Madeley Nursery SchoolWe are giving the sound backMadeley Nursery School

“We are All Paulas”An enquiry project into the identity of the school office

AUTHORS

Alex Annabelle Anya LexiMadeleine Rory Rosie VictoriaWilliam B William G

Louise Lowings Sarah Johnson

We listened to the sounds of the nursery outdoors and indoors. The children engaged in their research with physical and emotional energy that continues as the culture of the learning group.

The children approached the indoor space with the proposal that the nursery is ”full of the sound of persons” - Victoria 3y 10m.

The group were curious about the sounds of the school office. The most interesting sound is the click click click of fingers on the computer key board. This is unexpected as the quiet sound seems almost imperceptible compared with the loud sound and movement of other items in the office such as the photocopier.

But the keyboard and the member of staff who uses it remained a consistent focus for the groups inquiry. As the project progressed it emerges that ICT is not just a vehicle of physical and technical communication, but it is alive with expressive vitality, and active will, engaging multimodal communication of ideas that go far beyond the commonly held discourse that ‘print conveys meaning.’

The identity - The group, the project

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

Regularly the actions and intentions of the keyboard are presented as lines of symbols linked to the symbols on the keyboard; letters, numerals and punctuation. These are written or word processed and printed.

The educator chose to present a photocopy of a computer keyboard to the group as a starting point. The image included the connecting cable of the keyboard and provokes discussion about how communication reaches out from the keyboard.

“Wire gets it to work.” - Anya

“Makes it to switch on the screen with letters.” - Annabelle

“Pee and Cee! I think it’s called peas and sneeze and mommy has sneezed.” - William G

“It’s telling it to Grandma.” - Anya

“It making mommy dance.” - Alex

The keyboard

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

An idea of how the computer keyboard sends a communication.

The sounds here communicate between keyboards, moving to connect

to the printer in the school office and they radiate and increase to represent

sounds getting louder.

Exploring the question ‘who does the computer

want to communicate with?

It makes our fingers dance

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

The dancing fingers is a game that children play together. As the dances become more frenetic the laughter increases, then the movements take on other identities, sometimes slower, exaggerated, defined, almost with the tempo and expression of a symphony in music and a suite in dance.

The codes are both limitless in possibility and intention but also limited by the fixed and predictable nature of the keyboard.

The children make their fingers into poses or symbols, these reflect and define again their interests shown throughout the project.

“the dive” “the V” “the roll” “the peep-bo” “the chatter” “the love heart”

“What tells our fingers to dance?” - question from the educator“Came from the computer.” - Madeleine“Our fingers did it because they wanted to dance them.” - Annabelle“All sorts of dances for computer fingers.” - Madeleine“We need to turn it on. We plug it into the power on the wall, la, la, la.” - Rory“our fingers are doing a dance competition.” - William G“Fat dance.” - William B“Should we do a V and an A?” - Annabelle“V, A, 7, 4, N.” - Madeleine“NNNNNNNN.” - Annabelle

Our project work continued, the group had been creating and developing their theories about the school office and the action / reaction / interaction with the computer. The computer communicates with us; there are codes and symbols, wires that connect and it wants us to move our fingers maybe to dance, make shapes, communicate with and between brains and hands.

“The computer wants our fingers dance.”

“It goes in your mouth and down to your brain in your tummy.”

“Your brain is everywhere.”

“It goes through the door it doesn’t need to open it.”

“It goes to my house it knows the way.”

“The computer has pipes to make it work.”

The connections between hands and the keyboard

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

Small lumps of clay representing fingers pressing keys

Clay hands connect around and to the keyboard

The clay acts as markers on the keys and links keys together.

Model of hands in clay.

The clay model extends with codes and symbols that have meaning for the children, the connections increase in

complexity.

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

The keyboard makes connections with people, places and memories. The connections show emotional energy between the children of the group and with life beyond school. The map of connections creates a web where the proximity of drawings and the strip of paper communications are considered and interrelated.The children operate with many systems of ideas at the same time.

The connections“Mommy’s seeing if she’s getting any messages. She’s getting a mmm and an i message.” - William G.

“The airports coming on this computer to get to Susie.” - William B.

“That’s my bed and my computer, that’s the study room with the computer in, it’s on a desk, Lou that’s them coming out, the dots and the wires, that’s the wire going into yours.” - Anya

“I talk to Grandma on the ipad an the phone.” - Anya

“From the pipe from the internet.” - Victoria

“We can send it to Paula’s computer through these two wires, I’m printing next door.” - Anya

“This is the hill and it’s got concrete on the hill, the computer, I’m playing the computer.” - Annabelle

“Daddy goes for his work on the internet. It’s auction work. He has to , it goes round and round to the auction in another city.” - Annabelle

“In the computer, in the wire, moves on the wall all the way to Paulas’ office.” - Anya

“The wire bring it up higher.” - Rory

“I love it and it’s really perfect, B’s and kisses.” - Victoria

“MMMMM for Madeleine.” - Madeleine

Children begin to identify their knowledge of computers beyond the school, at home, with family, friends places of importance. There are strong ideas that link computers, adults and work that reveal themselves many times during the project.

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

Adding complexity and contra ideasThe wireless internet and ideas of timeIn a challenge to the children’s ideas that the computer communicates down wires that connect, an educator used her tablet to take a photograph and send an email. This prompted new layers of connection.

Anya - “The computer goes over our heads by the lights, it is green and follows the roads. It goes through the door and doesn’t need to open it.”

The children chose a sheet of transparent plastic to record the communications that are in the air.

Annabelle - “It goes to my house it knows the way. It goes to the internet.”Victoria - “We can’t see it, it’s up there, it’s looking at you, a rectangle screen, it can see your shoes.”William G - “I’m using the internet to talk to dinosaurs.”Madeleine - “The internet doesn’t talk, it says nothing!”

William G - “I’ve see a real internet floating away from inside the bathroom, a green. Some shells at the dinosaur museum are called ammonites, the internet at the time of the dinosaurs turned to rock,”Anya - “It goes to the dinosaurs, they’re a long way.”William G - “It doesn’t go to real dinosaurs it goes to dinosaur skeletons.”Victoria - “We won’t ever find some.”Alex -“We will find some.”William B - “We want to talk to dinosaurs.”Victoria - “You can’t talk to them.”Alex - “You can”Rory - “Because you pressed them.”Victoria - “You type it Lou.”“It went from the computer.”

William B - “The internet drives, went into the car to the internet. The internet message went in the car to the dinosaurs.”Madeleine - “It didn’t go in the car (laughing) It’s Google! “

The internet communicates in the air.

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

Adding complexity and contra ideas (Continued)The wireless internet and ideas of timeThe consensus of the group was to show how the computer communicated with dinosaurs / dinosaur bones via the internet. The action of drawing and talking enriched their ideas, they lend ideas to each other.Anya - “You used the mouse to tap - you asked it to find fossils.”Madeleine - “Dinosaurs come up on the screen.”William G - “Because when people were around dinosaurs weren’t around.Victoria - “They died.”Anya - “My message needs to go along way away ago.”Rory - “I need to tell them my name.”

Victoria - “I need it the right way, otherwise my letters will be upside down.” Rosie - “My message it winks to the dinosaurs. Winks! Winks! Winks!”William G - “It’s going to the dinosaurs, the time of the dinosaurs. I need even more message in orange writing too.”Anya - “This is at Madeley Nursery and that’s the time of the dinosaurs, my house is in the middle.”

The internet communicates with dinosaurs through the air.

Madeley Nursery School“We are all Paulas”

Sharing with Paula, sharing with familyThe children wanted to suspend the internet ‘in the sky’ over the model and connect the communications to it and between other elements to create a three dimensional map of their ideas. They as a final act shared their work with Paula and she types new messages into their creation.

“The internet is…you write something. Just letters and it will send it really, really far away. Pick which way you want it to go and which person and it will just go. Up into the sky and into a person.” - Victoria“To my home.” “And that’s my special letter. (about a letter M on the model) - Madeleine“I want to join it to William and then to Lou and your parents and family and friends.” - Rory“These go up to join in the words, this is the bit what we work with.” - Anya“This is how you do the talking.” - Rory“The internet is Paula working.” - Anya

“The internet is called Anya, Rory, and William and Lexi and Annabelle and Vicky and Madeleine and William and Alex and Rosie and Lou. WE TYPE.” - Anya