This blog is about and how 'EVENTS' play a significance on children's learning and development :). Today our centre manager brought in some new plastic buckets and tennis balls for our infant room. This caused excitiment amogst the infants because they knew it was something new. They really notice anything new that we get in the room and are always ready to investigate. I placed the buckets and balls on the floor for them to explore and sat down beside them. E was right in there grabbing the bucket to check it out. J was more interested in the balls than the buckets and A who has not quite mastered crawling yet seemed content to try and grab the tennis balls stretching out his arms to try and grab them every now and again he would let out a cry of frustration and annoyance if the tennis ball was just out of his reach and he could not get it so I would gently roll it closer towards him he would let out a scream of excitment and grab the ball and try and puts it into his mouth where he tries to bite it. Infants use their sensory system senses of vision, hearing, touch, taste, and smell to find out about their environment.
In this photo E and J were trying to grab and hold on to the tennis balls in this activity they are using their fine motorskills which are their hands to hold onto the round small ball. Because their fine motorskills are still developing E dropped the tennis ball in which it would roll away therefore E and J would crawl after them around the room. Every now and again they would put them into their mouths. In this activity they are learning cause and affect cause would be dropping the ball and affect is that because it is round it would roll away (Liddle & Yorke, 2004).
M is 2 years old and ready to transition into the toddlers room he has joined E J and A on the floor with the new buckets and tennis balls he decides to put all the balls into his bucket then tips them out again. He then hands out the tennis balls to E, J and A counting as he does this "16-32 month old babies interacting with peer in a room full of toys, frequency of coordinated acts, which demonstrated reciprocal and responsive interactions between children, steadily increased" (Talay-Ongan & Ap, 2005, p. 48). 
M has given E a bucket with balls in E finds it more interesting to tip the balls out just like M did previously "Modelling is a process through which children learn how to behave by copying (modelling) the behaviour of others" (McNaughton & Williams, 2004. p. 124).R E F E R E N C E S
Liddle,. T. Yorke,. L (2004). Why motor skills matter. New York: McGraw-Hill.
McNaughton,. G. Williams,. G. (2004). Techniques for teaching young children
choices in theory and practice. Australia: Pearson Education Australia.
