The Early Years Foundation Stage, the statutory guidance on child development is mainly divided in seven areas – Communication & Language, Physical Development, Personal, Social and Emotional Development as the prime areas, and Literacy, Mathematics, Expressive Arts & Design, Understanding of the World as the specific areas. For children under 3 years old, Early Years professionals focus on the prime areas and, holistically include the specific areas. This game is great for children of any age as it is an open-ended play, which means that even though you plan to achieve a learning goal, children are free to be led by their own ideas and curiosity. All you need is a cardboard box and ice lollies sticks. Make a few slits on the cardboard and let your child decide how they want to explore! It is a great activity to support dexterity, focus, problem solving, cause and effect and fine motor skills and even their language as they learn words such as “push”, “down”, “pick up”, etc. All three prime areas covered! To expand into the specific areas, you can colour-match the sticks and the box, pair numbers or quantities and let your child decorate and design both box and stick as they like.
