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In this video Luna, has been invited to draw, using pastels over paper that has been placed on a ramp on the outside deck. Luna begins her work by moving her body up and down on the ramp, and in between the movement she makes marks on her paper. Luna adds sound in addition to the movements, and her movements range from jumping to sliding on her knees. Why does Luna include this type of action while drawing? When thinking about how young children play and create, we often observe them doing so by using their whole bodies, often times trying to make themselves bigger. We can refer to the phrase embodied cognition, the idea that the brain not only gives directions to the body but that the body-movements give new information to the brain. How many of us have to pretend to key in a phone number to remember the correct sequence? But more than memory retrieval, imagine what sort of mathematics our specie would have created had our bodies not been bilaterally symmetrical. Click here (or go to http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/11/04/a-brief-guide-...) to learn more about embodied cognition, to wit: "Embodied cognition is the striking claim that the very structure of reason itself comes from the details of our embodiment… Thus, to understand reason we must understand the details of our visual system, our motor system, and the general mechanism of neural binding." Things to ponder: • If the provocation had been offered at a table with a chair for sitting, how might the outcome have differed? • How does the role of the teacher influence the outcome of this provocation? • Luna describes what she is drawing @ 0:30, as “a big heart for Luna”. Is she drawing her idea of what a heart looks like or her idea of what big looks like? • How does Luna’s body movement influence her mark making process? • Why do you think Luna combines sound with her large motions? • Have you heard children use metaphors that reference their own body shape, movement or constraints, e.g., "That joke was over my head"? Length of video: 1 minute Keywords: Threes, Body, Movement, Drawing, Representation, Creativity