In our classrooms, children play to learn! The quality of the materials available for play matters. In A Mother’s Touch classrooms, one of the primary considerations at play is open-endedness.
For this reason, we love to integrate loose parts.
In early childhood settings, loose parts mean alluring, beautiful found objects and materials that children can move, manipulate, control, and change while they play (Oxfordshire Play Association, 2014). Children can create, take apart, and pretend with loose parts in almost endless ways.
Integrated into S.T.E.A.M. learning centers, loose parts:
- promote hands-on learning through tinkering, experimentation, and design;
- stimulate curiosity, imagination, engagement, and problem solving;
- support learning across all developmental domains, including physical, social-emotional and cognitive development.
Loose Parts for Tinkering, Experimentation and Design
In our Preschool, Pre-K, and Jr. Kindergarten classrooms, loose parts are available as part of our Creation Stations. Housed on low, open shelves, loose parts include recycled materials such as caps, tubes, and cardboard as well as fasteners such as tape, pipe cleaners, glue, and string. Children use loose parts to solve design challenges, such as building a chair to hold their beloved stuffy or engineering a sturdy bridge that is 2 feet tall! Having a variety of interesting materials available while children make a plan, execute, test, and revise it enriches the creative process!
Loose Parts for Curiosity, Imagination, and Engaged Play
One of our favorite places to store loose parts is in our dramatic play center. There, stones can turn into anything – currency, sushi, potatoes, or pets! On the other hand? A play piece of pizza is always a play piece of pizza.
Sticks and wood cookies in the block area become ponds, people, and launch pads for rocket ships built with unit blocks! Children think outside the box, and build on each other’s ideas with their imaginations. They are not limited by the toys. The toys do not direct the play – the children do!
Loose Parts to Stimulate Learning Across Developmental Domains
You’ll find baskets of glass gems, collected sticks, seashells, balancing stones, and dominos in our math and science centers. Loose parts such as these can be used for math concepts like patterning, sequencing, and design.
The open-endedness of loose parts really lends itself to building important executive functioning skills as well. Skills such as coming up with an idea, seeing it through, and collaborating with peers become the foundation for future learning. The fact that materials are natural and have interesting weights and textures supports attention regulation and encourages kids to engage deeply! Ever noticed how children often love the wrapping and the box more than the toy itself? That’s loose parts at play!
