For the past few weeks I have observed Lily C and Sophia return to the animals bucket everyday. Everyday they tip out the bucket and sort the animals and then play. Last week Lily was getting all of the water animals into a group and this gave me an idea to change out sensory trough into a water aquarium. This could support Lily and Sophia in their categorizing and strengthen their play by giving them a change of scenery.
Today we began to set up our aquarium and to my surprise Lily and Sophia were not interested but a few other children were very excited to set it up for out class.
The children went for a walk with Mrs V to collect any taonga that they thought would be suitable for our aquarium and then we filled it with water.
We added some sand to one end because we had some animals that like water but not deep sea water. Ava said "the ducks like to sit on the side of the water"
It was all a bit exciting having this new sensory activity in the playzone. Listen to the excitement in the children's voice in this video.
After the groups of loud, laughing, excited children had passed I looked up and Lily had made her way to the mini aquarium.
She played delicately, placing each animal in the area of the aquarium that best resembled their true habitat.
It was amazing sitting and listening to Lily's knowledge and love for animals. She told me about a pet duck that she used to have that passed away and this activity reminder her of her duck.
Mrs V now knows where all of the good rocks are in the school thanks to my little group who showed me on Tuesday :)
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