Adult learner puts studies into practice during lockdown

Adult learner Naomi Charlton is using the knowledge she has learned at Northumberland College on the Early Years Educator programme to create activities for her children during the COVID-19 lockdown.

Following the government’s announcement to suspend face to face learning at colleges and schools, Naomi has been home-schooling her two young sons while also trying to continue her studies. However, she has found it easy to combine the two.

Linking fun and engaging activities to the Early Years Foundation Stage taught on the college’s early years educator diploma, Naomi is developing their numeracy, literacy and creativity while practising her own planning skills.

Naomi said: “I have always done activities with my own children at home but since starting the course and attending my placement I have a greater understanding of the benefits of doing them.

“I have learned that allowing children to participate in a variety of activities has much more of an impact on their learning and development than just sitting them down with a pen and paper. It allows the children to have fun and get creative which relates to their expressive skills whilst also prompting mathematics and extends their vocabulary by describing how things feel or smell.

“My children aged have both loved each activity and I will continue to do different ones to help with their home-schooling.”

Below Naomi shares some of the activities her children have been enjoying over the past weeks:

• Salt dough keepsake

“The children measured out how many cups of water, salt and flour they needed which used their mathematical skills. They then used spoons to mix it all up and a rolling pin to create the shape which supported their gross motor skills.

Once the dough had been formed, we all placed our hands in the mixture to make a print, we cooked it until it became hard. The children then got creative and chose what colour hands they wanted and painted our creation with some assistance.”

• Ice block car rescue

“This activity helped my children develop their creative skills by finding different ways to use the tools provided to break the ice. This sensory play activity gave the boys an opportunity to describe how the ice felt, how cold it was and how hard it was to break their cars free.

“This task kept them engaged until they had managed to break all of their cars free; they then continued free flow play with the melted ice and their cars for quite some time afterwards.”

• Under the sea

“For this sensory-led activity we made jelly and put some toys in that we might find under the sea. We also read the story relating to the activity which prompted literacy skills and an opportunity to express their thoughts and ask questions relating to the book/sea.

“The boys explored different textures and then took the opportunity to eat the tasty jelly! Followed by my youngest putting his feet in the mixture and explaining how cold and slippery it felt.”