Preschoolers 18 videos
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Grandma's Elevator
Andrew and Edward have different orientations to block play. Edward wants to arrange the blocks as props to support his story. Andrew wants to make spatial motifs, a triangle on every cylinder. Yet the two boys find a way to play together fluidly. This fluidity is facilitated by the symbolic…
Subjects: blocks
Ages: threes
Tags: pretense co-construction symbolization child-child closed captions
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Planning to Paint, then Draw
Four girls find a flat sandstone and decide to decorate it with paint. We see their project unfold over three days, with the teacher encouraging the children to plan what they will paint and how to divide the work among the four girls. The girls offer a list of elements:…
Subjects: paint
Ages: fives
Tags: collaboration planning drawing children-teacher closed captions
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A String Too Short
What makes a child persist in his attempts to make something work? Are repeated attempts at the same strategy a mark of high-level thinking or indicative of the absence of creative problem solving? If a strategy does not work, does the child become frustrated or change the goal? Let’s look…
Subjects: glue
Ages: fives
Tags: problem solving collaboration children-teacher closed captions
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Measuring to Size
Measurement is challenging work. It requires children to have knowledge of mathematical concepts, spatial relationships, and measurement tools, and to then coordinate those understandings in order to carry out the physical measurement. This video clip shows three five-year old girls, Grace, Maya, and Peyton, working to measure a curtain from…
Subjects: paper
Ages: fives
Tags: problem solving math children-teacher spatial relations closed captions
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The Meaning and Function of Writing
As Chaislyn writes the names of her teachers and peers, we discover how a young child’s writing reveals her understanding of text conventions and what she believes is the function and purpose of writing. Observe the symbols she invents to represent writing and notice what sounds Chaislyn associates with her…
Subjects: markers
Ages: fives
Tags: child-object literacy spelling special education writing closed captions
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Symmetrical Structures
Ria is able to build her symmetrical block structure starting either on the right side or on the left side. This flexibility suggests that Ria has a general understanding of symmetry. When her teacher asks about the importance of having both sides the same (symmetrical), she says, “It has to…
Subjects: blocks
Ages: fives
Tags: child-teacher spatial relations symmetry equivalence
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A Hole Problem Solved
Block building encourages children to think about potential solutions to interesting and varied problems. In this video, Ria builds a ‘spaghetti-maker’. The vertical dowels that inspired her idea prevent her from inserting a horizontal dowel between the same pair of cubes. She first removes the vertical dowel from the hole…
Subjects: blocks
Ages: fives
Tags: child-teacher spatial relations closed captions invention obstacles
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Invisible Rats - Reality in Fantasy
This is a video of a group of three children in a 4-year-old classroom. The teacher discovers two boys hiding under a futon and begins filming. Soon a girl joins the group and asks the boys what they are doing. They declare that they are “Invisible Rats” and thus begin…
Subjects: story
Ages: fours
Tags: children-teacher pretense communication rules shadow closed captions
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Transforming Colors in Water
The boy in this video touches his brush in the red pigment, then the blue and notices how the water darkens. After touching his brush into blue again, he paints, perhaps expecting the color to be blue. But as you can see in the video, the red on his brush…
Subjects: paint
Ages: fours
Tags: water colors paint child-object closed captions
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The Hidden Value of Routine Activities
In this video clip, we observe five children working individually to make similar figures out of clay. This experience is repeated a thousand times a day in preschools across the country. However, many college methods courses in ECE cite such activities as less than optimal practice. These courses make rather…
Subjects: clay
Ages: fours
Tags: children-teacher symbolization closed captions
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Construction Site Dilemma
Eight boys and their teacher problem solve about how to learn what some construction workers are building without crossing the parking lot at school. The teacher says, “So we’re gonna try and figure out what they might be doing over there.” This activity encourages the children to make inferences about…
Subjects: body
Ages: fours
Tags: children-teacher communication perspective mind of other outdoor play closed captions
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Counting to Determine Quantity
Three children work with their teacher to assign prices to cartons of eggs from the pretend store in their classroom. The children begin by thinking about how they can use the size of the cartons to calculate prices. Then they open the egg cartons and discover the holes inside. The…
Subjects: containers
Ages: fours
Tags: teaching children-teacher counting cardinal-ordinal quantity closed captions
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Children Drawing
Three children draw flowers and people. One child adds a ‘part’ in the drawn head so it will not look like a helmet. Another child represents the density of grass by adding spikes to a continuous wave. A third child represents the diversity of flowers by changing colors and size….
Subjects: markers
Ages: fours
Tags: child-teacher drawing thinkprint closed captions
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The Language of Blocks Part II - Symmetry
Beginning in the first year of life when children bang identically shaped blocks together at the mid line, symmetry evolves into finished structures of increasing complexity. Placing two same-shaped blocks side-by-side as a finished product captures the mid-air action of banging them together. As the child reflects on the symmetry…
Subjects: blocks
Ages: threes
Tags: spatial relations language representation logic mathematics
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Transforming Colors on Paper
“I made brown, Grace” a three year old girl exclaims excitedly to her teacher. Grace asks, “What colors did you mix to make brown?” The girl answers, “Red, and blue, and black” pointing to remnants of these colors on her easel paper. Most likely the girl was not thinking about…
Subjects: paint
Ages: threes
Tags: mixing colors paper children-teacher paint closed captions
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Tapping Together
Fours boys create a way to experience the joy of doing something together by inventing an activity in which they can participate simultaneously. To do so, they gather drumsticks and use sections of tree trunk to symbolize drums. Notice that near the beginning of the video one boy says, “Let’s…
Subjects: drums
Ages: fours
Tags: children-object communication collaboration
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Tea Party
Three children enjoy a tea party with George, a visiting teacher. One child seeks to clarify the roles in their pretend script. Hanna says to William, “Hey, who are you now? ….(since) You’re not cooking these food, ….what are you?” William answers, “I’m the cooker!” Hanna makes her own expectations…
Subjects: containers
Ages: threes
Tags: children-teacher pretense empty-full leadership closed captions teaching
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Tree Trunks: Balance and Power
Four children and a teacher are working to build a tower using large sections of tree trunk. As the children arrange the wood to create a platform for their structure they encounter a problem. The base of the platform is not stable. Rather than wait for the children to discover…
Subjects: blocks
Ages: fives
Tags: children-teacher spatial-relations negotiation teaching outdoor play closed captions