Play-based learning is an important part of early childhood education. It allows children to explore, learn social skills, develop imagination and problem solving through different types of play like sensory, pretend, and physical play. However, many kindergarten classrooms have reduced or eliminated playtime in favor of more academic instruction and standardized testing preparation. Research shows children who engage in socio-dramatic play have better language, social, and self-regulation skills. Educators should make time and space for different types of play daily and find ways to incorporate it into the classroom.

1. Play-based Learning
By: Tara Oakes
“The skillful teacher of young children is one who makes….play
possible and helps children keep getting better and better at it.”
Source: Jones & Reynolds. 1992. The Play’s the Thing, p.1

2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ9fzJttMPY
The Importance of Play-Based Learning

4. Exploratory play/object play/sensory
 Is when very young children explore by touching, mouthing and feeling
objects in their environment.
 Older students will use sensory by playing with objects such as rice,
paint, play dough and water. These items could be used at a sensory
center during center activities.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 0-2.5 years.

5.  Is when young children engage in imaginative play by themselves
generally by using dolls, cars or action figures. They invent scripts and
role play with toy objects.
 Older students will usually create entire worlds and with toys and
objects and play independently.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 3-8 years.
Dramatic Play (solitary pretense)

6. Construction Play
 Is when children use objects such as blocks, cardboard boxes, play
dough or other objects to build.
 The students can play independently or in groups for long periods of
time. Centers for building can be incorporated in the classroom and
can be used with dramatic play by creating their own worlds.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 3-8 years.

7.  Infants start to use sensory motor when they begin moving and kicking
their arms and moving on to kicking and moving objects.
 Rough and tumble play is more commonly found in boys and a social
form of play, often confused as aggressiveness.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 3-8 years.
Physical Play
 As students get older they move into physical play where they try to
exceed their limits with running, jumping and climbing. This often
becomes competitive and moves into games with invented rules.

8. Socio-dramatic Play
 Is students playing with small groups and reenact social rolls creating
their own rolls and scripts.
 Socio-dramatic play generally incorporates social rolls such as
firefighter, mother and father or other similar community rolls.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 3-6 years.

10. Games with Rules
 Is when students begin to play organized sports and games in groups.
 These games and sports tend to be organized but can be board games
and card games with organized rules.
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 5 years and
up.

11.  Children invent their own games with their own rules.
 Groups tend to be self organized play groups by the students and their
peers. Ex: Hopscotch or Tag
 This type of play is most prevalent with children from ages 5-8 years.
Games with invented rules

12.  Research shows that children who engage in complex forms of socio-
dramatic play have greater language skills than non players, better social
skills, more empathy, more imagination, and more of the subtle capacity
to know what others mean. They are less aggressive and show more
self-control and higher levels of thinking.
 In many kindergarten classrooms there is no play-time at all. Teachers
say the curriculum does not incorporate play, there isn't time for it and
many school administrators do not value it.
 Standardized testing and preparation fro tests are now a daily activity
inmost of the kindergarten studied, despite the fact that most uses of
such tests with children under age eight are of questionable validity
and can lead to harmful labeling.
Interesting Information about Play-based Learning

13.  With asking kindergarten students to perform at what used to be
considered a first grade level, and denying students play it is believed
that there has been a rise in students anger and aggression. It has also
been reported more frequently that younger students are having more
severe behavior problems.
 There are two types of teachers involvement in play:
1.) Outside flow- is meant to prompt reflection on the part of
the children and leads to extension of play.
2.) Inside flow- teacher takes on a role of play and
communication directly with the students.
Interesting Information about Play-based Learning (cont.)

14.  Provide time and space for play to every school day, both indoors and
during recess.
 Mark room for all types of play that contribute to children’s
development, including make-believe, sensory, language, construction,
large and small motor, and mastery play.
How to create effective classrooms through play-based learning
 Learn to effectively monitor and be involved in your classroom play.
 Get creative and use a variety of different ways and tools to
incorporate into your classroom.

15. Are we doing the right thing with moving towards less play-based
learning and more instructional and assessment based learning?
“Most of the play-based kindergartens in Germany were changed into centers for
cognitive achievement during a wave of educational “reform” in the 1970s. But the
research comparing 50 play-based classes with 50 early-learning centers found that
by age 10 the children who played in kindergarten excelled over the others in a host
of ways. They were more advanced in reading and mathematics and they were
better adjusted socially and emotionally in school. They excelled in creativity and
intelligence, and oral expression, and “industry.” As a result of this study German
kindergarten returned to being play-based again.”

16. Hand in Hand Strategies to support play-based learning
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIibN10XQwU

17. Credits
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ9fzJttMPY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIibN10XQwU
Jones & Reynolds. 1992. The Play’s the Thing, p.1
Hewes, PhD, Let The Children Play: Nature’s Answer to Early Learning , Early
Childhood Learning Knowledge Centre, p. 3
Ashiabi, Early Childhood Education Journal, Play in the Preschool Classroom: Its
Socioemotional Significance and the Teacher’s Role in Play, Early Childhood
Education Journal, Vol.35, No.2, October 2007 p. 203
Miller and Almon, Crisis in the Kindergarten Why Children Need Play in School,
Alliance for Childhood, March 2009, p. 2, 3, 6,

18. The End
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