The Child’s Voice: Mark Making and Pen Pals
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Information about the setting
Allsorts Nursery is an English medium nursery in the village of Crickhowell, Powys. The preschool is situated on the site of Crickhowell Primary School but operates independently in terms of funding and management. The setting provides 2 hours of funded early education per day (9:00-11:00am) as well as childcare provision for both 2- and 3-year-old children.
Context and background to the effective or innovative practice
The setting places strong emphasis on responding to children’s interests and ideas to shape meaningful learning experiences. Practitioners observe children closely and use these observations to plan engaging experiences that promote curiosity, communication, and early mark making in a natural and motivating way.
Description of nature of strategy or activity
A story about the sea, which mentions a message in a bottle, sparks the children’s curiosity about how messages travel. A practitioner then introduces a real “message in a bottle” found abroad, further engaging the children and providing an opportunity to follow the child’s voice and extend learning across the five developmental pathways.
Following the children’s fascination with the message in a bottle, practitioners plan a range of open-ended experiences linked to the theme of the sea and communication. Books, poems, music, and dance related to the sea are introduced, alongside discussions about where the bottle has come from and how far it has travelled.
One child independently decides to create their own message in a bottle. Practitioners respond by inviting all children to take part, providing a variety of materials to support mark making, drawing, and early writing. Bottles are also explored in the water tray, allowing children to investigate floating, sinking, and movement through play.
The children’s interest then develop into discussions about how letters travel, the role of the post, and people who deliver letters. This leads to children sending letters home, with parents encouraged to post replies to the setting. Building on this enthusiasm, children begin corresponding with children in another Powys setting, exchanging drawings, marks, and messages sometimes linked to shared events such as Christmas and Easter.
The next step is to invite the children to create time capsules which will be kept until the children leave the feeder primary school, and memories of their time at the setting to be shared during a Year 6 leavers assembly.
What impact has this work had on provision and children’s standards?
This approach has had a positive impact on both provision and children’s learning. Children are highly motivated to engage in mark-making as a meaningful way to communicate, with a noticeable increase in children choosing to do so independently.
Children are beginning to understand that marks and writing carry meaning. The real-life context of letter writing strengthens links between home and the setting, with parents actively involved in supporting communication. Correspondence with another setting further enhance children’s sense of purpose, excitement, and audience for their early mark making.
How have you shared your good practice?
The setting has shared its good practice by opening the provision to other settings across Powys. Practitioners hosted a ‘Network and Natter’ event, inviting colleagues to visit the setting, look around the learning environment, meet with staff, and take part in informal professional dialogue. This provided opportunities to share approaches to provision and practice, including how following the child’s voice can lead to meaningful and sustained learning experiences.