Angel, M. (2021). ‘Embracing the principle of participation: how a relationship with a young musician created powerful learning opportunities for a whole community’, The Challenge, vol. 25, no. 3, Reggio Emilia Australia Information Exchange, pp. 10–15.

Robson, D. (2021). Interoception: the hidden sense that shapes wellbeing. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/aug/15/the-hidden-sense-shaping-your-wellbeing-interoception

Wilson, R. A. (2012). Nature and Young Children: Encouraging Creative Play and Learning in Natural Environments. Routledge.

From nowhere, I can hear birds. One sang, and other side bird sang back. Although I couldn’t see many birds, I could sense there were some as I listened to them. Water was still. I saw the sound of water when the bird dived in, but silent. I realised that we could see sound without hearing it. The silence also made the place alive rather than feeling of emptiness. The metal roof and raindrops from tree branches were creating rhythmical sound. I was alone but I could feel I was belonged to them. I didn’t need to ask for permission to birds or water. I was assimilated in the place. I felt free as I could choose what I focus. This was totally different experiences from watching a screen on TV. The visual image in the screen manipulates where to look, but the nature made me to focus to interact with them. This relates to how commercialised and computerised environment don’t promote creative play. Contrast to natural environment, those environments don’t provide open-ended resources which is necessary for creative play (Wilson, 2012). 

The second visit was just around sunset in cloudy dark evening. Crickets were singing loudly without showing their beautiful shapes. Compared to the first morning visit, I saw lots of birds gathering in water. More and more different birds flying down on the pond with loud talk. They looked very active, and water moved around. Surprisingly, it was not resting time for the creatures. The cold air and muddy smell made me feel like I would rather go home and rest myself in a warm place. However, having a deep breath helped me to tune myself in the place again. Then, my childhood appeared with the place. It was my past memory, but it was there with that place. It is something like a fusion of past and present. I was feeling that this was different experience from daydreaming as daydreaming separate the presence from the imagination. The parallaxis through deep listening was happening in the presence.

During creating my creative response, all the drama about going to a festival came up from the sounds from creatures and natures, the stillness of surroundings, the birds’ movement in the dark. As sounds and songs participated together, the story developed. This also applies to the festival. As people participate together, we create drama with music and develop the relationship with others. The music and song are powerful message as language of expression. The process of collaborating music is a greatest learning opportunity for children to interact and connect with people (Angel, 2021). This provokes me how we should embed singing a song more frequently as a learning resource as like a story book. Singing a song together is a fun and innovative way for young children to learn while sharing joy with others.

Furthermore, after learning about the importance of movement in the former unit of Moving with Young Children, I started to run as I realised it enhances my physical and mental well-being especially during study. Surprisingly it also enhanced my deep listening through my country visit. As my inner strength and better lung function made my deep breathing effective, I was not only able to pay attention to my auditory and visual sense but also interoception. My brain was receiving various signals from different sensory system such as auditory, visual, and olfactory from the cold air in a bush. My interoception promoted positive experiences there. I was calm and enjoyed creativity there. This supports the idea of how strength training support interoception, my brain to receive the signals from whole body (Robson, 2021). I believe that children can wonder in nature more creatively with their inner strength as their attention to nature will be influenced by interoception as well. I am confident how important to support children's creative play while promoting physical activity. I also would like to pay more attention to how interoception influence executive functioning skills in early childhood. I assume whole body conditions and sensory systems are connected to each functioning especially to a brain. 

I recorded each sound and composed it together.