Taking A Step Back

What happens when we step back and watch children?

As adults, with our fully developed brains and years of experience, it is easy for us to jump in and help children when they are struggling to take off their coat or when we see them fill a water cup to the brim and start to carry it across the room.

When we adults jump in to rescue children from these situations, we have the best of intentions: preventing water from spilling all over the floor, wanting to be helpful, or needing to get out the door quickly and get on with our day. But what do children lose if we adults always step in and help them?

Recently I intentionally stopped myself from rescuing a group of children who were experimenting with ice and water in the sensory bin. The bin contained some water as well as large ice chunks that had toys frozen in them. The children were trying to figure out how to get the toys out. One child got a plastic bowl, carried it over to the sink and filled it with water. That is when I almost stopped her because I didn’t want water all over our classroom floor, but I decided instead to pause and watch. She took that bowl of water and walked very slowly back to the sensory bin, not spilling a single drop, and she dumped the water on top of one of the ice chunks. Soon a few other children followed suit, filling bowls with water at the sink, walking carefully back to the sensory bin and dumping the water out.

I was amazed at how serious the children were about this work and how careful they were as they carried the water. I observed many important things happening during this play: the deep concentration children showed, the initiative they took, the way they tested their ideas to try to solve a problem, their independence, and how they watched and learned from each other. I wonder what would have happened if I would have stepped in and stopped them from moving water across the classroom. Yes, there are times when adults need to step in and help children – such as for safety reasons, or to prevent extreme frustration with a task that is physically too hard for them to do alone. But I would encourage you the next time you are tempted to jump in to pause instead, take a step back, and watch your child. They will probably amaze you with what they are capable of.