Inspirations for the research 4 - loose parts

REMIDA is unique to the city of Reggio Emilia (see our 20th September post below) but there are innovative projects with reclaimed resources in the UK. The Midas Touch project in Liverpool involved young children, artists and early years educators taking part in creative play with recycled objects. Nick Owen, Laura Grindley and Michiko Fujii write about the opportunities that this project provided for creative development in Ioanna Palaiologou’s book Early Years Foundation Stage: Theory and Practice.

 

In Bristol the Children's Scrapstore have produced Play Pods. The theory behind Play Pods includes the concept of ‘loose parts’. This term was coined by architect Simon Nicolson, who wrote: “In any environment, both the degree of inventiveness and creativity, and the possibility of discovery, are directly proportional to the number and kind of variables in it”[i]. He argued that creative opportunities should be for the many, not an elite few, and that all children should have the chance to experiment and make discoveries. Children’s play with loose parts is also explored in the Sydney Playground Project.

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[i] Nicholson S., 1971. How NOT to Cheat Children - The Theory of Loose Parts. Landscape Architecture, 62: 30-35