As parents and carers, we want our children to become confident and independent so that they can achieve to their full potential. But how do we encourage the development of these skills?
In this blog today, I am going to break down each age group that we work with here at Pop Up Play Village and provide examples of ways in which Pop Up Play Village classes can support with the development of these skills.
0-12 months old:
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Our whole village is suitable for babies so there are no boundaries in the exploration that they can do. If your baby is moving, they can move around our play areas developing the confidence to explore new resources and new situations. Already from this young age, babies can independently choose how they explore the toys in our village.
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By exploring new resources and environments away from home, babies are developing the confidence to try out new experiences and develop their learning about the world around them.
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Our village is a very sociable place so by bringing your baby to play, they are learning about how to interact with others and developing their understanding of vocabulary. These are two key building blocks for developing confident and independent learners.
1-2 years old
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Children in this age group are keen to explore the world around them whether that be through sitting and observing, crawling or walking. Our open plan design enables children of this age to go and explore our village whilst their grown ups can see them at all times. They don’t need to be restricted to any boundaries due to making sure that they are safe. Our village provides a safe place for the little ones to explore as much as they would like to. This develops their confidence and independence skills as they can be in the driving seat to their learning. Often at this age as parents, we are looking for the dangers wherever we go and protecting our little ones from any harm. When we are in an environment where we can relax a little and know that they are safe, it is a wonderful feeling.
2-3 years old
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Children in this age group are learning how to socialise with others through sharing and turn taking and developing their speech and language to communicate their thoughts and feelings. In a play based environment, it is a comfortable place to practise these skills developing their confidence and independence to play with or alongside others.
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Children are using our play areas to take on a role or character acting out roles and experiences which in turn is developing their understanding of how the world around them works. This builds the confidence to want to explore the world further.
3-4 years old
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Playing with others through taking turns to talk, taking others’ ideas into account during play and solving conflicts are very big learning skills in this age group. Through play, children can practise and develop these skills and develop confidence to play with others.
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Our dressing up rail is a great place to practise the all important skill of dressing and undressing themselves, a great way to develop independence and in turn develop confidence in this skill too.
5-7 years old
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In this age group, children are learning to read and write. Through play based experiences, they can use the skills they have learnt to strengthen their knowledge. In our village, we have reading and writing opportunities throughout making it a perfect place to practise and develop confidence in these skills.
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Just like with reading and writing, our village has so many opportunities to develop mathematical skills and solve problems which builds on children’s confidence in using these skills and independence to work out solutions by themselves. The children will be having fun playing whilst strengthening these skills.
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Children will be developing the confidence to play with others as a team working together to build up their play experience. They are in the driving seat giving them the opportunity to be independent learners.
