Placement - Creating Environments Part 2

Hey all,

So during my second week of placement, I had to make an environmental change with the outdoor environment. The centre had a beautiful blue water trough but following a child getting comfortable inside the trough, a large crack appeared. This meant that for the last 12 weeks, it had only been filled with a small layer of sand and some sifts.

I saw this area as an opportunity to make a positive and supportive change and got to work o  how a could switch it up. During one of my tea breaks, I came across a book in the staff room a out creating play environments and after a quick flick through, I found a recipe for making coloured rice.

Coloured Rice

White rice (amount depending on the activity/environment you are planning)

Food coloring

Water

Large flat tray

Lay the rice flat on your tray. Mix the water, just enough to wet the rice, and your food colouring. The darker the colour you want the rice to be, the more food colouring you should be adding. Mix the rice and the water, moving it around so that all the grains are coated. Lay in a warm dry area to dry. If using separate colours, they can be mixed at this point in the process Once completely dry, the rice can be stored indefinitely.  

I chose the blue so that I could create and under the sea theme following an underwater puppet show that the children experienced. After the rice was dried and mixed, I brought it to the centre and placed it into the trough. I added some small blue cups for pouring, some shells to further the experience and some bath toys.

The end result looked spectacular and the children could not be pulled away!

The rice provided a new use for the trough and really lit up this area of the garden. To actually look at the rice and see it run through their fingers was a different experience for the children and the smell of the Basmati rice added to this.

I would definitely replicate this in the future and already have some ideas on how to do so. However, while the children enjoyed it, the cleaning up is not as easy as sand. Older children would understand that the rice needs to stay in the trough, a concept that was lost on the 0-2 age group. But this did not stop them from enjoying themselves.

The educators really loved this and since the weather in Melbourne is so often hot and dry, preparing this material is terribly easy for the staff. I would definitely recommend trying this in your educational environment!

Miss Tracy xx