Welcome back to “As You Go” learning – making the most of learning in day to day play activities.
This week The Boy has been really into his “basket ball hoop”. I love this game.. we use a soft ball, a hoop at the back of the door in the corridor – house and garden are not big and space is limited, yet there IS space for a small hoop…. fabulous.
If you don’t have a hoop, could you fashion one out of two coat hangers?
What are our learning opportunities?
1) Counting – in our case, counting how often you have thrown your ball, rather than how many go in
2) Agility and Hand/ Eye co-ordination - getting the ball in! We have a way to go!
3) Science – you can talk to OLDER kids about the trajectory of the ball and how different angles change the path of the ball
4) Social skills – taking turns and, ahem, learning to “loose”
5) Writing skills – use a black board (or pen and paper) to write down people’s scores
6) Division - you can turn this into a maths game and calculate things like “average number of shots to get the ball in” etc.
I am sure there are PLENTY more things you can learn from Shooting Hoops – what do you think? Share your ideas below!
Happy hoop shooting!
That’s a great idea. I know my kid loves basketball. I never would have thought of making my own hoop out of hangers!
Aaawwe thanks
oooh cool idea…..I’ll be using this
Hooray!
I love the different learning ideas for such a fun game. Something to remember for the future.
@Cerys – I think there are so many learning opportunities in every day games, aren’t there? I love exploring what we are doing already and how we can learn more from it all!
shooting hoops is always an activity my boys enjoy great tips on things you can do to learn while shooting them.
I confess, I do like the fact that they are also improving their hand eye co-ordination!
What great ways to incorporate learning into play!
Learning through play – my favourite type of learning!
Woah! That is too much of a coincidence. Goblin discovered a basket ball hoop at the toddler soft play center today and spent ages throwing things at the basket – I say ‘at’ because i don’t think any actually went in but i was impressed he knew what he was supposed to do with the basket because I hadn’t shown him. Your post, and pointing out the learning potential has convinced me to get one for the house. Thanks
Aah how funny! And hooray for buying a hoop, I bet you will have lots of fun!
I love how you wrote out everything he is learning. Too often parents feel the need to plan more “educational” activities for their little ones when most of the time, play is educational enough.
So lovely to visit your new (to me) site, Maggy! Love how a simple toy can accomplish so much. We love to play ball inside too.
Ah, this post reminds me… we need to get a hoop! My Rosie would love it!
I love the whole concept of this series Maggie – that idea of looking at what we already do every day and finding the learning opportunities. It doesn’t all have to be about amazing activities. The ordinary and everyday can be just as wonderful. I also love the idea of making a hoop from coat hangers! Never would have thought of that.
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