Every early childhood centre has a sandpit. Children just love sand. It’s easy for them to manipulate and they enjoy exploring it in so many ways.
BestStart is for families who want more from early-childhood education. Safe, nurturing and educationally focused, we’re committed to growing caring people with curious minds. Together we teach, learn and nurture.Our vision is to work in partnership with families, whanau and communities to enable children to achieve their learning potential.
Patting, moulding, pushing, mixing, sprinkling and digging it - they can make cakes, build castles, create rivers, excavate land, easily moving it from one place to another. Through purposeful setups and observations about how children respond and want to play with the sand, adults can provide many learning opportunities.
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Patting, moulding, pushing, mixing, sprinkling and digging - children make cakes, build castles, create rivers, excavate land, easily moving it from one place to another. Through purposeful setups and observations about how children respond and want to play with the sand, adults can provide many learning opportunities.
Moving their bodies in the sand, digging holes and shifting sand from one place to another is great for muscle development.
The fine, controlled movements children use when sprinkling sand or carefully shaping their creations are the very same motor skills they will continue to develop to gain control of and easily hold a pencil.
Through imaginary play such as cooking and earthworks, children consolidate their thinking about what they have seen in their community.
The aesthetics of making patterns in the sand and the repetition of patterns are the beginnings of algebra – a maths and visual art experience combined!
Through mixing water and sand children figure out the best proportion of each to create the texture for what they want to make - sticky pies or sandcastles? That’s science problem solving in action.
Creating a volcano in the sandpit or creating other landscapes like a river or a tunnel helps children learn about science concepts like geology and the environment – what happens when the river is blocked? Teachers may extend on this by talking about pollution in our rivers and why it’s important to keep the waterways clear of rubbish.
Introducing a large set of scales helps children learn about weight as they experiment with wet and dry sand.
Working together with others in the sandspit on a shared project develops interactive social skills which are very important. How do I communicate my idea? How do I accept there are many ideas? How can I be part of the cooperation to make something big in the sandpit?
Sand Play | Onepū
Continuing the learning at home
Digging equipment like spades, scoops, and sticks are perfect tools for the sandpit.
A range of containers of different shapes and sizes are great vessels to be filled and emptied and to transport sand from one place to the other.
Natural resources such as shells, stones and wood of different sizes are great ways to recreate the beach at home. They provide lots of opportunities for creating patterns and form.
Sieves and tubing of different lengths and types are fun ways to move sand around.
A range of cars and trucks help bring to life construction scenes.
A water source and sheets of plastic is an exciting way to build rivers, dams, and lakes.
