Which one works the best?

Last Monday, Diane began work with a small group of three: Chester, Maren, and Brooke. She invited them to create a video about how to build a catapult. The children decided that they want the video to feature two catapults.

"Our video is about catapults that work and catapults that don’t work. Because this one works well and this one does not work well." Brooke

However, the group created two working catapults and could not decide which one to use for the video. They presented this problem to the whole group during Friday's morning gathering and asked the class to vote on the two designs.

Mark demonstrated how each catapult worked and then we held a vote.

"Demonstration is he's gonna show it and then you vote which one works better." Chester

"...to see which one goes higher." Charlie

"It's like we each write it on the paper. And then we put them all in the basket and then we count them and the one that has more wins." Brooke

Children and teachers voted.  A small group counted and recorded the votes.

A small group project can be an opportunity to engage the larger community in reflection. As Chester, Maren and Brooke present their thinking to the group, they invite the entire studio to make new meaning of our play with catapults. The larger group is engaged in the process, helping to solve the problems that arise, providing feedback in the form of suggestions and questions. Reflecting in this way, the whole group will create a shared knowledge and the small group video will make this knowledge visible.