A schema is a pattern of repeated actions, which will later develop into learned concepts.
Schemas use the ‘trial-and-error method of learning and are adopted by children as an effort to make sense of the world around them. They won’t necessarily manifest the same way with each child and will be primarily based on their interests and natural curiosity.
Children will use a schema pattern of behavior to keep trying out their ideas and testing their existing knowledge. They will modify these schemas based on their newfound knowledge and skills.
Why are schemas essential?
These repeated actions are strongly linked to early cognitive development and embedded in our early years’ practice. The ability to explore schemas will improve children’s cognitive brain structures and help them develop new neurological pathways.
Schemas are a fundamental part of child development; through practitioners having an awareness of schema development, they will be able to:
- Successfully observe schemas, and be able to use this knowledge to inform curriculum planning.
- Practitioners reviewing observations will use this knowledge to track development and provide informed learning assessments.
- Be effective in scaffolding learning.
It’s essential that they can skilfully identify these schemas and scaffold them successfully, providing children with the necessary adult reinforcement. Furthermore, once practitioners identify various schemas, they should ensure that the setting provides an ‘enabling environment’ that gives children ample opportunities to explore and refine them.
Levels of Schemas
There are four distinct ‘levels’ that are associated with each schema; these consist of the following:
- Level 1- Sensorimotor Stage: This stage is mostly explored by every young child in infancy. They will explore the world through their senses, understanding what is happening around them through taste, touch, smell, hearing, and sight.
- Level 2- Symbolic Representation: This will start at around 16-26 months; children will begin to use one object to symbolize another, particularly if these objects have common characteristics.
- Level 3- Functional Dependency: This will happen at the latter stages of the EYFS; children will use the information and knowledge they have gained throughout the Early Years Foundation Stage to secure their cognitive structures. Each of the Early Learning Goals (ELGs) summarises the essential skills children have learned within that specific development area and describes how they will blend all of this knowledge.
- Level 4- Abstract Thought: Children reaching the 40-60 months stage of the EYFS Development Matters framework will take their life experiences and the information and knowledge they have gained to adapt and assimilate their ideas. They use this to form their ideas and concepts, sharing them with others.
The Main Types of Schemas
Many types of schemas can be explored in several ways; here is a breakdown of the most common schemas developed in early childhood.
Trajectory
This schema involves children exploring the movement of objects or their bodies through the air. Children are excited and curious to see how their actions can impact an object or themselves. They want to test out different ways of using the trajectory schema; much like a science experiment, they will observe the various outcomes and use this information to refine the schema. Trajectory exploration will later lead to more refined physical movements within both gross and fine motor development.
Example: Have you noticed that babies will throw their food at meal/snack times? It can sometimes be frustrating, but rest assured that they are learning from this experience, which is their way of exploring the trajectory schema.
Scaffolding the trajectory schema: Preparing activities that allow children to explore the schema in a supportive environment is an excellent way to encourage children to engage in the trajectory schema positively; this might include:
- Rolling cars on different surfaces and observing their landing and speed.
- Playing with other balls, exploring the different ways they bounce.
- Playing with paper planes and watching how far they can fly.
- Inputting target practice to start to refine the trajectory skills.
Connecting
It can be the connecting of toys and provisions such as blocks or sticking craft materials together, or children might explore connecting their bodies with their peers through hand holding or linking arms.
You will notice that children enjoy connecting objects such as Lego and are just as fascinated with disconnecting them or sometimes the creations their peers have made! They are testing out what will happen when things come together and fall.
Creating a safe environment where this type of play is encouraged will support future understanding of more complex connecting concepts, such as magnets and the correlation between a slippery surface and the speed at which an object will move.
Example: Children may spend an extended time making a Lego model, and just as you take a picture to track the many EYFS developmental outcomes they have achieved, they knock it down. Watching in awe and excitement as the many block fall to the floor.
Scaffolding the Connecting Schema: Some children will want to explore the schema using smaller equipment like threading resources and collage activities, while others want to connect on a larger scale. You should provide activities for both, ensuring that these are safe and that adult supervision is given where necessary.
If children are exploring the schema with objects that aren’t safe, outline why this is dangerous and provide them with things that allow them to develop the connecting schema, such as:
- Lego
- Blocks
- Duplo
- Threading Beads
- Tracks
- Large foam bricks
- Collage materials
Transporting
Children use the transporting schema regularly; they enjoy seeing the physical payoff that comes with moving an item from one place to the other; they might also enjoy mixing these items to see what will happen.
Example: Have you noticed that children are fascinated with transporting sand to water and vice versa? Which usually ends with a very watery sand tray and a very murky-looking water tray. It is their way of exploring transportation and observing how the two materials mix.
Scaffolding the Transporting Schema: Be aware of the importance of transport, and although it may not fit with your set areas within the setting, understand that it is essential children are given a chance to move items from one place to the next. You can implement a range of simple activities and provisions:
- Provide practical transport tools like pushchairs and trolleys so that children can transport items safely.
- Have children explore the schema by being helpful. For example, can children transport toys from the floor back to the box?
- Have areas where children are encouraged to mix materials; why not provide buckets in your outdoor water tray, and encourage children to transport the water to plants/flowers or a mud kitchen?
Enclosing/Enveloping
At first glance, these schemas seem very similar, and initially, they have common characteristics, but the end goals are different.
- Enclosing is the ‘closing in’ of objects; these will still be visible but will have a bordering enclosure; this could be in the form of placing the small world farm animals inside the chamber, wrapping the doll in a blanket, or placing circles around marks which are already on a page.
- Enveloping: Envelopes will ‘wrap’ on an object, sometimes from sight. For example, they will ‘hide’ the doll beneath the blankets, and might create a beautiful picture, only to cover it entirely in paint so that it is no longer visible.
You will provide opportunities to enclose and envelop all your areas of provision; children will use the items and activities in the setting to explore these theories. You will quickly identify which one of these schemas the child is using and be able to explore these more in-depth through adult scaffolding.
Example: In the small farmyard world, one child may spend extended periods making fences and placing each animal in the enclosed spaces they have made- Enclosing.
Example: Another child later accesses the small farmyard world; they take each animal and hide them in the barnyard and cottage, moving them ultimately from sight-Enveloping.
Positioning
You might notice how some children don’t use the provisions quite as you intended; rather than drawing with the crayons, they line them up. They might be territorial over the cars in your small world area, using them to make neatly formed lines of various vehicles.
Example: You may have set out a beautiful sea life small world area and notice the child taking a limited interest in the imaginative concept of the activity. Instead, they are more concerned with lining the shells up and placing them in size or color order.
Scaffolding the Transporting Schema: Give children opportunities to explore positioning; this can be done using a range of natural materials. For example, why not collect stones and pebbles, then use these to make lines and shapes on hessian?
Rotation
Children might explore these through circular items such as car wheels or by rotating themselves, twirling, and spinning. This schema will help children understand rotation, which will help lay the foundation for mathematics skills and physical development.
Scaffolding the Rotation Schema: There are many ways to explore rotation, from providing ‘busy boards’ that use all rotating devices such as locks, wheels, and nuts and bolts. To explore spinning outside or rolling down the grass. If children are particularly interested in the spinning nature of your resources, create a space where they can sit peacefully and explore the concept.
Orientation
Have you ever wondered why children enjoy being upside down? Rather than sit on the settee, they want to hang from the couch upside down. Because they are exploring the orientation schema, they wish to view the world from a different angle and explore this contrasting concept.
Example: Children want to climb up on surfaces and walls, interested in how the world looks from higher up.
Scaffolding the Orientation Schema: You can provide these opportunities through your larger outdoor equipment; rather than take away risks, work hard to minimize these risks to give children opportunities to hang upside down or be elevated in comparison to their usual stature.
It can be as simple as undertaking a daily task lying down, so why not provide pens and paper at ground level, encouraging children to lay on their tummies?
Each schema is interlinked and won’t necessarily follow rigid ‘rules’ or appear in a set sequence. It is the role of the practitioner to identify these schemas as they happen, understand their importance, and provide ample support and opportunities for children to explore them safely.
