Play

Play should be considered a key factor in the early years of a child’s life most importantly but also in their entire childhood as well in order to provide the best possible education for the child. I believe it is highly important for adults to understand the nature of play and how to accommodate them and provide the necessary tools and the environment to accomplish this. According to Sheridan (2002) there are several types of play which contributes to the development of children’s knowledge and understanding. There are six key types of play which Sheridan talks about. They are active play, explorative and manipulative play, imitative play, and games with rules, constructive and pretend play. All of these contribute towards the development of the child. Sheridan (2002) also highlights the key developmental changes with in children.

“Development means far more than just growth, it is about gaining and perfecting a whole range of other skills and abilities…Children’s development comprises a complex mixture of progressive changes” (Sheridan, Harding, & Meldon-Smith, 2002, p.5)

From my own experience of voluntary work I was able to understand more about the importance of play in children’s education and how much of an important aspect it is in their learning process.

This picture I have taken is of a sand pit at my local primary school (Tal-y-copa primary school) where children have just finished playing, after listening to their conversation about creating a ‘butterfly mountain’ it is clear that the four children that were playing here have accommodated each other’s imagination in order to create it. This is vital to learning in my opinion at this age as this demonstrates they’re skills which have already developed such as team work, listening and communicating. This was encouraging to see children at such a young age use their ideas and put them into one to create this ‘butterfly mountain’. As Tepperman (2007) explains that play provides key benefits for cognitive, social, emotional, physical, and moral development (cited in Elkind, 2007) for children from all socio-economic, cultural, and linguistic is backgrounds (cited in Zigler, E. & Bishop-Josef, S., 2006) because it gives them the opportunity to express themselves with other peers. Reeve (2012) argues that there is a positive background behind play and its not an usefulness tool within learning as famous educationalists such as Juhin Huizinga, who went against the idea of play. Reeve’s argues that play is a valuable means of facilitating learning because the act of playing encourages imagination, creativity and spontaneity which yet again is vital as children won’t be able to develop as learners and succeed in the future in my opinion without this opportunity to play no matter what form of play it is. Reeve defines Piaget assumption of play as a “process of assimilation of experiences through which a child reaches higher levels of cognitive development” (Reeve, 2012). Therefore I believe play should be considered a key factor in a child’s development and be highlighted as a key part of any school curriculum not just in Britain but around the world for all children to gain the best education.