It is important for children and young people to choose and explore play spaces for themselves because it enables them to show their individuality and preferences and to grow in confidence. By making any choices, they have considered their preferences and are reflecting their own interests which in turn allows the play setting an insight into the child’s interests. Also the children and young people will be more engaged if they have self-chosen as it is interest based.
Letting them choose also meets one of the 7 play objectives (Best Play(NPFA2000)) is ‘the provision extends the choice and control that children have over their play, the freedom they enjoy and the satisfaction they gain from it’.
The methods were completed by interviewing child-minder’s and giving parents questionnaires to get their opinions on role play and the house corner. It was found that there are mixed views regarding role play,
“Play is a process that is freely chosen, personally directed and intrinsically motivated. Children and young people determine and control the content and intent of their play by following their instincts, ideas and interests in their own way and for their own reasons. The child chooses when and how to play and this is seen as a biological drive, essential to health and well-being.”
As an early years practitioner you will recognise that children’s play is closely linked to their learning and development. Children learn in so many different ways but you will notice that they learn mainly through play. When children are able to do many different activity’s that allows them to lean but have fun at the same time thy will find what they are doing fun and will engage the children. It is important that when in you your setting you set up a variety of educational activity’s this way the children will be able to choose freely what they want to do.
The kids have access to all resources, eliminating (reducing) all possible barriers that may prevent any of them to enjoy of their self- directed freely chosen play.
“Current theories about inclusive play revolve around the idea that play is important for life and that all play workers should be committed to creating play environments that are inclusive and that offer multi-sensory experiences for all children. Play environments should ensure children and young people can become involved in imaginary play and can help develop motor activity. They should also allow interaction in a safe environment. Play is seen as the language that can bring children of all different abilities together. All children and young people have the same basic needs and go through the same development stages, even though they may not all go through them at the same pace: some go through some stages more quickly than most, while others may become static in their development for a while. None of this should prevent access to any setting. Through play with other children they develop social skills and learn about behaviour, communication and friendship. Play is the tool for practical learning
Finally, I work hard to create an indoor and outdoor environment that enriches, challenges, and encourages children to develop interests, connect with each other, have alone time, and learn through play. I accomplish this goal by continually assessing my play materials, adding new things, gauging my children’s interests and needs, and adjusting my environment accordingly.
Preference for outdoor play. Child A plays mostly outdoors as he believes it is more fun, and loves to investigate the surroundings. The choice of indoor play is often related to the weather, child A only plays inside when its cold or raining. It is only in severe weather conditions children have to stay in doors as in our setting we believe the children can learn and develop much more outside even when the weather is poor. Play preferences are the child’s own choices & the freedom & opportunities to be able to make those choices by enabling varied resources that are
When learning becomes fun the teachers find it less challenging for trying to keep the child engaged in the activity at hand. The job of the educator working with a play-based curriculum is to facilitate play, to draw out and extend what children learn through play (Play Based Programmes, 2015). Children have a variety of play spaces available that mimic their regular world around them, each space can be intertwined with another centre such as combining the truck centre with the block centre, or adding in some zoo animals to the area. The play based approach can be used by children of all abilities, it allows children to play independently or as a small group, and allows the children the opportunity to bring their home life into their play.
A child centred approach is important because, if a child has an option to choose what they want to do, they will be able to process information more efficiently through the motivation of play, and how much time they have to explore by themselves. The EYFS declares that “children learn though actively investigating the world around them.” Therefore the more they engage with an activity of their choice the more they will take from it and learn.
Conflicts of the West Introduction There has been many conflicts in the West that have included whites, and Native Americans. The hardships, and conflicts that the Native Americans have had to go through are very substantial to the history that was made in the West. Exactly how did the Indians start out in the West? The conflicts in the West were very external like conflicts between the tribes, extinction of the buffalo, wars with whites, and being moved from homes onto reservations.
Play contributes to children’s “physical, emotional and social well-being” (Else, 2009, p.8) and through play, the child’s holistic development and well-being is being constantly accounted for as is it led by the individual. The child decides what s/he wants to do and does it; it is
The Early Years Learning Framework relates the importance of play to notions of belonging, being and becoming. It states that children make sense of their social worlds through playing with others (DEEWR, 2009). Article 13 of the UN Convention reads that every child has the right to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child (Connor, 2010). It is important to note that play has multiple approaches and that children’s play varies greatly according to culture, interests,
In addition to play promoting pleasure as well as physical activity, play forms the holistic growth in children’s development, or to put it in another way using Brown (2003) acronym, acknowledged as ‘SPICE’; play represents the ‘social interaction’; ‘physical activity’; ‘intellectual stimulation’; creative achievement and emotional stability, (with the addition of “compound flexibility”) in a child’s development. Compound flexibility is the idea that a child’s psychological development occurs using the relationship between his/her environment with the adaptability of the child himself. Thus the flexibility of surroundings and his/her adaptableness can provide children the means to explore; experiment and investigate (Brown, 2003, pp. 53-4). On the contrary, the absence of social interaction and physical activity through the means of play can inhibit children’s overall development and without the consistency of play children suffer a “chronic lack of sensory interaction with the world, [which leads to] a form of sensory deprivation” (Hughes, 2001, p.217 in Lester and Maudsley 2006).
Play is satisfying to the child, creative for the child and freely chosen by the child.
Freely chosen play is where children are able to choose what they want to do