SAMPLE LEARNING OUTCOMES – PLANKS

Play is learning and PLANKS play, in all its forms, is a valuable medium for authentic learning.

At Green Hat Workshop we specialise in making this learning as clear as possible and in optimising opportunities for learning of different types.
Because open ended, play-based learning is cognitive in nature, multidimensional, intuitive and often invisible, this work can be challenging. We continue to do our best and hope that, with your help, we can provide a valuable resource for all teachers and parents who want to understand the great value in play-based learning, block play and loose parts play.

We pride ourselves, at Green Hat Workshop, on running experiences which authentically fit with the abilities and interests of all participants and with the values of their communities.

We welcome the opportunity to work with teachers in tailoring a workshop to fit with preplanned class’ investigations and curriculum outcomes.

Our experience shows that the authentic manner in which participants practice and develop a wide range of skills during the course of open ended play provides the greatest value. Open ended play is therefore a feature of our work.

Curriculum design principles and PLANKS play

Challenge and enjoyment: PLANKS play is active. It engages and motivates people of all ages who are open to play experience.

Coherence: PLANKS play brings many strands of learning into an experience that has meaning and purpose to the participant. It is holistic where physical, social, cognitive and emotional development is happening simultaneously.

Relevance: PLANKS play provides a real world context to the experience of being present for children, teenagers and play-ers of all ages.

Personalisation and choice: choice about how to play and with whom.

Breadth: a resource with no defined way of being used provides almost infinite possibilities. The opportunities are further extended through the staging of regular construction events where abundant PLANKS are available and a culture of student empowerment and trust is prevelant.

Depth: PLANKS play-ers can focus on a key passion or interest, developing a depth of knowledge and skills. This could be
imaginative contexts or practical skills such as involved city mapping or structural representations of objects, characters or places.

Progression: The provision of extended periods of time, enabled by deep and extended engagement with PLANKS, enables play-ers to create and recreate as repetitively as necessary, learning at their own pace and celebrating authentic perseverance in the aquisition of new skills and understandings, taking time to practice a growth mindset while experiencing the ebb and flow of play themes and interests.

English

Analyse, Understand, Communicate and Build Relationships

Speaking and listening (Language)

Open ended play, as a shared experience, draws upon a wide range of speaking and listening skills and is commonly characterised by an almost euphoric engagement with the task.
During an open ended PLANKS workshop participants of all ages are motivated by a natural desire to create and solve their own challenges. Working within the restriction of time, materials and energy, they quickly find it necessary to negotiate with and to convince their peers to cooperate, in order to be successful.

The component nature of PLANKS authentically draws participants together and those builders who would like to create a taller tower or a larger city, quickly find that many builders make these projects possible.
Convincing peers to participate in ‘your’ project is quickly found to be more challenging than simply sharing ideas, creativity and the ownership of a construction.

Working in this way demands the use of language and conventions of discussion and negotiation; including appropriate body language, volume and tone of voice, personal space, active listening and clarifying of ideas, putting forward a point of view, using inclusive and empathetic language and the development of feedback and judgement skills.

Importantly, the task itself is not instructed to be team building or strictly collaborative. Feedback that peers give eachother is therefore both honest and authentic, as while both parties can simply leave and set up somewhere else, they are motivated to work together to enable taller and larger structures.

A PLANKS workshop is an environment where there is free movement and no task expectation. Peers simply move away from those members of the group who don’t share their vision or communicate it well, or gravitate towards those who offer collaboration and inspiration.

It should also be noted that even participants with a more socially introverted style of behaviour find the lack of collaborative expectation, in open ended play, quite liberating and it is not uncommon for them to work in a more socially integrated way during our workshops as a result.

Victorian Curriculum Outcomes

Foundation

Language for interaction
Expressing and developing ideas
Listen to and respond orally
Use appropriate interaction

Year 1

Engage in conversations and discussions
Use interaction skills

Year 2

Using language to describe actions and consider consequences
Interaction in discussions, appropriately asserting opinions in discussion

Year 3

Cooperation with others
Work in collaborative situations
Use interaction skills

Year 5

Clarify and connect understandings and present a point of view
Use interaction skills

Year 6 & 8

Participate in discussions
Use appropriate interaction skills and conventions.

Text use (Literacy)

Using PLANKS to create lettering and to communicate written meaning is not uncommon in a Green Hat workshop. Particularly Foundation and Grade One aged participants demonstrate a need to label, so as to explain their work, and to instruct their peers to “Keep Out” or “Stay Away” from their delicate constructions.

Older participants create more intricate messages of appreciation, or reflection.