November 

• 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. Post and update to your research study and also answer the following questions:

                 2. What does playful learning look and feel like in your classroom?

                 3. To produce the conditions for playful learning, what is one thing that you tried (and tried again)? How did it go? What did you learn? 

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I try to incorporate play into many parts of my day for the students. Obviously the biggest obstacle is time. Every day during Morning Meeting I make sure that our activity is some sort of game for us to play. This is such a safe space/time for kids to show sides of themselves that they may not always feel comfortable sharing in class. Since beginning Responsive Classroom in my room 2 years ago, I have learned how to incorporate play in a much more meaningful way so that it meets the kids' emotional/behavioral needs as well as their academic needs. I don't want it to be playing as a "break" from our learning, rather incorporated into many aspects of learning throughout the day.

One thing I am always trying to do is give students a choice in the kind of assignment they do (academic choice). This includes choice of what and how they learn as well as how they present their knowledge to the class. I decided to make this choice play based and I tried using STUDIOS for the first time. I chose to try and assess the students' understanding of the content in an SS Unit we are working on. They had just learned about the colonies of Jamestown and Plymouth and one one colony was much more successful than the others. The purpose the assessment was really the way the chose to explain their project. I gave them exactly 60 minutes and said that at the end of that time whatever they had completed was what they would present to their peers. The results were incredible. Every child felt included and an incredible sense of belonging and ownership of their own work. In order to make this play based we provided a choice board of playful activities that the children could explore. 

Choice Board

Although this play was academic in nature, the activity was experienced as playful as all students. All students were interested and invested. The best part were the conversations and watching what the students created. Most definitely had an idea of what they were creating before they began and knew exactly what they wanted it to look like, clearly not used to the idea of play as part of their learning. The best part of it was that they were talking with each other the entire time. Some talked about what they were doing and some just talked and got to know each other since they were not all (although most were) sitting with their closest friends. Moving forward it will be interesting to see how they make their choices about what to do as well as who they will sit near. I am really excited about trying this with more emphasis on the play and less on the academics.

Hey Amber, I LOVE the STUDIOS. I might also try it for science and maybe reading partners too. Kids love making stuff, but we just don't have time for something totally open ended. I think it's actually more meaningful to them when it is connected to their learning. 

I just wrote on Syd's page that I am going to use some ideas from P of P in my morning shares too- I'm going to add a share that starts- "What if..."  Also- "What comes to mind when you read the word... "