In Early Childhood, Play Diverges, Contingent On An Immense

Play is essential to every part of children’s lives and is important to their development. It provides the children with different ways of doing things children will want to explore and learn new things.

The Playwork Principles (2006) state “All children and young people need to play. The impulse to play is innate”.

The relationship between play and learning seems obvious to many child professionals and parents, and yet there are still lack of understanding surrounding the importance of children's play. Some people believe that children need to "work" not play, and that playing serves no useful purpose in a learning and development environment. This is surprising considering that play, with its high levels of motivation and potential enjoyment empowers children (as well as people

Why is it important for a child to play? In one article, it is stated that free, unstructured play is important for a child’s brain development (Anonymous, 2016). It allows for the child to not only

The idea of “play” is also discussed in this video and is important to babies and children’s development. When children and babies play, they are actually conducting a series of experiments. According to Gopnik, letting children and babies play is significant to their development because it allows for “counterfactual thinking, which is the idea of babies and children thinking of different possibilities.” (Gopnik, Alison. “Let the Children Play, It’s Good for Them!”

My own framework of play takes a great deal from Vygotsky, but takes pieces from both Bronfenbrenner and Piaget and might be seen as having social constructivism tendencies. I tend to see Piaget’s stage theory as lacking in the thought that children’s social interactions plays such a vital role in development, his interpretation of adaptation being part of the process in which accommodation and assimilation are continuously fluctuating and is evident in children (Frost et al, 2011). The exposure to fresh experiences, for children, and being able to integrate them, falls

There are numerous theories of play and countless theorists, from Freud and Spencer to Piaget and Vygotsky, who have studied play in relation to what it is and what it does for the child. This essay will outline the definition and value of play and the importance of how it can foster the child’s learning in regards to these theorists who studied the effects in great detail. It will discuss the how the environments constructed by educators can impact play and the theories of learning relating to the quote “play and learning are inextricably woven together ...” Ebbeck and Waniganayake, 2010, p. 5).

The importance of play has been a long debated topic in elementary schools across the United States. There have been numerous research studies conducted to discover if play is effective or not. Psychologist Lev Vygotsky 's theory of cognitive development posits that information from the external world is transformed and internalized through language.  Since language is both a symbolic system of communication and a cultural tool used to transmit culture and history, play is an essential part of both language development and a child 's understanding of the external world (Bodrova & Leong, 2010). Children have dialogues with others when they engage in play, which enhances cognitive development.

Let’s start at the beginning when a baby is born, the brain is like a sculpture waiting to be molded. It has been known that a child's brain develops very quickly in the early years of its life. There are all different types of play whether it is set up or free play it definitely ensures that one’s child will get a wide variety of experiences. Children can almost play with anything o0r anywhere, its almost as “play is a child’s work, play is important” (McNamee-Anderson, 2010).

One of the signs of early childhood development is the ability to engage in play. Young children (ages 4-6) prefer non structured environments that gives them the “freedom” to un-limit their play in different settings. Working with preschoolers for over five years, I am fascinated to learn all the different ways children play to learn. I understand every child has their unique talents and skills that makes them individuals. It is important to sketch out different play strategies for children and their desired interests. The goal is to answer the question: what way do children learn the best; actual or dramatic.

What is play? When people think of the word play, usually a mental picture of children and various toys enter their minds. However play is so much more than the action of picking up a G.I Joe and playing soldiers. It can be affected by one’s environment, one’s culture, and can even be altered due to changing developmental stages (Let Them Play, 2016). As I look back on my own personal experiences, it is easy to see how these factors even shaped my own play.

play is an excellent opportunity for adult to scaffolding learning during play can be particularly successful because, as children‘s own purposes and needs direct play, they are more discernible to the observe and, the child is working athis highestlevel, the adult can more easily gauge whether the level of challenge is with the child’s ZPD. Duncan and Lockwood, (2008:95) role of observation during Play is an instrument to observation which creates opportunity for children to display their disposition and attitude from their innermost in which enable practitioners to observe children’s play. -Friedrich Froebel (1887) believed strongly in the importance of play, they felt that based on observations of children at play it gave teachers in sight into the children’s interests and the curriculum could be developed for those interests. (Downey and Garzoil, 2007) Fawcett,(2009:p15) explains “observation is about taking children seriously, hearing what they have to say, respecting interpretations, and value their imagination and ideas, their unexpected theories, their exploration of feeling sound viewpoints.’’ And also Duncan and Lockwood, (2008) argued that `observation is not just looking; it also involves listening and note- taking in an objective manner’. Further explain we can observe play either formally or informally’: a child who feels emotionally uncomfortable in class or who is unhappy willfind it difficult to take up an activity, and even more so, to become involved in

In the first two years of life play is both a reflection of and an influence on all areas of infant development: intellectual, social, emotional and physical. Play is a central, all–encompassing characteristic of infant development, allowing children to learn about the world and themselves. Even during the first half-year of life infant’s really do play, even though the interpretation of what is play and what is exploration must first be established. The focus of this paper is to discuss three forms of play that occur during the first two years of life. The work of Jean Piaget and other psychologists in supporting and developing these ideas is critical. The first of these is sensorimotor play

“For young children, there is no distinction between play and learning; they are one and the same. Playing is a priority in early childhood, yet not all play is the same” (Butler, 2008, p. 1). Since the beginning of mankind children have imitated adults and learned to survive through play. Evidence of this includes toys and board games from 6,000 years ago that have been found in Egypt and Asia (Dollinger, 2000). In the last two centuries, child’s play has been observed and studied by theorists and recognized as an important tool for adult life. Three theorists that studied children and spent their lives researching how children develop were Erik Erikson, Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky. These theorists agreed that from the time a child is

When you think of play you don’t really think about or realize how important it really is in a child’s life. It consists of five elements, and these elements are the make-up and the meaning of play. The first element is that it is pleasurable and enjoyable. This means it must be fun! In order for it to be considered play, there must be a fun and enjoyable element to it. Play also has no extrinsic goal which means it is engaged for