Ask just one of these questions to see what impact it has on children’s learning.The History of Scaffolding Reaching for the Sky The beauty of questions is that they can encourage and provoke children’s thinking and take their capabilities to the next level! Genuine curiosity and scaffolding allows the teacher to assist in deliberate and co-created discovery. This can also be a tool to help the child revisit their learning process and the ability to return to this topic with or without the teacher! You can help to suggest a friend or family member.Įncourage drawing, documentation, writing, or photographing of the play to make the learning visible. Who would you like to share this with?Įncourage social interaction and peer learning. What is different in your thinking now? What do you now know about _.Ī prompt that moves children into mastery solidifies their learning.ĩ. The purpose of the prop is to open the conversation up for the child to make interpretations and connections.Ĩ. This is a helpful question for the teacher to introduce a prop or a demonstration to extend the play. For example, if the child says “shopping” you can add in additional elements to the “shopping” that might not be in their regular experience.ħ. Once you know what the child relates to, you can add in other relevant pieces to their play. Pause while a child gives you an example. For example in the photo above, the teacher may ask, "When you added the top block, what did you notice?" The boy might comment on the number of blocks stacked or how he feels about his creation or what sort of vision he might have for his next move. When you do _, what are you noticing? That means you are learning about _.ĭirectly communicate what is taking place by pointing out the learning that you see. Additionally, this question can help to maintain the child’s interest on the task where they are having success.ĥ. Helping the child to notice where they are having successes and challenges in their play will allow the teacher to help chunk up anything complex into manageable pieces. This is the type of question that could lead to a shared brainstorm. Take the topic or interest area and help the child to expand on what they are learning. What do you need in order to learn more about _? This takes the child from where they are, “the known” area, into the potential of a new place or layer of the learning.ģ. This question takes the child into full discovery mode and allows the teacher to be co-player by staying open to possibilities.
Listen for the places that you, as the teacher, can take the child’s existing or prior knowledge and add some new layers to it. To provoke additional layers of learning, ask some of these powerful “scaffolding” inspired questions: During play, where foundational social and emotional skills are developed, scaffolding is a bridge to new skill levels using three key ingredients modeling the skill, giving clues and asking questions while the child is trying out a new skill, and then as the child approaches mastery, withdrawing the support. Scaffolding enables a child to solve a problem, carry out a task or achieve a goal which is just beyond his or her abilities. It is a framework to describe an adults’ supportive role in children’s learning. Scaffolding has become a key concept in education. This is where scaffolding enters the picture. When you feel the nudge that your intervention can take their play to higher levels of learning, it is a prime opportunity to enter the play as a co-creator and help provoke a framework for the children to go from “what they know” to “what else they could know”! Whatever the activity is, whether preschool or elementary aged, what you are looking for as the educator is what the children are captivated by and where they are CAPABLE of going further with their play! It is these moments of play that hold endless possibilities for learning. Or perhaps, they continuously use their outdoor time in the nearby forest area to build stick and stone infused forts. They are happily building with blocks and creating an intricate roadway that has captured their interest most of the week. The children in your class are content and engaged in their play.