Early childhood education (EYFS) in the UK has put forward many requirements for kindergarten practice, one of which is the "enabling environment". Creating an enabling environment refers to creating a challenging, developmentally appropriate environment based on the children's interests. In Chiway Repton Kindergarten, how have we, the K3 China class, combined the IB PYP curriculum with environment creation? How could we truly make the children the master of the environment?

Before the children returned to school, the teachers of the K3 China class continued to use a "Chinese style" as the main aspect of environment creation and decoration and took the children's art work "Only Green" from K2 as the theme of the whole class's environmental creation. The children's works are displayed in the corridor and echo with the "green landscape" and "painted umbrella - spring" at the top.

The walls in the class are also decorated with a "Chinese-styled landscape" as the frame of our display boards, waiting for the children to fill the space with the results of their own explorations.

When the students came back to school and they arrived in class, they had to draw their own "self-portrait" on the sign-in board at the entrance of the class, indicating that they were a member of the class. This self-portrait has also become the first "family portrait" of our K3-China Class.

On the first day of school, we discussed the classroom agreement with the children. The children divided themselves into groups to discuss which rules we need to abide by in the class and shared them after their discussion. After this, they used their own fingerprint to create a ‘Superhero’ signature, to indicate that they agree to the rules in the classroom agreement and would abide by them in class.

Each corner of the K3 China class has been designed according to the interests of the children. In K2, the children often mentioned "Haidilao". In K3, we opened a "Haidilao" hot pot restaurant in the class. The children discussed the rules and procedures of the hot pot restaurant by themselves and made the restaurant menu as well as the hot pot "ingredients" out of clay.

Our fashion studio is a place for kids to design freely - they can make bracelets, necklaces, and clothing for themselves and their friends. When the children plan to create clothing, they first create a design sketch in the class, they can then use the materials in the art room or bring materials from home, and then they complete the production process in the "studio".

After the children entered the art classroom, the children found that "there are no artworks on the walls of the art room!" While they were painting in the classroom, they discovered that the art classroom had a lot of broken crayons, damaged colored pencils, and watercolor pens that had dried out. The children asked, "Where are these pens going?" "Can we recycle them?" This gave me a good idea and I discussed with the children how these materials could be used. What can we make to decorate an art room?

First, we divided the children into groups, and they discussed what kind of work their group was going to create. They then created draft sketches, each with its own theme and characteristics.

After that, with the assistance of the teacher, the children moved the sketches to the big KT board one after another and decorated and colored their own boards.

After painting, the children who designed a universe asked, "Can we put a transparent semicircle as a helmet for the astronauts?", I then assisted the children of the group with looking for materials and suggested that we use the damaged materials from the art room. The children quickly separated the colors of the materials and were ready to create on their own boards.

Throughout this time with the children, we can see that the school is closely related to the children's learning and life; we can see the role of the school in leading and educating the children; and we can see the traces of the children's gradual growth. As a teacher, we should not control children's thoughts and behaviors in the creation of the environment and should let the environment truly become a space for children to think, express, and act.

The K3 China class's journey of environmental innovation continues, and we look forward to their growth!