29 Januari 2015
Hallo semuanya... apa kabar? A LOT
of things going on for our family for the past few weeks. Let’s just say, we’re
gearing up for more play-based learning, dengan bayang-bayang homeschooling
untuk jenjang SD yang insyaaAllah semakin mendekat. But with a few big
decisions and crossroads that we’re currently facing, that’s not a reason to
stop playing (or should I say, learning?)
The latest toy that Little Bug is
playing with is a zipline (or flying fox, you might call it) that he made from
Lego. I got this idea from here
but I only gave him a short glimpse
of what the model looked like and then he had to make his own “vehicle” for the
zipline. Btw, he has been on the flying fox things a few times before, so he
can recall on his experiences on how the whole zipline thingy works.
This activity is packed with STEM (science,
technology, engineering, and math) learning points and also not short on
creativity, language arts, and just plain fun, even for Baby Bird (who is just
under 3yo right now)!
First, Little Bug had to think
about how the “vehicles” would be designed so that they would run smoothly on
the zipline. An important part of the vehicle design was about how the thread
for the zipline would be attached to the vehicle. Because I didn’t set any
limits or give any instructions on this activity, Little Bug expanded the
activity into making more than 1 vehicle for the zipline à which he then had
another problem to solve: how to switch between vehicles easily? He also made
up a story about the zipline being in an amusement park, so he made a ticket
booth and a fun ship ride to go with it.
Having a ticket booth, I asked him
about pricing the rides. So he made a sign with the prices (practicing his own
handwriting but without any corrections yet from me) , along with a made up
math-story problem about a minifig that wanted to go on the ride with only x
amount of money and y amount of change that he would get from the ticket booth.
Just like what he sees in real-life money transactions.
After all the set up on the Lego
parts, I taught him how to make a simple knot. Being in a modern-day world with
velcro and slip-on shoes, he hasn’t had a lot of practice in tying knots &
bows. It took perseverance but alhamdulillah, he finally learned how to make
his own knots.
Then we tried a few combinations of
places to tie the knots, experimenting with angles, slopes, and string tension.
I also added info about gravity and friction, and FYI, I barely passed my
physics in grade school, so we’re just talking about simple basic concepts
here.
All that aside, we just had fun
playing! Little Bug (and Baby Bird) played with this for 2 days in a row, just creating and
adjusting. It was fun to watch the Lego minifigs slide down the line (or not,
in some cases), and even some fell apart upon impact!
As a facilitator, all I did was
just provoke with “I wonder why?” type questions and I was his cheerleader for
not giving up and wanting to find out more about how things work. He needs work
in that area... I’ll be worried if everytime
he encounters a problem/something surprising happens, he won’t want to ask “why?
What caused it? How can I find out about this?” and just shrug it off, shift
his attention to something else. This sort of attitude takes a lot of time and
hands-on activities to nurture, and this is what will fuel him to keep on
pursuing his passion/interests/goals/dreams in the future. I believe that all
kids have a huge amount of curiousity within them, but it’s our job to make
sure that curiousity will keep living and driving them in the right direction. We
have to give them plenty of time to just play and learn to their heart’s
delight along with a fresh view on life around them... not weigh them down with
spoon-fed fact learning/memorization, a schedule that’s too packed, and a
boring view of life. Again, this is what I call part of the “fine art” of educating
your kids... you can only fine-tune your “dance” with your kids—your goals and theirs—so that it’s a win-win and
happy solution for everyone. Happy
playing!
