Sunday, 5 August 2012

Digital Camera




Digital Camera 


child using camera
With working at my home centre for 3 years, the children have always been interested in taking photos or being photographed. I decided to bring my camera in to the centre and allow children to take photos of each other. I believe cameras have come a long way from Kodak rewind cameras to now digital cameras.




I gave the children my digital camera to have a play with. Children were taking photos of each other and then playing it back to see how they looked in the photo. Before I brought my camera into the centre.  I thought maybe it might be a bit difficult for the children to use or explore as it is quite technical with lots of buttons. Surprisingly it wasn’t, children knew which was the shutter button. They were familiar with shapes and logos that symbolised certain things like the play shape on remotes are the same logo that was on my digital camera. A child said to me “This is the play button Ash, I have this button on my dvd remote”. It was good to see that children were familiar with certain things of the camera.


I found that children were learning social skills by asking children if they could take a photo of them, this was a sign on respect and well being. This is linked to “Technology- capability in solving practical problems contributes to self- confidence and wellbeing” (Ministry of Education, 1996, p.94).




Photography for children 



The centre is very anti-technology, staff believe that children who are exposed to technology will not take risks and not build on their learning development. I decided to introduce the digital camera to children and the staff as I way to show staff that technology has its place in Early childhood setting.Children were exploring with the camera, taking photo’s from different angle’s and learning about the different shapes and viewing nature from the view of the lens. Children were learning about creativity learning by talking about the ways things looking different from a camera’s lens. Something that was also great to see was that children were taking care of the camera, using it in an appropriate manner. I noticed a huge amount of social learning where children talked about the photos they took. This is linked to “Techonology is also a creative and purposeful activity aimed at meeting needs and opportunities through the development of products, systems or enviorment” (Smorti, 1999, p.5).


I found that the digital camera was a great way for me to introduce technology to my centre, since teachers do use it on a daily basis but are not afraid to use it but are afraid of using other technologies or allow children to use other technologies. From this experience I was able to explain to staff that children were gaining meta-cognitive ability which means “that is, their ability to think about their own thinking” (Ministry of Education, 2006, p.24).

I believe a digital camera is a great social tool for children, it influences children to talk about their photos, it allows children to explore their own thinking and gain cognitive skills. I believe this is linked to “Piaget said that children are able to succeed in cognitive tasks depending on the presence of certain operational compentecies” (Smith, 1998, p.6).

Therefore I believe technology such as a digital camera is not only a great social skill tool but also a great way to get isolated children to interact with other children and the teacher. Children are able to take their own photos and explore in their own thinking.

I believe technology is here to stay and therefore we should embrace it and teach children the basic use of these technologies. 



Reference 


Child using camera Retrieved from: http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?q=children+using+camera&um=1&hl=en&biw=1280&bih=760&tbm=isch&tbnid=VioNk86Ca6H_mM:&imgrefurl=http://edrudge90.blogspot.com/2011/02/creative-ways-to-use-technlogy.html&docid=HpyFCswEyXSf5M&imgurl=https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxE9Y5si9KBY77Db6cBnRDEXknho4sDHoqhssJM5OPY7DBPzP8Kf3NOaSbjLcW67SPu3e6PvBcHERWDUMyQM4Uv7NXxFJ2BlAhIcwRNBG9lpL80eb_6G_zImFH76B7NPF2tP8LdMlCrYA/s1600/child%25252Busing%25252Bcamera.jpg&w=389&h=349&ei=H2A4UNrMFo2ciAfQpYCoDA&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=522&sig=101586902518276814607&page=1&tbnh=127&tbnw=161&start=0&ndsp=26&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:68&tx=66&ty=13

Photography for children retrieved from: http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?q=children+using+camera&um=1&hl=en&biw=1280&bih=760&tbm=isch&tbnid=b_TReqLcgtyfjM:&imgrefurl=http://www.everydaychristianity.com/articles/family-life-articles/home-schooling/photography-for-children/&docid=gyR_gkO7HHiiZM&imgurl=http://www.everydaychristianity.com/images/photography_for_children.jpg&w=499&h=332&ei=3WE4UI2YBuq8iAeZzIDYCw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=524&sig=101586902518276814607&page=1&tbnh=114&tbnw=171&start=0&ndsp=26&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:0,i:74&tx=108&ty=28

Ministry of Education. (1996). Early Childhood Curriculum Te Whāriki: He whāriki mātauranga mo nga mokopuna o Aotearoa .Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.


 Ministry of Education. (2006). The New Zealand Curriculum. Draft of consultation 2006. Wellington,

           Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.  
Smith, A. Understanding children's development (4th ed.). Wellington, New Zealand. Bridget Williams books Ltd.   
Smorti, S. (1999) Technology in Early Childhood. Early Education, 19, 5-10.
     



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6 comments:

  1. rachel sun12 August 2012 at 02:11

    Good girl, Ash! You are always the first one to start the assignment.Hehe, I hope this time I will be the first one to post a comment on...Haha...

    I agree there are many educational and developmental benefits for children to use digital cameras. At my home centre we just give children to use the broken digital cameras, just for fun. I believe using a real digital camera can help young children to improve not only their hand-eye coordination skills, but also their cognitive and social skills. Moreover, children’s spatial awareness can be developed when they take the photos and edit images after the shot.
    Digital cameras also provide a great way for teachers to interact with their children. Talking about the photos allows children and teacher to revisit their work, to evoke their learning experience. Talay-Ongan (2005) emphasises the use of digital cameras effectively (Talay-Ongan & Ap, 2005).
    I think using digital cameras to teach our children will depend on children’s age and experience, depend on what age they can play with the digital cameras in an appropriate manner. I work with the children under 2. Obviously I will not let them play the real digital cameras by this age. However I would like to teach them to become familiar with cameras through showing them images on the LCD, and letting them look back themselves- happy, sad, crying or funny face!

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  2. Jasmeet17 August 2012 at 22:35

    Hi Ash
    You provided an excellent opportunity for the children to think and explore their ability in to use the digital camera in the centre. I think you have provided children to get familiar with the new technology. Ash as you have told us about how your centre is very anti –technology and the staff and not exposed to take risk for the children learning. I think you have done a good job by giving the children the opportunity to use the new digital technology the digital camera which will enable the children to gain the confidence and develop their ability to think and capture their own photos .As, you have talked in your reflection about how the technology is going to stay forever and children need to learn the basic about the technologies.
    “Technology is about helping people and solving problems” (Smorti, 1999, p.3). I totally agree to what you say because as an early childhood teacher we need to teach the children the basic skills by giving them the opportunities through which they can explore their ideas.

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  3. Unknown26 August 2012 at 03:54

    Ash you are so generous and children are so lucky to have you in centre as your centre is very anti –technology. You said: “I thought maybe it might be a bit difficult for the children to use or explore as it is quite technical with lots of buttons. Surprisingly it wasn’t”. I think probably it is because we have already belonged to the last generation. We couldn’t imagine that how fast children can accept new things, isn’t it?
    I agree with all your “believes” (I noticed that you like using this word ^.^). By providing this digital camera experience, children are able to gain confidence and explore something new in the centre, it creates a new excitement for them. “Technology- Capability in solving practical problems contributions to self-confidence and well-being” (Ministry of Education, 1996).
    But Ash I am wondering what did you centre (centre manager or other staffs) say when you introduced digital camera to children because you said your centre is very anti-technology.

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    Replies
    1. Ashly30 August 2012 at 13:20

      I have mentioned it in my blog already "From this experience I was able to explain to staff that children were gaining meta-cognitive ability which means “that is, their ability to think about their own thinking”. As I am still waiting for my final reflection and still introducing technology in the centre, staff are still getting use to the idea.

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  4. Catherine26 August 2012 at 21:45

    My centre is not great on technology as well. I liked the fact that you brought in your camera for the children to practice their skill on. In a lot of centres only the teachers have access to the camera and I believe that’s a bit of a shame as we are only postponing there development in this area. Most children have cameras at home and they most certainly will use them when they get to school, where they will be learning about technology practice knowledge and the nature and technology programmes (Ministry of Education, 2007).When you think about how much exposure children will be getting at primary school it makes you think that we as teachers could be doing more to help them prepare for school. Also as you pointed out, when children are using the camera they are developing other areas of their development such as social skills, shapes, symbols and communication skills, all of which are of vital importance to a child’s progression. If children can learn to respect technology equipment then they will lean to have respect for each other.

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  5. Unknown30 August 2012 at 23:09

    Ash I totally agree with u about “the digital camera was a great way to introduce technology to the centre”. Last year, I provide children camera to taking pictures in my excursion as well. In the excursion I found that it is a little bit hard for children taking the pictures because of them were still young. Their hands were shaking when they push the button. I believe that gave children more opportunities to have practice, they will master the skills very quickly. “Technology is about helping people and solving problems” (Smorti, 1999.p. 3). Maybe the picture was not perfect, but it is the process of their learning. They can get in touch with the nature world and use their lens of camera to represent it. It is awesome! “Try to get as close as possible to capture details, take pictures from multiple angles, and get some shots of the surroundings” (Hachey., & Butler, 2009, p. 45). Te Whariki Strand 4, Goal 4 said that “Children experience an environment where they discover and develop different ways to be creative and expressive” (Ministry of Education, 1996).

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