Take It And Put It Back

Original lesson metadata

code: EMP-SCFR-L1-T1-WK6
curriculum_id: "a_day_without_screens"
curriculum_name: "A Day Without Screens"
level_id: L1
level_name: "All ages together"
age_line: "around 2 to around 6"
term: 1
week: 6
title: "Take It And Put It Back"
aim: "Takes one card from six, does it, and returns the card before leaving the mat."
blocks_this_week: 2
minutes_per_block: 20
weekly_minutes: 40
blocks: [{n: 1, title: "Six And Still Choosing", minutes: 20}, {n: 2, title: "Carrying It Back", minutes: 20}]
domains: [PSED, PD, CL, EAD]
objectives: [{domain: PSED, text: "Chooses from six and returns the card to the mat afterwards."}, {domain: PD, text: "Carries the card back across the room and lays it flat."}, {domain: CL, text: "Names the card she has returned when asked."}, {domain: EAD, text: "Completes a making card or a sound card in her own way rather than copying another child."}]
materials: ["Things To Do cards 1 to 12", "new this week: Carry The Water, Sweep This Bit", "the things those cards name, or their minimum versions", "one dry cloth on the floor beside any card that uses water"]
space: "One mat, or one swept square of floor the size of a door, in the same place every week."
differentiation: {younger: "Point at the mat from where she is standing rather than walking her back.", older: "Ask her to lay the six cards out again at the start of block two."}
watching_for: "Whether she walks past a near card to reach a further one."
resources: []
version: 1.0
date: "2026-09-04"
access: free

A DAY WITHOUT SCREENS · CHOOSING WHAT TO DO

L1 · around 2 to around 6 · TERM 1, WEEK 6 · 2 × 20 minutes


DOMAINS: PSED, PD, CL, EAD
CODE: EMP-SCFR-L1-T1-WK6
DAY & DATE:

Objectives

PSED Chooses from six and returns the card to the mat afterwards.
PD Carries the card back across the room and lays it flat.
CL Names the card she has returned when asked.
EAD Completes a making card or a sound card in her own way rather than copying another child.

Before the mat goes down

You will think six cards is too many and you will want to put four out. Every teacher wants to reduce the spread at this point. Six is the number that stops her taking the nearest one out of habit, and four is not.

Three of them will still take the nearest one. Move the mat so that the nearest card is different for each child, or move where the children come in from. The habit is about geometry rather than about the card.

The failure this week is the card that comes back to the wrong place. She will bring it to the mat, which is the hard part done, and then lay it on top of another card. Leave it. Tidy the mat between the two blocks and not during one.

Returning the card is not tidying. It is the first time she closes a thing she opened, and the whole of week ten depends on it. A row of ten cards only works if a card that has been used goes back to being available.

By week six the corners of the first two cards are soft and one of them is torn. Cut replacements now rather than in week nine. A card that has gone floppy reads as a different card to a three year old and she will stop choosing it.

Do the return while she is still standing at the end of her card, not after she has wandered. The gap between finishing and returning is where it is lost, and that gap is about four seconds long.

One child will do the card and take it home in her pocket. She is not stealing it, she has decided it is hers. Cut her a copy, write nothing on it, and give it to her without ceremony. She will bring the mat card back within a fortnight.

How the mat always runs

One adult stays with the mat while cards are out. The children carry their cards away from the mat and come back to it, so the adult stays where the cards are and not where the children go.
Water sits in a cup or a jug and never in anything deeper than a cup. A dry cloth stays on the floor beside any card that uses water. A spill is dried before the next child crosses that floor.
Hands are washed after any card that uses water, and after sweeping.
Every card is larger than a hand. Every object a card asks for is larger than a fist. Nothing smaller comes onto the mat, whatever the card says.
If something appears on the mat or on the floor that is not on the card list, stop, move the children back one full step, touch nothing, and deal with it alone.
A child who takes no card stays on the mat. She is not handed one and she is not asked again. She is counted as present and the mat carries on around her.
A child who takes the same card every week keeps taking it. Nothing is said about it.
A card with no materials in this room is run in its minimum version, which is written on the card. The minimum version is not a lesser version.
The word screen is not said to the children in any session of this curriculum, and no child is asked what she does at home.

This week on the mat

How the card reaches her this week. Six cards lie face up on the mat. She takes one, does it, and returns it to the mat.

Six And Still Choosing · 20 minutes

AIM: Chooses from six without taking the nearest one every time.

Six cards, two rows of three, laid so that the nearest card to the door is one she rarely takes. Stand at the far side. Say the line and then move to a different corner of the mat, so that where you are standing is not a clue. Watch which hand goes out first. The block ends when six cards have gone.

SAY: "Six on the mat. Look at the far ones too."

Carrying It Back · 20 minutes

AIM: Brings the card back to the mat herself and lays it down face up.

Stay at the mat with your hands empty and visible. As each child arrives, point at the floor of the mat with one finger and take your hand away again straight after. Do not take the card from her. If she puts it down on top of another card, leave it there. The block ends when the mat has six cards on it, however they are stacked.

SAY: "Bring it here. Lay it down. Picture side up, please."

If you have more time

Turn one card face down in the spread and see whether anybody turns it back over. Slots into block one, five minutes.

One line home

Your child chose from six things today and put the card back afterwards. Ask her which six.

If you are asked why: putting it back is what keeps the choice available.

You will know it is working when

She walks past the nearest card to get one further away. The card comes back to the mat before she goes anywhere else.

Notes: