Hello
the bat phone bark phone rang
ooh i DO like questions about treasure baskets
of course anything you like could happen at a treasure basket groups but i know of 3 sorts -
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you could just have treasure baskets and let the babies play
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at my one we start and finish with musical games / parachute play etc
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i heard of one where the babies played while the parents took part in a kind of support group / parenting skills course, facilitated by the organiser of the session
In all cases the treasure basket play should be unstructured and free, in my opinion. the parents need to supervise but shouldn't really be 'doing' anything other than sitting nearby and watching benignly, so a good time to chat and have a cup of tea.
as for how old is too old - Elinor G the grandmother of treasure baskets, developed the idea for seated but not yet crawling babies, so from about 6 months to 9 months, something like that. this age is actually the safest for playing with the objects as babies of that age can not usually throw or poke, and they aren't standing so they don't drop stuff on their toes, etc.
however IME older babies and indeed much older children still enjoy the baskets. i started bringing one to my class for older children, to entertain their younger siblings while the class was on, however ALL the children like playing with it and their treasure basket play gets more sophisticated as they grow older. so i don't think there is an upper age limit. the parents seem to like them as well. they should be full of nice interesting sensory things - which appeals to anyone, of any age.
the only thing i would say is that during the classic toddler period, from about 1 year to say 2.5 years, what is called heuristic play with objects is a better and more age appropriate activity, especially for groups of children. with heuristic play with objects you have COLLECTIONS of things, eg a bag of wooden pegs, a collection of large tins, a bag of corks, rather than a variety of different things. 2 reasons for this - at this stage a child's play is about "what can i DO with this?" rather than the baby stage of "what is this object like?". so a selection of materials designed to be rolled, posted, stacked, sorted, emptied, filled, etc, is satisfying and challenging for them. secondly the children this age will have great difficulty sharing or taking turns, so ensuring large quantities of the same object ensures that they can play alongside other toddlers without so much conflict as with a treasure basket, where several children will want the same item.
hope this helps
i really do love talking about it so let me know if i can help further or if anything did not make sense
xx