Small World Play


The Montague Way Helen Dowling, Montague Pre-School


“These resources enable children to act out daily routines or past events either keeping the story as it happened or changing the end to suit them.”


W


hen asked to write about small world play it was a really good opportunity for us to ask ourselves: Why do we include it in our


resources/play? Is it because it ticks a box? Is it because the children like it? Is it because it is included on the EYFS?


After much discussion, we concluded that there are many reasons why we include small world in our planning; using imagination, building language skills, independent play and problem solving to name but a few. As practitioners, we all know that these are core to the ‘Characteristics of Effective Learning’ and the EYFS.


To set the scene, we are a pack-away pre-school based in a church hall, with a large open space for the children to access. We have a small outdoor area which is free-flow. Small world is placed at the centre of our space and usually ends up overflowing into the other areas of play, which shows its versatility. We often find small play


resources in the playdoh, on the trampoline or tucked into a handbag.


We use small world outside and in the lovely weather we have had this summer, small world has been taken outdoors everyday amongst the plants and flowers that we grow for the children to play calmly in the shade so that they don’t overheat! We set out the resources in an inviting way and the children usually head to them first over anything else we have out.


We discussed two main categories of small world. There are the fantasy scenes of pirates, dinosaurs and space. Then there are the everyday situations that the children may come across or have accessed e.g. houses, train track, garages, farms, zoo animals all topped up with cars, people and animals.


These resources enable children to act out daily routines or past events either keeping the story as it happened or changing the end to suit them. For example, we used our small world farm resources


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Shop Little Learners ypo.co.uk/earlyyears


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