Today, in the morning, the preschool room was filled with excitement when children have found one more role-play area called a Hair Salon. The space was prepared like a play area with toy hairdryers, ribbons of various colours, and clips and combs. I started at the salon chair where one of the children acted as my hairdresser and asked me what kind of a style I desired. I role-played ways polite customers addressed hairdressers, by saying, please and thank you, in order to promote respectful communication (Early Childhood Australia, 2016).

This activity enhanced fine motor considering that all the action required the hands twisting of ribbons, manipulation of clips, and combing of dolls hair. It also promoted EYLF Outcome 5: Children are effective communicators, as they had an extensive conversation, practised turn-taking and language associated with a certain job (Department of Education, 2022).

Some of the children started putting coloured ribbons in the hair of others leading to a conversation about diversity between individuals, which was they can have different types of hair, colour, and hairstyles, as different cultures create their own styles. This was connected to NQS QA6: Collaborative partnerships with families and communities since we discussed how the families of certain children style their hair differently when celebrating various events or these traditions (ACECQA, 2020).

 

Professional Reflection: As today showed, role-play can be used in the development of not only social skills and language, but also cultural awareness. One of the things I would include in the salon theme in the future is some hair accessories representing various cultures which will promote diversity and inclusion.