Working on building our social skills.
At BestStart Te Whariki, the tamariki in the Piwakawaka Room (2 year olds to 3 year olds) have been learning exploring and playing together.
Children can begin to grasp the concept of taking turns, sharing and beginning to explore play in their social setting. As we have had more children start in our Piwakawaka Room it is great to see their friendship and forming social skills.
In our Piwakawaka Room we have been focusing on developing children’s social and emotional competency. This means developing their social skills and being able to manage their emotional skills. We have been focusing on developing these skills by supporting children to take turns, negotiating, sharing space, waiting for their turn, offering and sharing their feelings. During mat time we read a couple of special stories called “Tucker Turtle” and “I can be a super friend”.
In our room we have been promoting Manaakitanga, Whanaungatanga and rangatiratanga. We have been talking about what do we do to be a good friend and how being responsible for our own actions can make our friends sad. Social skills has been our centre’s priority for learning and this links to parent aspirations from our centre whanau for their tamariki.