Rolly Poly

I just have to share the cutest story about some toddler play I witnessed and was lucky enough to film for our Toddler parent meeting this week. Daniel has discovered how much fun it is to lay inside the foam and vinyl cylinder on the deck while his friends roll the cylinder from one side of the deck to the other.

So I come out onto the playground to find Daniel diving into the cylinder as Ellie is staring to roll it across the deck. "Rolly Poly,” she says, as she rolls the cylinder with Daniel in it across the deck. Teacher Susan joins in the chant. When the cylinder runs into the wall, all movement stops. Now what? Susan directs Ellie to come around to the other side to roll Daniel back the other way, which she does.

Now here comes a friend to help Ellie. Now two children are pushing and chanting "Rolly Poly." Every once in awhile Susan looks into the cylinder and says, "Daniel are you OK in there?" She gets an enthusiastic giggle or a "Yeah!" They reach the other side of the deck. Now both children have to understand that they need to move around to the other side to continue the game. Susan does a good job of explaining and showing and the game continues.

Next comes Walter, a much younger toddler. As Ellie and Cameron are starting to roll Daniel inside the cylinder back to the other side of the deck, Walter gets in front of the cylinder and pushes on it from the wrong side. Now Susan has to convince Ellie and Cameron to wait until she can convince Walter to join them on the back side so they can all push.

Susan does a valiant job of explaining and showing and the play continues. But it sure was like the proverbial herding cats task! However, Susan didn’t resort to picking anyone up and placing them where they needed to be. She used words and gestures.

The children had to work together to play "rolly poly." Without Susan's skillful support and help, they would not have been able to do it and they would have ended up in a conflict with one another, probably with crying involved. Instead, with some strategic support, they all worked together and had the experience of how much fun cooperation can be!