Ok, so I believe that the very notion of a timetable is contradictory to a play-based class that aims for child led learning through interests and urges. So we 'formally' ditched it this year and it has the best thing we could have done. Like a flowing stream I believe a play-based class meanders, whilst the water is all ultimately travelling in the same direction, every drop of water travels a slightly different path. Restricting play to a timetable gives a ping pong effect, that I personally find very stressful, for me I wanted to get of the conveyor belt and just allow the learning to take over. So what it is it we do, are we travelling along blind. are we still planning? Yes we are planning, I look at it like different camera angles, there is the extreme wide shot that shows us the full picture, the wide shot that focuses in on particular items and the close up which picks out priorities for the day/week. Alright, enough of the waffle, this is how I do it (...
I am passionate about play and structured explicit learning, finding the best of both worlds.