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Wednesday 20 September 2017

Philosophical photos 2.

To continue the posts of photos that can stimulate thinking, reflection and dialogue with young children. I am back at Fotografiska (The Photography Museum) here in Stockholm as there are two new exhibitions to check out   Paul Hansen's "Being there" - series of photographs from his work as a journalist (I got quite emotional in this exhibit as there are a whole load of war-torn images) and found I could not look at the whole exhibit in detail as it was a bit overwhelming for me (and plenty of images that are totally unsuitable for young children to explore, but for older children and young people there are some excellent images that should and need to be reflected upon)
There is also an exhibit called "Last night in Sweden" a response to Trumps statement "last night in Sweden where Trump implied there was a terror attack/unrest in the country - instead this series of photos (and a book) show what happened on that evening around the country... lots of non-front page news... just life!

So here are three photos I have chosen from these two exhibits...

Paul Hansen.
Questions
where do you think they are going?
why do you think they are all on the bike?
How many people can ride on one bike at the same time?
How many people should ride a bike together?
What do you think is in the container?
What do you think they will do with the contents?
activities
if you have bikes/trikes, how many can ride at the same time, how easy is this?
take paper outside and paints - use bikes to paint on the paper
go out and look at transport, how do most people get about
find films of people doing tricks on bikes, think that bikes are used in many ways
get the children to design a bike that would make it easy for many to ride at the same time
listen to the sound bikes make on different surfaces.

Jonas Lindkvist (Jönköping)
Questions
are mermaids real?
what is happening in the pool here?
Are the mermaids captured?
is it OK to catch mermaids? or anything?
why would someone want to put mermaids in pool?
is this a mermaid prison?
Why do you think people want to dress up as mermaids?
Do adults like to play? Why?
Are adults allowed to play? Why? When?
if you were to be a mythical/magical creature, what would you be? Why?
Activities
read books about mermaids
try moving on the ground like a mermaid, maybe even try to negotiate an obstacle course as a mermaid (with legs together)
draw magical creature, let the children explain to you their powers
can these creature be connected and create a story as a whole group?
Use figures and small world scene to create spaces for imagination play
dress up clothes, scarfs etc can also offer the chance for story telling

Izabelle Nordfjell (Arjeplog)
Questions
is this a pet or a wild animal? How do you know?
Is it OK for wild animals to be inside?
Why do you think the reindeer is inside?
If you could choose any animal to be your pet what would you choose? Why?
Are there any animals that you should not have as a pet? Why?
Activities
Draw your favourite animal (the children can always explore lots of images of photos of a variety of animals to widen their knowledge of what animals they have a choice of) Let the children tell you why it is their favourite, or if it is their favourite today, or if it was hard to choose as they like many animals etc
go looking for animals in nature... think about how it would be for these animals inside at the preschool, would they like it there?
look for animals tracks outside. Use animals figures inside to make tracks in clay or with paint.
let the children bring a stuffed animal to school and create your own safari experience. You could make interesting fact signs for the animals like you would find at a zoo... get the children to group the animals... do they sort them by colour, or by size, or by the climate they live in... you could sort by all methods bringing maths and also natural sciences into the play.
read the book "Dear Zoo" by Rod Campbell - can the children make their own lift the flap book together using inspiration from their own favourite animals or photos of their stuffed animal? The children can take their own photo of their toy.


When it comes to the questions the idea is that you do not have to use ALL the questions. They are just suggestions to get you going... especially with the  mermaids, the questions I have shared have several threads of thinking... you really don't know what direction the children might take the dialogue, and it can be good to have a few extra questions up your sleeve just in case it takes an unexpected direction...

Hope that gives you some food for thought...

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