SUPPORT FOR CHILDREN'S EMERGING mathematical thinking is a characteristic of high-quality early childhood education. Young children's spatial thinking, an important component of mathematical thinking, is both innate and influenced by experience. Since spatial thinking contributes to children's mathematical thinking, it is important for children to engage in activities that support this learning. Early childhood educators are calling for guidance in how to support children's mathematical thinking in the context of an informal curriculum. In this paper, we describe how a project-based approach to mathematics teaching and learning provided a range of opportunities for children to investigate and rehearse understandings of two- and three-dimensional (2D and 3D) shapes and spatial thinking within the context of a project that was of ‘real world’ interest to the children. By intentionally embedding multiple opportunities for children to explore shapes and spatial thinking in a sequence of core learning experiences and complementary experiences, educators provided children with opportunities to rehearse shape and spatial concepts and related language in differing ways. Opportunities for formative assessment of children's learning are also discussed.

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THIS PAPER REPORTS ON a social emotional learning (SEL) program entitled COPE-R and the role of the teacher in supporting young children's developing social and emotional understandings, particularly around caring and empathy. Thirty-eight four- and five-year-old children and their teacher from an inner-Melbourne city long day preschool program participated in the research. The teacher was also a member of the research team hence the study falls within the realm of practitioner-research, which aims to shed further light on the role of the teacher in designing, implementing and evaluating challenging programs for young children. A qualitative case study methodology was employed to ensure that the voices of the children and the teacher-researcher were centrally located in the research. The data included the teacher-researcher's program plans and reflective journal notes, children's drawing-tellings and transcribed child interview data. Findings highlight the capacities of the participating children to engage in the COPE-R program and to demonstrate increased social emotional skill development—as evidenced through being able to identify and give voice to social emotional issues, enact relational empathy, demonstrate care for others and the environment, and recognise emotions in self and others. Also, the findings provide insight into the role of the teacher in implementing the COPE-R program, which enabled the participating children to give voice to a range of social and emotional issues including empathy, reciprocity, generosity, kindness and joy.

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