Family Roles

Since we have been talking a lot about families and our families, the kids have stayed interested in playing with babies and taking care of them. When the babies were first introduced into our classroom the kids loved being able to swaddle them, rock them, and pretend to feed them, but that's where the play ended. In the last week, the kids have started assigning roles to both the babies and themselves. 

The families they create are often consisting of a mom, dad, a baby or two, and a brother or sister. It's been interesting to see how they continue to assign typical roles to one another, especially when there are all kinds of different kinds of families. 

Last week, one child stated that their pretend family was "full" and therefore nobody else could play. It had me thinking a lot about why that child may have only allowed a mom, dad, and child. Then it clicked, her family is only made up of three people and therefore those were the roles she was comfortable assigning to her friends. Are they the only roles? Of course not! 

After a short conversation about who else could be in a family, the kids were open to adding other friends into their play. Soon after, they began adding grandmas, grandpas, babies, sisters, and brothers. 

We are lucky to have all kinds of families in the Pine room and talk about them on a day to day basis. Our bulletin board within the room is beginning to come together and fill up with all of the family pictures the kids are creating. We love all of our families! Take a peek and see this week!