Warm and responsive relationships + dialogue + play

According to Perry and Dockett (2002), warm and responsive relationships are important to facilitate play and results in learning. Through the establishment of such relationships, teachers assume “the role of provocateur” (p. 98) by posing questions, including elements of surprise, asking children to mathematically justify reasons for their positions, encouraging collaboration, and reasoning with children by making explicit “the logical consequences of the positions [children] adopt” (p.98). Mathematical concepts need to be taught explicitly (Haynes, 2000). However, that does not necessarily mean taking a transmissive approach, which conceptualise children as being passive learners – empty vessels that receive knowledge which teachers pour into them. Instead, by taking a social-constructivist approach, we view children as active participants in their own learning and constructors of meaning and social interactions as being integral for optimising such meaning-making (Perry & Dockett, 2002). Through warm and responsive relationships we can provoke children to pose and investigate mathematical problems as well as discuss mathematical ideas, hypotheses, strategies and understandings using mathematical reasoning, in a way which makes mathematical learning experiences fun and enjoyable.