My first experience is of Sound/music of my artefact " Boydtown Beach Country visit", I created a calming sound experience for children by using hands on materials like with water in a blue trough with sand, shells, fish, crab for them to explore.

I used a beach theme cloth as a mural to enhance and mimic the beach environment. as the children gather around, the trough gets transformed into a image of Boydtown Beach. As the children were dipping their hands in water, they could hear the soothing sound in the background tap water. This created a mimic rhythm of waves.

This helps the children to imagine themselves at Boydtown Beach as they listen to the waves. I encouraged children to feel the water and make waves.

Further more for a simple sound activity inspired by the waves, I created a "Wave drum" by providing children with drums, sound of water in the background and encouraged them to play the beat listening to the sound of water.

Rationale/ Justification

As I was walking on the beach and enjoying the sound of gentle waves crashing into the shore, it inspired me to create this sound adventure. I wanted the children to experience the connection between water, senses, sound.

In "Watershed" (Arts House, n.d.) Cass Lynch talks about environment, culture, Land, history. She is connecting and acknowledging past, present and future of the river country. Watershed makes me feel amazed by nature and thoughtful about land's history. Aboriginal cultures traditionally pay more importance on relationship between land, water and natural world. Water is also a main theme in many Aboriginal Dreaming stories symbolizing life and connection to the land.

Link to EYLF Outcome 2.4.d Children explore, infer, predict, and hypothesises in order to develop an increased understanding of the interdependence between land, people, plants and animals.

Reflection:

As I observed the children were engaged with the sensory sound based environment. They displayed wonder and curiosity. They were twirling the hands in water to make the sound of waves as instructed by the educator. They learnt about water, sand and sea creatures.

Through this experience, children can begin to understand the importance of water, sea creatures.

What went as expected:

the children were involved. I could set up the experience before hand with the support of my colleagues. The weather was favourable.

What did not go as expected:

supervision as all children wanted to explore at the same time.

what might I do different next time:

I might include more natural materials. I will collect rocks, seashells from the beach. More sound effects.

How I will use in my Future practice of Early Childhood

as a teacher to scaffold their learning by asking open ended questions like what sound does a water make. as it is an openended I will use my observation and child interests for future planning. Encourage more activities for them to differentiate different sounds.

How has my perspective changed

I learnt that by providing experiences for children to listen to various sounds can develop their sensory, language, creativity and auditory discrimination skills

Reference :

Arts House. (n.d.). Watershed

https://www.artshouse.com.au/watershed-audio-experience/

The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia.

            (2022). Belonging, Being & Becoming . Australian

            Government Department of Education for the

            Ministerial Council.

            https://www.acecqa.gov.au/sites/default/files/201

            8-02/belonging_being_and_becoming_the_early_ye

           ars_learning_framework_for_australia.pdf

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I introduced the theme of exploring the ocean through movement and yoga. I put on a video for the children to watch and mimic the movement of being a fish, turtles, waves.

Rationale/Justification:

As I was watching the movement of waves at my country visit, and imagining the sea creatures in the big wide ocean, I wanted the children in my Toddler room to have the same imaginary holistic experience with the nature.

Drawing inspiration from Aboriginal perspectives on the ocean and by incorporating indigenous dance movement children can learn about cultural heritage connected to land and sea.

In the article Creative Dance Play for Early Childhood (Dance Teaching Ideas, 2024). emphasize the idea of creativity and imagination in Early Childhood. By introducing this activity of Yoga exercise sea world dance, children are able to engage their body, mind and emotions. According to this article, by making various movements like fish, waves it is a dance for the child to closely observe nature. What children do in play through rhythm and movement help develop complex skills in later life. This Dance Play experience was a wonderful play for toddlers to share my world and to communicate through creative play.

Link to EYLF Outcome :3.2d children combine gross and fine motor movement and balance to achieve increasingly complex patterns of activity, including dance, creative movement and drama.

Reflection:

what went as expected:

children were engaged, mimicking actions. it combined physical movement with imagination.

what did not go as expected:

some young children were distracted and reluctant to join in. as it was raining outside, had to do indoors.

what would I do different next time:

provide encouragement for active participation. plan to do it outdoors in the nature.

how I might use this in my future practice

Include more Yoga, exercise and dance based activities in my program. Incorporate various cultural Aboriginal perspective on the ocean into the dance experience.

how has my perspective changed.

I have learnt the importance of dance, movement in early childhood and to allow children to actively engage in their environment and make meaningful connections. I have also learnt about how and why children move their bodies.

I

Reference:

Dance Teaching Ideas (2024). Creative Dance -Play for Early Childhood

https://danceteachingideas.com/creative-dance-movement-for-toddlers/

 The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia.

            (2022). Belonging, Being & Becoming . Australian

            Government Department of Education for the

            Ministerial Council.

            https://www.acecqa.gov.au/sites/default/files/201

            8-02/belonging_being_and_becoming_the_early_ye

           ars_learning_framework_for_australia.pdf

htt

As an extension for my country visit to Boydtown beach, I wanted the children to feel the movement of waves happening in the big ocean and to connect the children with the drama that unfolds in nature.

I introduced the children to the activity by explaining what we are doing. I provided them with cut out blue crepe paper and encouraged them to sway it up and down in a rhythmic motion as if they were waves.

I also engaged children to share about their experiences of going to a beach.

Rationale/Justification

As I was watching the video The Art of Mime (Northwestern University, 2008) I was inspired how the artists use gestures, facial expressions and body movements to tell a story without words. Similar to that I created this experience for the children to use their bodies and imagination with the use of crepe paper to create their own story about their own beach experience.

By creating the sensory experience of creating waves with blue crepe paper and exploring the technique in the video silent story telling : The art of Mime, I provided children with a imaginative, dramatic, multi sensory experience to relate to my country visit to Boydtown beach.

From Aboriginal Perspective, their culture have deep spiritual connection to ocean and natural world. They value creativity and storytelling as important aspect of cultural identity.

Link to EYLF: 4.1 children develop dispositions for learning such as curiosity, co operation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination and reflexivity.

Reflection:

what went as expected:

children had fun and used imagination, gross motor, dramatic skills, social skills. They were able to understand the basic concept of beach, waves

what did not go as expected

some children got distracted as there are children between 18months to 3 years, different levels of engagement, crepe paper was ripping so had to get another cellophane paper. the weather was an issue as it was raining outside.

what might you do different next time

use more sturdy paper or connect into large strip. use more provocation to set up the scene.

how might you use in your future practice in early childhood

encourage children to perform their own story telling to mimic their beach experinces.

roleplay different characters in ocean themed stories

use drama activities to explore emotions and feelings related to ocean.

how my perspective has changed

Now I see that drama is a powerful tool for children creativity, imagination. I understand the role an educator plays to encourage children to express themselves through verbal and non verbal language, gestures, body language.

References:

Northwestern University. (2008, December 19). Silent Storytelling : The Art of Mime [Video]. YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDN0fxGByko

The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia.

            (2022). Belonging, Being & Becoming . Australian

            Government Department of Education for the

            Ministerial Council.

            https://www.acecqa.gov.au/sites/default/files/201

            8-02/belonging_being_and_becoming_the_early_ye

           ars_learning_framework_for_australia.pdf