During the last few weeks the children in the Preschool 1 class have been enjoying creating yummy food and treats in the dramatic play center. To expand on this interest, we decided to create our own Ice Cream Shop. We collected different colours of paper and turned them into balls using tape to hold them together. Next, we used brown paper and folded them into the shape of an ice cream cone. We added menus, paper money, and a cash register. Now that our shop was ready it was time explore. Right away we were excited to play with the different materials. We used our fine motor skills to hold on the scoops as we scooped our ice cream into our cones. Marcy placed a brown ice cream in her cone and said, “It’s chocolate with brown sprinkles.” Emerson added the green and yellow ice cream together and said, “its yummy!” he placed a blue ice cream in a cone and said, “here Amy!” I asked him, “what flavor is it?” He answered, “blueberry!” Adrian said, “chocolate is my favourite.” Brady said, “me too.” We enjoyed creating different ice cream for the educators. Benjamin brought ice cream over to Gurpreet and said, “I do not like mint. Can I have strawberry instead?” He replied, “oh you want the pink one. Okay.” He went back over and placed the pink ice cream in the cone and brought it over to Gurpreet. Now that we had enjoyed our ice cream it was time to pay. We took the paper money over to Brynne who was using the cash register. She placed the money in the drawer. After a few minutes she said, “here Diya. Its your turn!” As we were taking turns sharing the money we discussed what the numbers were on the money. We used our numeracy skills to identify the numbers that were on the money. During this activity the Preschoolers built on their sense of belonging and language skills as they discussed which ice cream flavor was their favourite. They discovered through their conversations that some of them liked the same flavours of ice cream. The children were engaged in this activity as they each found a different role to play. It was so much fun and we are excited to see what we can create next.
