Dramatic Play as a Context for Children’s Investigation of Size and Scale

The author describes and reflects on ways that a class of prekindergarten children used collaborative processes to investigate and make representations of elements of an underwater environment. These explorations followed the reintroduction of a mural depicting underwater life that several of the children had made, which had been displayed for a time in the local public library. The children's re-engagement with the mural in the school's theater space led to their design and creation of 3-dimensional representations to be part of the underwater setting. Concepts of size and scale played significant roles for them during their creation of mermaid costume tails, construction of small and large representations of sea creatures, and work on a life-size representation of a scuba diver. Vignettes of the children's individual and small group work, along with transcripts of their dialogue, reveal their processes of design, problem solving, construction, and collaboration. The author also reflects on the role of the experience in her professional growth.