Reflections

Emilie Holroyd
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REFLECTION
Over the last couple of months I have had the privilege of experiencing the process of
preparation and presentation of activities for Out of the Box Festival (OOTB), which is an
early years targeted festival that hopes to engage children in culturally based art
experiences. With my cohort I have been a part of the planning of a set of four art
experiences which were developed around traditional Indian cultural practices. Using fabrics
in particular we made plans for the following activities: bangles, torans, magic carpet and
block stamping. Within each of these activities the children were talked to about the
traditional Indian heritage of the piece, and given images of them as stimulus.
The primary focus of these activities was the ways in which the children were engaged, and
the pedagogical practices that influenced our cohorts delivery. The different ways in which
children learn, and experience art based play were taken into account. This is supported by
Gardners Multiple Intelligences Theory, which suggests that children learn in a multitude of
ways that would be supported in the OOTB environment. These ways include, kinaesthetic,
linguistic, artistic and auditory (Plucker, 2014). The collaboration between myself, my
cohort, and the staff at OOTB, was key in making sure that all children were catered for and
supported during the arts festival. During the festival it was necessary to keep up a running
commentary on the progression of the activities, in order to make sure that we were
delivering them in suitable pedagogical manners, and allowing for smooth and seamless
engagement of the children with the activities. After years of education on classroom
management, and working within a childcare, this opportunity at OOTB helped me to reflect
on the variety of new ways that I could present activities in the future; the chaotic nature of
the festival was like no context I had ever taught in before.
Duncum (2011) further explains that the way educators engage children in these ways,
through art, help to stimulate childrens emotional investments in play. The festival itself
engages particularly with interest driven, play-based learning, wherein the children are
active participants and learners, which is supported by the Early Years Learning Framework
(DEEWR, 2009), and much of early years pedagogy. Allowing the children to drive their own
experiences within the activities was something I found both difficult, but enjoyable. After
much planning and structured scaffolding was used to guide the children in many of our
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other teaching experiences, having them take control and create independently was eyeopening. Through this I saw the joy it brought the children to be able to autonomously
experiment with the materials given to them, and show their families and friends what they
had created by themselves, or through collaboration with their peers. The festival supported
all of the key things that I hope to provide through arts based play; collaboration, support of
autonomy, child-driven and interest based activities and catering to diversity. To conclude,
the festival has helped me to better understand the ways in which I am able to provide
these things for children within my care, and supported my learning of the flexible nature of
activity design.

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REFERENCES
Department of Education, Employment and Workplace (DEEWR), Australian Government. (2009).
Being, Belonging, Becoming: Early Years Learning Framework For Australia.

Retrieved

from http://foi.deewr.gov.au/documents/belonging-being-becoming-early-years-learningframework-australia
Duncum, P. (2011). Engaging public space: Art education pedagogies for social justice. Equity and
Excellence in Education, 44(3).
Plucker, J. (2014). Multiple intelligences: Howard Gardner. In D. C, Philips (Ed.), Encyclopedia of
educational theory and philosophy (pp. 554-557). Sage Publications.

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