A New Game

We are always looking for good examples to help our students understand a constructivist view of cognitive development. This one is classic demonstration of how prior experiences are processed, assimilated, and adapted to create a new construct – in this case understanding what a game is and how rules apply to playing one.

One of the Sunflower’s (3 year olds) current finger play/game favorites during the transition from group meeting to lunch is “One Little Leaf.”

One Little Leaf

One little leaf, two little leaves,

Three little leaves today.

Four little leaves, five little leaves,

Blow them all away.  Whew!

Five children at a time are chosen; each child is given a leaf with a numeral 1-5 on it and holds up his/her number when it is said.  At the end, the children blow their leaves, then go wash their hands for lunch.  This continues until all children have had a turn.

Katharine announced at large group time that she had brought something to share and had made up a new  game for us to play, “but only four people can play.”  When asked to describe the game, she said, “You get one of the leaves then you gotta do what I say.  You shake it and then blow.”  We let Katharine go and get her leaves, which was a branch containing four leaves (so she clearly understands the one-to-one correspondence connection that determines how many can play).  She called four children at a time to stand up, then handed each child a leaf.  Then she said, “now shake it and blow!”  The children happily followed her directions, then Katharine told them, “Now go wash your hands!”