3D-materials’ Resistance and Challenge

Long time ago I watched my son building with Lego-blocks. At that moment, building in height seemed to be one of the main challenges he faced and he was using whatever was possible to stack on the top of each other – even pigs and palms!

A week ago I experienced a massive sculpture carved in Norwegian stone Larvikitt by Martin Kuhn (in cooperation with Makoto Fujiwara) and placed as a part of the Norwegian peace monument in Sarajevo (Norsk Fredsmonument i Sarajevo). Can you imagine which kind of challenge it can be to re-shape the hard surface of the solid rock with you hands? - and to transport its 30 tons 1800 km away?

Today I analyse what “my” early childhood students did in contexts where they played with 3D-materials. What happened when the materials surprised them with their resistance? How eager were they to take action when the materials’ qualities challenged them?

Some of the children, when they discovered a new quality of a material, seemed to be curious and motivated to different kinds of activities towards the material (jumping on it, lifting it, crawling through…). But the materials’ resistance also initiated activities in their mind when they tried to understand – to make meaning of the new experiences.

Elliot Eisner wrote: “Constrains and affordances emerge in any selection of tasks and materials. These tasks and materials constitute what it is that the student will need to “get smart about”. Getting smart, in this context, means coming to know the potential of the materials in relation to the aims of project or problem; and since each material possesses unique qualities, each material requires the development of distinctive sensibilities and technical skills. (Eisner, p.72).”

With another words, our environment offers us possibilities and limitations to learn through interactions with it. The selection of 3D-materials for student activities in early childhood and schools will therefore also be “the selection of an array of forces that will influence how students will be challenged to think” (Eisner 2002, p. 72).

Eisner, E. W. (2002). The arts and the creation of mind. New Haven: Yale University Press.