zigzag Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 Appreciate any ideas or advice, tips or tricks. We currently have a group who are incredibly messy in their play. Half hour into the session it looks like a bomb has hit. Now some of this play is fully engaged and warrants the mess but some I think it has just become a habit to get as much out as possible. (And it’s not even the two year olds) It has suddenly become clear to me that there is no care or respect for the toys. I have started restricting what they can have out and have made my expectations very clear about putting something away before getting something else out. Tidy up time has also become a battle with children not seeming to care. I am addressing this and slowly making progress. We have never had issues to this extent and just wonder is it a sign of the times or something we are doing wrong. How do you approach mess control, care and respect of resources and tidy time? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Julie_Brighton Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 Sounds familiar....watching with interest. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cait Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 I found that a staff member sited in the area actively playing with resources could help quite a lot with prompts. A well timed 'oh, are we going to play with those Joe? Hang on whilst we put these away first' could really help. It does seem to be down to having an adult in the area. I did spend a bit of time in circle time explaining too, just so the more responsible children were aware - the older ones could be particularly helpful sometimes. It's really constant, positive reinforcement. It can be very hard sometimes to get children to tidy up, particularly those who tip a whole box of in-set wooden puzzles out! I imagine these children aren't expected to tidy up at home, so a few gently spoken words to parents to say what you're trying to reinforce at work can help. It's maybe not occurred to them that they can expect a child to tidy up at home - when it's just the mess of one child it's not so overwhelming! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnyday Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 We have this problem in our Home Corner - all outfits are taken off the dressing up rack + accessories (bags etc) and left on the floor For tidy up time I now give groups of children specific jobs and find that really helps - 'Tom, Dick, Harry you are in charge of tidying the small world area', 'Martha and Arthur please can you tidy away the play-dough', 'Penny and Jenny you are so good at puzzles I would like you to tidy that table please' - honestly before you know it we are all nice and tidy! 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cait Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 Yes, Sunnyday, it really works. I think being confronted by a huge mess is overwhelming, even for an adult, so we internalise by saying, okay, dressing ups first etc. Children need that inputting and directing to a specific task. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
finleysmaid Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 ah you can just tell those children with play rooms can't you 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Froglet Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 I used to find it really worked when I gave named groups of children a specific area to tidy up too. I also made it a bit competitive although I had older children (reception) at the time. As for the lack of respect thing... am right there with you and it's something we are having a big push on in school although it feels like a bit of a losing battle at the moment... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Panders Posted February 5, 2019 Share Posted February 5, 2019 6 hours ago, sunnyday said: We have this problem in our Home Corner - all outfits are taken off the dressing up rack + accessories (bags etc) and left on the floor For tidy up time I now give groups of children specific jobs and find that really helps - 'Tom, Dick, Harry you are in charge of tidying the small world area', 'Martha and Arthur please can you tidy away the play-dough', 'Penny and Jenny you are so good at puzzles I would like you to tidy that table please' - honestly before you know it we are all nice and tidy! This was very much how we used to work at my nursery. We would have a signal for end of play, the children all collected in the book area and once all there and settled, that's when we had a very quick reprise of the morning's work and then jobs were handed out. Adults helped obviously, chivvying and encouraging as we went, a little competition never did any harm either. Sometimes I had a bag of those big sparkly foam numbers and would choose a child from the group to pick one out of the bag, then they would have to find that number of things to tidy away, they quite enjoyed that game. We only had snack time once we had tidied up and so that was another reason for them to do it! If we had had a particularly good tidy up then my flashing light up sparkly star of wonderfulness would come out and be waved over heads. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zigzag Posted February 6, 2019 Author Share Posted February 6, 2019 The other afternoon there was a complete lack of activity at tidy time so I made myself and my deputy just sit down in the middle of the floor with very clear intentions that unless the toys were put away where they live we would not have time to go outside. We sat there with a completely passive, uninterested stance and lo and behold it worked! The funny thing is that one of the children had the camera and took a photo of us (not known to us at the time) later when I was downloading photos I discovered it, our faces say it all! Thank you all for your advice, most of which we do, but I think we definitely need to go back to basics, form a consistent routine around tidy time like we do everything else. Let you know how we get on later...... 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amarrian Posted February 6, 2019 Share Posted February 6, 2019 Hello Zigzag You, yourself, have said it: "consistent routine". If you want children to behave in a particular way, you must constantly reinforce those rules (you don't need many rules, but you do need a few). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
louby loo Posted February 6, 2019 Share Posted February 6, 2019 17 hours ago, Panders said: If we had had a particularly good tidy up then my flashing light up sparkly star of wonderfulness would come out and be waved over heads. This just cracked me up! Today my 'sparkly fairy ribboned wand of wonderfulness' awarded the 'tidy-up trophy' to a member of staff ... the children's faces were a picture as the wand wandered over all their heads and stopped on adult. We have a trophy that goes home each night with a child. It's an old swimming trophy that my daughter was chucking out, I had originally taken in for them to play with but it got such a good reaction when I got it out of my bag that we just had to find a use for it. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zigzag Posted February 6, 2019 Author Share Posted February 6, 2019 6 hours ago, amarrian said: Hello Zigzag You, yourself, have said it: "consistent routine". If you want children to behave in a particular way, you must constantly reinforce those rules (you don't need many rules, but you do need a few). Totally agree and we do stick to our rules and routine, I am old school in that respect. Just lately there has been a slip and I think that all of us have been guilty of doing most of the tidying ourselves just to save time and hassle. But I had one of those wake up moments and thought what on Earth are we doing! Let’s get back to basic expectations again. Using the suggestions above we had a marvellous tidy up time today, just like old times again. Thank you all. Xx 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cait Posted February 6, 2019 Share Posted February 6, 2019 Great to read that! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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