A science activity guided by children at pre-school level: from a string to a pendulum

Abstract

A challenge was made to a preschool class for an activity about science seeking to find situations where children use creativity in the process of science learning at this age level. No previous suggestion was given about the method and way of implementing the activity. The teacher prepared in advance a set of diverse materials that could be eventually used in due course of the activity. The teacher would guide the activity to arrive to the concept of pendulum, but the way to reach that would be defined by the children themselves. The starting point was a simple string: to every child and the teacher was given a string of equal length. What could be done with such a string hanging in a hand was the first exercise. Immediately children´s imagination and creativity was shown. After a while a simple pendulum was under observation and some functioning problems were detected and later on debugged by the children, whose suggestions led the teacher hanging the pendulum at a door’s lintel.