The children were playing in the family corner. In the family corner, there was some plastic food and empty cereal boxes for them to use. There was a cupboard for all the food and boxes. Then next to the cupboard, there was a shelf filled with cups of tea bags, coffee, sugar, salt and rice. In front of it was a small table with a cash register.

The children that were playing at the family corner was playing shopping. J asked me to join them with their shopping. J gave me some pretend money to buy things. P went to grab a phone to put next to the cash register.

P said, “here J, this is for you to make calls, if you need someone’s help”. T went to get some fruits and cereal boxes to put on the shelf to sell. P said “we are ready now”. Then J said to me “come and buy something”. When I walked to the cash register, J said, “what do you want to buy?”. I then asked, “what do you have?”. J started to list some of the things he had. Then I paid J the ‘money’ and bought some fruits from him. Then, it was the next person’s turn to buy things. They continued this process for awhile but using different objects/food with a different person.

J soon needed to call someone, so he decided to use the phone. Soon, I decided to suggest to them to be turn-taking/sharing so that they could each get a turn with the cash register. “Suggestions can be used to enhance many areas of children’s learning” (MacNaughton and Williams, 2004, p. 194). Gonzalez-Mena (1998) mentions that teachers “should encourage sharing and taking turns” (p. 326), so that is why I decided to suggest sharing for the children.

I think that from this ‘dramatic play’, the children get to learn to “act out their feelings, as if they were someone else, or were experiencing an event again” and “they relieve anxiety and get used to the new situation by ‘playing out’ that experience” (Somerset, 2000, p. 63).

From this play, they got to interact with their friends, which provided them the “opportunities for children to interact with…. other children” (The Ministry of Education, 1996, p. 73). The children also “develop knowledge about the role of the wider world of work, such as the… supermarket” (The Ministry of Education, 1996, p. 56). I think that the children have extended their knowledge about ‘the supermarket’ after this dramatic play experience.

I think that next time if I do this again with the children, I could add more materials to the play to make it more interesting and creative. For example, we have different cooking utensils, and ‘dress-up’ clothing. We could have used these items to enhance the play by dressing up as other people, or using different materials and utensils to sell. This could make the play experience more dramatic and creating a new, exciting event for the children. I think that if we did this, it might have been more interesting and enjoyable for the children.