I named my daycare “Little Makers,” inspired by the “maker movement,” a push to provide a variety of materials to learners and allow them the time, space, and tools to create and invent. This movement is synonymous with STEAM learning and taps into the creativity and questioning that is at the heart of early learning. The maker movement formalizes a process that has been naturally and informally adopted by children for centuries. It allows children (and adults) to use loose parts and other building materials to tinker and create new inventions, finish a story, solve a problem, and then share their ideas. (Thompson and Compton, 2020, p.1). Most are traditionally open ended and allow children to build in their areas of interest.

 

Another important aspect of the maker movement is community and collaboration. A maker observes not only the materials and their inventions but also the others in the makerspace, looking and listening for their friends’ ideas and sharing what they attempt. Makers are curious collaborators who boldly try new things and build upon one another’s creativity. (Thompson and Compton, 2020, p.2). Through their collaboration, makers build social emotional competence because they share materials and give one another ideas, they become excited when their friends replicate their ideas. Tinkering also allows children to build more complex creations as they “read” the same materials every day. After playing with a building material and observing their friends use it, they can identify new uses for it and incorporate it into their creations in new and fantastic ways. Children are ingenious innovators “with materials, spaces, and processes [and t]hey discover new uses for common materials, invent representations for unfamiliar materials and develop ideas for processes as they play and make.” (Thompson and Compton, 2020, p.4).

​

Thompson, R. C. and Compton, M. K. (2020). Makerspaces: Remaking Your Play and STEAM Early Learning Areas. St. Paul: Red Leaf Press.