coloured cellophane, reflecting the colours on to the white paper.

- You can encourage children to explore pattern and shape by supportive commentary.

'I wonder how we can make the rainbow appear in the centre of the paper?'

'What would happen if we didn't use any water, could we still make a rainbow?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Extending vocabulary
Showing an interest in shape and pattern
Responding to what they see, hear, think and feel

Construction play

- To enhance play, put out large plastic mirrors with the building blocks. Children can use mirrors as a base to build on and explore how their constructions look, reflected in the mirror. Use hand mirrors to reflect different aspects of their completed constructions.

'What does the car you've made look like? Is it upside down in the mirror?'

'Does the tower in the mirror looks like yours? How is it different?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Talking for a variety of purposes
Problem solving
Exploring reflection
Counting with a purpose
Finding out about design
Exploring colour and shape in three dimensions
Developing motor skills

Sand play

- Put sand in shallow trays. Add a mirror, or some reflective paper or kitchen foil to the sand trays to act as a pond or lake (for sailing boats, ducks, fish, thirsty animals ...).

- Talk about the way this reflects the light, and whether you can actually tell from the reflection in the 'water' what is on the surface.

- Use a torch as the sun, to shine down on the 'water'.

'How many ducks have you got on the pond? ... Three, and I can see another three under the water!'

'That pond is all silver, isn't it? I wonder what happens when we shine the sun on it.'

ADULT ROLE

Support children as they make links with other areas of provision, for instance using small-world characters to populate the 'pond area'.

The adult can best engage with the children by hinting at the possibilities of the materials provided, and by responding to what the children do and say as they explore them.

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Interacting with others
Extending vocabulary
Responding to what others say
Counting with a purpose
Exploring reflection
Making predictions
Exploring objects and materials

Creative workshop

Provide a selection of:

- reflective papers, cards and fabrics

- sheets, strips of kitchen foil

- small plastic mirrors and lolly sticks

- scissors

- glitter, beads and sequins

- sticky tape, glue, glue spreaders

- paint powder and containers, for children to mix their own paints

- a selection of brushes

- marker pens for drawing on foil.

ADULT ROLE

The adult can model the possibilities of the materials:

- Make a picture or pattern with sequins or scraps of kitchen foil.

- Make a handle (with lolly sticks) and a frame (by sticking on beads and sequins) for a small mirror.

- Make a simple mobile with strips of kitchen foil.

- Draw or paint on reflective paper or a sheet of kitchen foil.

- Paint on one half of the paper then fold it in half, press, and open out to make a 'butterfly' picture.

- Create symmetrical patterns by dipping string in paint and pressing between folded paper and slowly pulling it out

- Make a pond for the small-world area using reflective card or kitchen foil; cut this with wavy-edge scissors and colour it with watery blue paint or marker pens

- Talk with the children about their work, asking questions and making comments such as, 'I wonder what will happen if you ...'

'I can see a reflection of your hand in that paper. What does that fabric feel like?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Co-operating and collaborating
Maintaining attention
Trying new activities
Extending vocabulary
Talking for a variety of purposes
Counting with a purpose
Making patterns
Exploring reflection
Making predictions
Exploring materials
Developing fine-motor skills
Exploring texture

Mathematics area

Provide some or all of the following:

- small plastic mirrors

- plain and coloured paper and scissors

- plastic or wood numerals

- a place for children to display their work, such as a notice board.

ADULT ROLE

Model ways of using materials:

- Fold paper down the middle (once, twice or even three times) and cut out a shape from the middle, then open up the paper to explore the symmetrical pattern made

- Draw a simple picture or write a letter or number and explore different ways of reflecting it with a mirror

- Use a mirror with a wooden letter and explore its reflections (there are some letters and numbers, such as W and 8, where you can hold the mirror midway and recreate the hidden half of the shape)

- Draw a dragon or snake with a long body; use a mirror to make the dragon even longer, with two heads

- Encourage children to explore mark-making and writing numbers. Provide mirrors to play with their drawn shapes. Talk with the children about their work, asking questions and making comments such as, 'I think that shape looks like an 8'.

'I wonder what will happen if you move the mirror back a bit.'

'What does that shape look like to you?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Co-operating and collaborating
Maintaining attention
Trying new activities
Exploring and experimenting with words and texts
Writing for a range of purposes
Making patterns, exploring reflection and symmetry
Selecting tools and techniques
Developing fine-motor skills
Expressing ideas

Outdoor area

You can add reflective surfaces to your outdoor facilities to create all sorts of interesting effects for children to explore as they use the area:

- Hang used CDs on the fence at various heights; these will catch the light and reflect it in interesting and surprising ways.

- Hang spiral wind chimes low enough for children to be able to blow or fan them to activate the spirals.

- Set up two or more giant mirrors, at angles to each other, inside the play house, or in the corner of the fence, so children can explore the repeated reflections these produce.

- Attach mirrors to the inside roof or walls of the play tunnel to change the experience of crawling through.

- Fix mirrors onto the climbing frame; children can see what their upside-down reflection looks like, or what they look like when doing handstands, or hopping.

'How many Kallums can you see?'

'I wonder what will happen if you move further away/closer.'

'Tell me what you saw. What did it feel like?'

You can also set up specific activities:

- Use a sprinkler hose to water the garden, and see how the light is reflected off the drops of water.

- Direct the hose onto upside-down umbrellas to collect pools of water, and look at the reflections in the water.

- Make puddles on the ground; wearing wellies, make body shapes that are reflected in the puddles.

- Pretend you are a mirror and make shapes with your body that are a reflection of your partner's shape.

'What does that look like? Have you seen anything like that before?'

'Tell me what you are doing.'

'Do you think those look the same?'

LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Developing empathy
Extending vocabulary
Talking for a variety of purposes
Counting with a purpose
Exploring reflection
Making predictions
Exploring materials
Developing fine and gross-motor skills

Carole Skinner, Fran Mosley and Sheila Ebbutt work for maths specialist company BEAM, www.beam.co.uk

RESOURCE BOX

There are all kinds of things you can use to explore reflections; most are easily available and many are free. The beginnings of a collection are outlined below, and can be added to by practitioners, parents and children.

Many children will enjoy showing others reflective objects they have brought from home. Together, go on a reflection hunt to find how many surfaces you can see yourself in.

To support children's interest in reflections, have at the ready:

- a large mirror (full length if possible)

- small plastic mirrors, which can be bent to produce distorted images, from various suppliers including www.hope-education.co.uk

- reflective papers and cards from various suppliers including www.thepapermillshop.co.uk

- reflective fabrics, available from some high street haberdashers and from www.online-fabrics.co.uk

- torches

- a coloured mirror ball from www.rompa.com

- dental care mirrors from www.hope-education.co.uk

- kitchen foil

- old CDs

- metal spoons, saucepans and lids (stainless steel and polished silver reflect well)

- kaleidoscopes

- overhead projector

- foil blankets that are used after marathon races.

EXPLORING CHILDREN'S INTERESTS

Tuning in

Making time to talk to parents and carers is an important way of finding out about children's current interests and about what matters to them. Such information helps practitioners to provide a curriculum that is both relevant and meaningful.

Having an existing interest in a particular theme means that children approach it with enthusiasm and expertise, giving them confidence and increased motivation to engage in the activities provided. Children can use this expertise best in carefully planned, open-ended learning opportunities without prescribed, uniform outcomes.

Enhancing provision

Any significant interest that a child or children may have should be explored by enhancing a setting's continuous provision - that is, by adding theme-based resources to the areas of provision that are available daily to children. These should comprise:

- role play
- small-world play
- construction play
- sand and water
- malleable materials
- creative workshop area
- graphics area
- book area

By taking this approach, children can choose to engage with the theme, or pursue their own interests and learning independently. Adults need to recognise that children require a suitable length of time to explore any interests in depth and to develop their own ideas.

ADULT ROLE

If children's interests are to be used to create the best possible learning opportunities, the adult role is crucial.

Adults need to be able to:

- enhance continuous provision to reflect the interests of children.

- use enhancements to plan meaningful learning opportunities across all areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS).

- know when to intervene in children's play - and when to stand back.

- recognise that children need a suitable length of time to explore areas of provision to develop their own ideas.

- model skills, language and behaviours.

- recognise how observation, assessment and reflection on children's play can enhance adults' understanding of what young children know, and realise how these should inform their future planning.

AREAS OF LEARNING
Personal, social and emotional development
Communication, language and literacy
Problem-solving, reasoning and numeracy
Knowledge and understanding of the world
Physical development
Creative development