Process Over Product

 

“It must not be forgotten that the basic law of children’s creativity is that it’s value lies not in it’s results, not in the product of creation, but in the process itself. It is not important what children create, but that they do create, that they exercise and implement their creative imagination.” (Vygotsky)

Children are fascinated by the world around them. They are learning through different experiences every moment of everyday. Children live in the moment and engage in what they are doing, not necessarily looking towards the end result.

Mother’s Day is just around the corner. More often than not we see children creating exactly the same cards with a perfect painted flower on the front. Yes, they are nice to look at as a parent and for you to be proud of your little ones creative skills. However, what learning outcome is a child gaining from this? Nine times out of ten the child is more excited and passionate about the process of how they come to that masterpiece of art. Creating moments and experiences for children will last them a lifetime, a perfectly painted card however, won’t! There are tons of ‘teaching moments’ in the process.

By providing them with freedom and open experiences to make, create and develop whatever, they as a unique child, wants to, their engagement and learning will thrive. As well as letting their individual personalities shine through!

At Little Owls Woodland this week we have been planting some fir trees with the children. Over the week, we took it in turns to have ago at drilling some holes into the bottom of the buckets and layered stones. Secondly, we packed in soil using what tools the children thought best to dig with. We had spades, spoons, buckets, scoops, etc. Then, we placed the fir tree into the bucket and patted it all down. A child suggested we needed to decorate the tree to make it look pretty, so we went on a hunt for some stones. We placed them around the tree and in the bucket. Throughout we discussed all about how our trees will need water and sunlight to grow, about why we needed to drill holes in the bottom of the buckets.

Once we had finished the children just wanted to plant the next one and the next one! Even though they had created some beautiful fir trees for us to admire, they just simply wanted to do the process over again. We later witnessed many children trying to recreate this process again through play. Many parents spoke about how their child had talked about nothing else and really went into detail of the steps we took.

The process of baking is what attracts a baker, the end result is a bonus.