Director’s Column: The Teacher’s Critical Role in Fostering Children’s Development

By Jennifer Winters, Director

“Our basic premise is that the skillful teacher of young children is one who makes … play possible and helps children keep getting better at it. To do this, the teacher stage-manages, mediates, and may play with beginning players, until their mastery of play frees her to focus her energies on … play watching.” –Gretchen Reynolds and Elizabeth Jones, Master Players

Bing is a play-based, child-centered school, born out of John Dewey’s progressive education movement and greatly influenced by Jean Piaget, Maria Montessori, Friedrich Froebel and in later years the work of Lev Vygotsky. At Bing, play is learning, and learning is play, but what is the role of the teacher? Teachers set the stage for learning through play while being keenly aware of how they are supporting each child’s developmental goals. Treating the child as an honored guest guides each and every interaction between the teacher and child—it’s our North Star. Watching the Bing teachers plan and execute activities in their classrooms is like watching a well-choreographed ballet. Each teacher knows their role and how to support the child’s learning through play. The fluidity of the child, the teachers and the environment working together is something beautiful to watch. Like a skilled choreographer, a good teacher is able to set the environment to optimally match the learning goals of children two to five years of age, and then intentionally and actively co-construct the child’s learning. 

“Children are capable and competent, full of curiosity, and ripe for making connections. Our job as teachers is to honor them as guests and celebrate the unique individual strengths of each child, and support them with their challenges.” –Bing teacher  

Over 25 years ago, prior to being a part of Bing, I witnessed this classroom ballet between teachers and children while conducting an accreditation visit at Bing for the National Association for the Education of Young Children. For two days, I observed classroom after classroom, and one thing was clear: The interactions between the teacher and children were consistently respectful, responsive, unobtrusive and intentional. The school was magical, and clearly the teachers were responsible for creating much of that magic. Has any of this changed in the past 25 years? I am happy to say: not at all. In any classroom, at any time, teachers are engaged and involved in guiding and supporting the play and the development of all of the children. Teachers keenly observe, knowing when to step in and out of the play. 

Everyday we open our doors and welcome the children, knowing we (teachers) are there to guide, support and value the play of young children. The tenor of the classroom is one of pure joy, there is a sense of belonging, and the play and learning are entwined. Children learn as they play and as they interact with their classmates and teachers (talking, discussing, collaborating, creating, gaining each other’s perspectives). The school’s beautiful and carefully planned classroom environments beckon the young child to explore, create, construct and discover.

The following example highlights the value of play, strengthened by a teacher who guides the play with questions and comments to support the children’s social-emotional development as well as their creative thinking:

Liana (4 years and 5 months), Connor (4 years) and Emma (4 years and 5 months) are playing house outside. “I’ll be the mom, you be the daughter and you be the brother, Connor,” Emma announces. The three children begin the process of setting up their play house with pots, pans, pillows and a basket of sticks and other found materials. For 30 minutes, the play is harmonious, with Liana and Connor deferring to Emma for all of the household decisions. Three-year-old Elliott roars up to the house pushing a wooden cart and announces, “I want to play in the house too!” He then proceeds to push himself and his cart completely into the crowded house. The play comes to a screeching halt. Teacher Sam is watching close by and calmly asks, “Is everyone okay in here?” “He just wrecked our house!” says Emma. “Yeah,” chime in Liana and Connor, “We did not like it!” Teacher Sam nods her head up and down, acknowledging everything they say, and adds, “I am sure that it was a surprise when a cart came in your front door!” And she turns to Elliott and says, “I can see that you really want to play with the children in the house. Did you notice what happened when your cart went into the house and knocked all the dishes over?” Emma speaks up to say that she did not like it that Elliott knocked over their house’s kitchen and now they can’t play their game. Liana offers her concerns on why Elliott can’t be in the play house: “There is just no room for him, and he’s little and does not know how to play the game.” 

Now what can we do? Teacher Sam appeals to the children to come up with a solution to the play disruption. Connor, who has been quietly watching, now speaks up to say, “I don’t like it that he wrecked our house, but maybe next time if he asked us, he can play.” The other two children agree, and then Elliott suggests, “I can be the dog!” The teacher asks a few questions about where the dog would sleep, and would it eat dinner with them, and with that, the play shifts to one of inclusiveness and creativeness. They all agree he would make a great dog, and they go on to create a space for the dog to sleep. 

This is a great example of four children communicating their understanding of the world and their place in it. There is an order in the play and roles to be played, as well as ideas and solutions to be examined. The teacher was there to support the play and help guide it when it started to disintegrate, but she did so much more—providing an underlying atmosphere of respect for all the children involved, and for their ideas and motives in the play. One of the most important things a teacher can do is respect the child. With thoughtful verbal (pleasant, responsive and calm voice) and nonverbal messages (smiling, listening and encouraging them to listen to each other, making eye contact), a teacher shows respect for the child, and in turn the child’s self-respect and respect for others grow. Not only does this model good behavior for children, it helps to build a strong and trusting relationship between the teacher and the child that will help the child socially and emotionally as they move on to the elementary years. 

The teacher in this vignette was also able to empathize with all the children involved, offering emotional comfort when things disintegrated. There is an underlying feeling that the teacher is there not just to protect them, but to share in their ideas and help with possible solutions to their play. 

In the hollow block area, Andrew (4 years) had been building a complex structure, as usual. It was a very small and compact room that he labeled a “dark room.” The room could fit only one child comfortably, yet due to its “pitch dark” quality, many children were attracted to it and wanted to join him inside. Heidi (4 years and 2 months) and Phoebe (4 years) were two girls who anxiously tried to slip in. “No!” Andrew exclaimed, “There’s no room!” Phoebe asked, “Andrew, can I come in?” “No, it’s too small,” Andrew repeated. They argued and struggled with this for a little while. The teacher asked, “Andrew, would you let them in if they could fit?” “Yes, but it is too tight.” “Is there a way that everyone could fit in? Do you have any ideas?” the teacher asked. “We could take turns,” Heidi suggested. “That is a good idea, then everyone would be able to sit inside, right? How can we make it bigger?” said the teacher. Andrew thought for a minute, “We could use big and small boards to make it bigger.” “And we could open the door,” someone else added. “I know, we could build two houses!” Phoebe said. She walked over to the stacked pile and started to build her house next to Andrew’s. After several minutes of building up a wall, she paused and said, “I know! Let’s connect the two houses, then it will be very big!” “Yeah,” some children exclaimed enthusiastically. With each child helping, adjacent walls were erected alongside Andrew’s dark room, and soon his house had what looked like a pen attached to it. The problem, however, was that the wall from Andrew’s house that connected to the pen still stood, and thus the enclosed areas remained small. “So, now you have two areas,” the teacher pointed out, “but it is still too crowded.” “Well,” Andrew said, “We could just take this off.” He then pulled away two of the larger blocks that formed the wall, and thus created a large doorway/opening. The children were then all able to play in the new “hide-out,” and no one was excluded due to lack of space. 

This anecdote is a good example that we frequently see with young children. They often only see one solution to a problem—part of being egocentric at this age. In this case, they felt that there is no room—and that is the way it has to be, because the structure is already built. Here the value of having an attentive teacher who can offer a few suggestions is evident—things can be changed, added to or rebuilt. In this case, the teacher stretched the children’s social and problem-solving cognition, getting them to think about what is possible. With only a few questions, the teacher was able to help the children turn a tiny “dark room” into a more spacious and inclusive “hide-out.”

At Bing, we view young children as competent, curious and creative human beings who, through play and with the support of highly trained teachers, are able to grow and develop in all the developmental domains—social, emotional, cognitive and physical. Our founding director always said, “We [teachers] must have faith, hope and trust in the child.” Those words ring as true today as they did in 1966 for all of us at Bing. 

Elinor Fitch Griffin, a clinical psychologist and early childhood educator, said it well in her book Island of Childhood: “A sensitive kind of awareness is necessary for a teacher to meet each child where he or she is—‘big’ one day and smaller the next—while maintaining her faith that the child will surely continue to grow and learn if she does her job of providing the right environment.”

The exceptional teacher sees children in a true competence model—focusing on their strengths and what they can do. The exceptional teacher is able to understand and support the children’s perspective and the intentionality in their play. This, in turn, leads to a trusting relationship where children can thrive and develop the skills and dispositions for a lifetime of learning. 

Behind all fluid, well-orchestrated performances, there is an abundance of hard work, dedication and professionalism involved. After 25 years, I can unequivocally say that it is the interactions between teachers and children at Bing that make it so special.