I had a teacher tell me this the other day. She had a child in the class who was dumping toys, over and over again. She would try to clean them up, and the other kids would help, but this one child just kept dumping and dumping and dumping. She expressed her frustration about the situation to me with this statement.

We all have a vision of how our classrooms should run. Smooth transitions from one activity to the next, children sitting criss-cross applesauce for circle time as we go over letters and numbers, peaceful play in centers with everyone playing together nicely. We've seen it happen - we know it is possible. So why can't we achieve this ideal in our classrooms?

Reality is a lot more messy, especially after the disruption that was COVID. We are still experiencing the after effects and are seeing how those affect classroom life. It seems like the days of a smooth running classroom are over, but we have to keep in mind that COVID changed aspects of our society that are affecting child development and behavior.

How Societal Changes are Affecting Child Development and Behavior

There are many factors that influence children's development and behavior. There are the genes they inherit from their parents and the socioeconomic status of the family. The stress that the parents are feeling can affect development and behavior. The cognitive stimulation that a child receives in different environments can affect development and behavior as well. Think about the ways that COVID has impacted these areas in families' lives. We know that screens are much more prevalent in children's lives than they used to be. We know that everyone is experiencing the financial strain of inflation in our economy as prices for necessities like food and clothing go up. How do you think this affects the stress level of children's parents in our society? How do you think the parents' stress affects the child's behavior?

These are questions that can be hard to ask ourselves in the moment, but that we should reflect on as we help these children be successful. Being aware of the stressors that they are facing before they even arrive in our classroom can help us in our responses to their behavior.

Managing Our Expectations

We come into the classroom with the picture in our head of the perfect circle time, the kids lining up in a quiet, straight line when we leave the classroom, and a smooth peaceful day. We strive every day to work toward this ideal, but sometimes it feels like we never get any closer to it.

This might be because the children that are in our care are simply unable to meet that ideal. When we talk about the field of early childhood, we are talking about kids that range in ages from infants to 8 years old. This blog focuses on children from infants to 5 years old. These kids don't have the impulse control to allow them to sit for long periods of time, keep their hands to themselves, or take turns. They need to move, to touch, to do. Helping them be successful typically looks like providing them with opportunities to do that throughout the day. It also looks like managing our expectations when it comes to sitting for a circle time or a story.

In this day and age, kids outside of school are sitting at home more than any other time in history. Screens are a big part of parenting. Whether we like it or not, it's true. So we have to recognize that children may be sitting passively in front of a screen for more amounts of their day than they have in the past. That can make them more active in our childcare settings, where we have restrictions on screen time. We have to prepare ourselves and our classrooms with this expectation in mind: that children in this day and age may not be physically capable of sitting for the amounts of time that they were expected to in the past.

Not only that, but there are other consequences to added screen time that play into children's behavior in the classroom. Children who get more screen time are not exposed to as many toys and materials at home, so they may not have an understanding of how to use the materials we provide in the classroom. In the past, children seemed to readily pick up on how to use and play with the toys in the classroom environment. Now it seems like we have to do more teaching of how to use the materials that we provide. Add to that the type of stimulation that screens provide vs. hands-on materials. Screens provide stimulation that children don't have to work for. They simply have to passively sit and watch the action. While there may be some tapping or swiping in the case of an educational game on a tablet, there is not much work involved in that. This can lead to a decreased tolerance level when it comes to challenging activities (children can get frustrated more easily and may give up or quit quicker) and a need for activities that provide a lot of stimulation (active activities rather than passive activities) because that is what their brains are used to because of increased screen times.

Learning Through Repeating

One of the hallmarks of true learning is repeating the same types of activities over and over again. After all, practice makes perfect, right? A child doesn't pick up a crayon and automatically draw any item true to life the first time, and if you give them a pair of scissors they aren't going to cut intricate shapes and patterns the first time they use them either. We know that children repeat activities over and over again as they explore phenomenon or learn new skills. The same is true for the child dumping toys over and over again. They are learning something from this activity. Sometimes it takes us changing our mindset and taking a step back to figure out what they are getting out of it.

I was working in a two year old classroom years ago when I had a child who kept dumping out the duplo blocks over and over and over again. It drove me nuts, and every time he dumped the basket the blocks would make a terrific sound. When I stepped back and observed to see the activity from his point of view, I realized he was dumping the basket because of the sound. Whether he liked the sound or not, I don't know, but he was definitely exploring it. Once I realized his reason, I became a bit more tolerant of the activity and even turned it into a learning activity of my own. After he would dump the blocks out, I would take out some pieces of construction paper the same colors as the blocks and we would sort the blocks by color. I didn't take away the activity that he was obviously getting something out of, and I turned it into another opportunity to learn another skill.

Kids Will Dump

One of the things we have to recognize is that kids will dump. If there is a container that is full, their natural inclination will be to dump it out.

Why do they do this? There are several reasons why kids dump toys out. One is that they are exploring. They might be like my friend in the story above, exploring the noise the toys make as they fall out of the container. Or they might want to see what else is in the container. Or, if they already are familiar with what is in the container, they may be looking for a specific piece from the container.

They might be imitating actions they have seen from others. We all dump things out when we need to. And since all kids dump at some point, it is likely a specific child has seen someone else do it and is imitating that behavior.

Another reason why kids dump toys is due to their strong emotions. Kids can easily become frustrated, overwhelmed, or upset. Dumping toys is a way for them to feel some type of control over the moment, because big emotions can make us feel out of control. While these behaviors are undesirable in the heat of the moment, the desire to gain some sense of control in an out-of-control situation is understandable. The key to managing these types of impulses is to be as tuned in as possible to what upset the child in the first place and examine how we can help them through that upset productively. Dumping toys and tearing up the room is likely not going to change the outcome of the situation, so we may need to look at how we are approaching a child's emotions and how we are responding to their upset about a situation. Children's strong emotions are typically caused by a consequence that they don't like, such as a friend saying they don't want to play with them or a beloved activity being taken away because of improper usage. While it is important for us to follow through on the consequences that have presented themselves, we also need to be willing to look at the situation through the child's eyes and offer empathy. This child is experiencing some type of loss, which leads to a fight or flight response. The best thing we can offer them in that moment is acknowledgement of their feelings and help to them to move on from the upset. Saying things like, "I see that you are upset. It's hard when you can't do what you want to do. Would you like a hug?" can go a long way toward helping a child feel seen and helping them move beyond the upset of the situation.

Then there is dumping as a developmentally appropriate activity - called the "dump and fill" stage of play. This type of play usually emerges between 12 - 24 months of age, and is a stage that most children go through. It is important for us to keep in mind that development of every child happens at their own pace, so for some children this could show up earlier and for some it could show up later. Whenever it shows up, it can be a frustrating stage for teachers because it tends to be quite messy with all of the dumping happening. There can be the desire to put up baskets of toys that children usually dump so that we don't have to deal with the mess. The key to understanding any type of play, though, is to understand that children are getting some kind of learning out of it. Dumping and filling is no different, so when we try to suppress this urge in children by putting the dumpable toys out of reach, the urge will simply come back stronger until it is fulfilled. And it will eventually be fulfilled. We just have to support the behavior until the child moves on to something else.

How are we supposed to support a behavior that drives us crazy? By recognizing that the child is learning something about their world from the behavior. They are learning about how things work, what things do, the sounds they make and the jobs of certain objects. Providing the child with many different kinds of containers to fill and then dump can aid this exploration. From boxes to bags to baskets, the choices are endless. And items don't fall the same way or make the same sound when they fall from different containers, making the exploration that much more deeper and fulfilling the more variables are added to the exploration. The more we support the child in the activity of dumping and filling, the more they will learn from it.

Sometimes a child will dump a container and then move on to the next one. It's our job in that moment to offer them a container to put the materials back into, perhaps for another experiment in dumping. Maybe they aren't interested in the filling part of the "dump and fill" activity, but someone else in the classroom might be. Be willing to take the focus off of that one child, what they are doing, and what you would like them to do, and turn it into a learning experience for the entire group: "Jacob wanted to dump out this basket of toys! What container should we put these toys in?" This type of question to the group is a great invitation to explore the world of containers and the action of filling. Another great question would be "How many toys do you think we can put in this container? Let's count and find out!" Helping the children count the toys as they go into the container helps build on math skills and keeps our focus on the learning aspects of the "dump and fill" stage rather than the parts of it that frustrate us.

Conclusion

When kids dump toys repeatedly, it can be frustrating and disrupting to the entire classroom. There are many different reasons why kids dump toys and there are just as many ways we can look at the situation and try to help those children be successful. Using the activity of dumping toys as a learning opportunity can help us move past the frustrating aspects of kids dumping and turn them into educational gold for the other kids in the class.