To act as a focus for collecting writing from the children, I put up sheets of paper on the fences around the garden and a couple of the ‘rides’ at the playground. By the end of the day these were all filled with text and drawings.
Some children drew, and from that we worked out an action that others could follow, other children wrote an action then made a drawing to go with that.
Children who are not verbal, and who do not use either a signing or picture system to communicate, were included by asking the play worker who knew the child best to tell me an action or game that the child liked, and that was used as the basis for an instruction.
For the young man particularly fond of playing with a piece of rope, his instruction was ~ Swing On A Rope.
One of the play workers suggested that I could include some of the PECS communication signs that are used at the playground on the hoarding, and another play worker suggested writing some of the text in Yoruba and Potuguese as children at the playground also speak these languages. This got me thinking about including some of the childrens’ drawings on the hoarding, something I hadn’t considered before.
The paper gradually filled up during the day, and the sheets of blank paper inspired several children to write stories.
One was about an egg that got woken up by an erupting volcano and was swallowed by a monster but lay safe and warm in the mouth of the monster, where it fell asleep.
I now have ideas from the children for actions / instructions to write up on the hoarding.
A few here:
Do hopscotch and skipping and smile as you do it ~ Crystal
Take it easy, don’t be grumpy at work, take the time to listen, walk in a funky way ~ Kieran
Move like a ninja ~ Bob
Pop your collar up ~ Jordan
Give someone a flower ~ Zeena
