Inspiring creativity in young children in the dance club Hotch-Potch Jihlava

 Inspiring creativity in young children in the dance club Hotch-Potch Jihlava

A Sometimes, as I showed my 3-year-old children in the dance club Hotch-Potch in Jihlava some new materials to work and dance with, they would ask me: “What does it do? What are we going to do with it?"” These questions make me think about what parents give their children to play with. Very often, these are toys and manipulatives that are designed to “do” something interesting. However, they do not push the child to do too much. My favourite choice for manipulatives I use in preparatory dance lessons have always been materials that are called “open-ended”. These are things that require children to think and adjust for themselves.

B For example, I once read a fairy tale of a “Little naughty breeze” with my class. This story is especially suited for younger children, preschool children and children in primary school. I used storytelling, children were engaged in their fantasy, curiosity and taste to try what the animals do in the story. I could have presented the yoga positions to the children, but I let them think them up themselves. After the movement part, we added visual artwork. Painting animals from positions might be a good idea or colouring in animals from printables. But I offered the children ribbons, strings, and little balls to create the fairy tale on the floor as they imagined. We involved most of our senses, and boosted our creativity. The children created amazing work of art and were proud of their creation. They cooperated and remembered the activity also after the lesson.

C My aim here was to use open-ended materials which did not ‘do’ anything, but they could be used in an originative way to inspire the child to create something. In this way, the children really immersed into a nice piece of children’s literature through movement and visual arts. They also discovered basics of choreography as they were encouraged to create a piece of dance art on their own.

D What can teachers and parents learn from this educational approach? We should think about toys we buy carefully and develop projects that allow children to be more creative, although it could be a bit of a dirty effort. And we should also try to reuse the things that are already in our surroundings as a means to support our creativity.

E And sometimes, the best manipulatives are not in the classroom or in the house. They are outdoors, provided by nature. I believe my own creativity was originally boosted and inspired by my ability to see products in clusters of wood, stones and rubbish. The ability to be creative can be the most important quality of our child. So next time, we are in a toy shop, we must ask ourselves: “What will motivate my child to ‘do’?”

Adjusted to (1)

1) Read the article and match each of the headings to a paragraph.

1 Buying toys should be more inventive

2 Creative activities and open-ended materials

3 Nature and creativity

4 A lot of toys aren’t creative enough

5 Wind story and activities

 

2) Read the article and answer the questions.

1 What is the majority of toys in toyshops like?

2 Who is the story teller?

3 How was the lesson improved?

4 What should parents think about more?

5 Where can they find inspiration for creative activities?

 

3) Explain the following words and phrases.

1 manipulatives

2 printables

3 to boost creativity

4 open-ended materials

5 to reuse things

Source:

(1)

PALACIOS, Rebecca. Inspiring Creativity in Young Children. ABCmouse [online]. 2012 [cit. 2019-01-29]. Available at: https://www.abcmouse.com/results-and-references-articles/sarticles.inc?num=7