Summer fun (... & learning)

By Jena Ivamy

The early Summer months during the new year are a fabulous time to enjoy the outdoors, comforted by a warm breeze and bright sunny skies. Water, sand, and elements of active play are wonderful accompaniments to these hot days and are super easy to organise.

Water Play

Wherever you use water, – in the bath, a tuff tray, containers on the lawn, paddling pool, beach, river - incorporating some resources (containers, jugs, blocks of ice, scoops, bubbles, dolls, animal figurines, spinning wheels) into the environment can add a tonne of fun, as well as further learning.

• Water play is a sensory, creative, social experience that often feels therapeutic, allowing for exploration of new learning concepts.

• It builds strength, balance, and coordination as we splash, fill objects, pour and lift, adding resilience to our play.

• When exploring alongside others, water play promotes sharing, interacting, and turn taking, engaging our social and communication skills.

• During water play, we experiment with cause-and-effect processes, learning about volume, measurement, capacity, and movement.

• Water play encourages use of our imaginations – we engage our creative skills to construct our play, adding our own choice of objects to the water and deciding how we engage with these.

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Sand Play

Access to sand (be it at the beach or river, at home or a friend’s sandpit) with both new and familiar resources is likely to be a hit with little ones. Favourite resources often include water, other liquids (food colouring, bubble mixture, dishwashing liquid) to create exciting potions(!), toy vehicles, buckets, containers, scooping tools, sticks, shells, leaves – whatever treasures you can find in your environment.

Feature

language skills to socialise, play, and create.

• Sand, as an open-ended resource, allows us freedom to use our imaginations to create our own play; through this we often feel a sense of self confidence, and pride in what we’ve created.

• We engage our senses as we explore the beauty in the natural elements of our environment.

• Playing with sand is a fantastic introduction to mathematical concepts (size, volume, space).

• As we experiment with building, digging, and creating, we naturally use strategies such as trial-anderror, engage with cause-and-effect processes, and utilise our problemsolving skills.

• Being in an open space, such as a sandpit, offers great social experiences where extension of learning takes place when communicating with others, working cooperatively, and using

Active Play

Being active allows for oodles of learning and skill extension. Many every-day activities support this - meeting up for playdates with friends, attending playgym and playgroup sessions, exploring in new and challenging environments (beaches, parks, playgrounds, friend’s yards, bike tracks, on trampolines, bush walks, swimming pools etc), as well as playing in familiar spaces (home or care settings).

• Active play encourages physical movement - essential for the health of our heart, mind, and body.

• It allows us to further develop our gross motor, balance, and coordination skills.

• It encourages social play, communication skills, builds our confidence and self-esteem.

• Through being active, we gain control of our bodies and awareness of our abilities.

• Active play is a positive outlet in which we can disperse energy and allows us to release emotions, including anger and frustration, in a safe and healthy way.

• Active play is generally enjoyable! Through this play, we experience a boost of endorphins.

• Active play enhances our overall fitness, health, happiness, and wellbeing.