Exploring spaces: Bottles, Containers, and Boxes! Extended Learning

If you've read the PreschoolFirst newsletter article Exploring spaces: Bottles, Containers, and Boxes! Oh My! and you're looking for ways to extend the learning into the classroom--you've found the right place.

More ways to investigate and learn

Use a camera to photograph all the different investigations the children do with the containers. Post these on the wall to document what the children explored and learned.

• Play a game of blindfold and let a child choose one object or container from the shelf and hand it to a child wearing a blindfold. Ask the child wearing the blindfold to feel it, smell it, tap it, and guess what it is. Let other children give clues to help the child. Then let the others carefully guide the blindfolded child to replace it on the shelf under the child’s drawing where it belongs.
• Gather the group around the story rug and ask them to help order all the objects from largest to smallest! This may take some debate given that shapes can be ordered indifferent ways. Some may be longer, but some wider all around. How can you decide?
• Place the set of containers in an area next to the Dramatic Play area and allow children to use them freely in their self-directed creative play for several days. After each playtime is over, ask the children to help you write a list of all the ways they used the containers in their pretend, imaginative play to post on the Investigation wall.
• Place the set of containers on a table next to a sand table with spoons, scoops, measuring cups and simple balance scales. Ask the children to guess which will hold the most and which will hold the least amount of sand. Let the children explore how much sand goes into different containers for several days. Help them identify the spoon, scoop, or cup used to fill a container and count the number needed to fill their containers. Leave this open as a child-directed center for a few days.
• Set up an investigation table during a small group time, invite children to work together, and try to fit as many containers as possible inside each other. Leave this as an open center for a few days.
• Place the collection of containers in the block area and encourage children to incorporate them into buildings and structures. Leave this open as a child-directed center for a few days.
• Place various containers in the manipulative area and invite children to see which and how many counting manipulative toys fit inside. Leave this as an open center for a few days.
• Gather the group around the story rug and ask them to help match any containers that are the same shape. What about used for the same purpose? Made of the same material? Those that smell and those that do not? Encourage children to think of new ways to categorize the containers. Write the list of ways on the Investigations wall!
• Finish the explorations by letting children use masking tape and the containers to construct a group sculpture. Encourage them to collaborate and even mix paint colors to paint the sculpture. Adding white glue to the tempera paint will allow it to stick to plastic surfaces. Display the sculpture in the common area of the center and invite other families to visit your room to see the Investigations wall.