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In the classroom, every inch of space is important..and every moment a teachable moment. The dread of every teacher is dead time..that lag in events or activities. Such laps in creative, productive energy give way to chaos and madness. To prevent laps and lags in time, especially if you end up with some 'extra' time on you hands..I keep a few tricks in my bag.
Be it plain wooden blocks, a tub of sand, or a box of packing peanuts, manipulatives are handy items to keep little hands busy. Kids are amazingly intuitive and need no real instruction in this activity center. Setting out the items, children quickly begin to stack, poor, touch and tumble with vigor and imagination.
Over the years many forms of hands on manipulatives have traveled in my box: tantagrams, popcorn kernels/rice with cups and funnels, blocks, Legos, foam shapes, sand, packing peanuts with small toys tucked down in them, even play dough.
Despite the commercial notion that kids need the latest and greatest marketed play thing, raw materials draw out the inner workings of a child's mind opening the door to invention and imagination. Give them the box and the foam that came it..step back..and see what their amazing little minds conjure up.
