Play, Play, Play!

How to engage in developmental play to improve student outcome

Our goal is to provide support and guidance to enhance the student’s ability to play.

• What is play?
• The developmental stages of play
• How to engage the student in play
• How to intervene to improve the level of play

The Importance of Play

Play is the tool young children use to learn. It’s active, hands on experience – seeing, hearing, touching, feeling, smelling, and tasting, getting totally involved.

Play is the framework for how a child develops and learns.

“ Play is the highest expression of human development in childhood for it alone is the free expression of what is in a child’s soul.” – Frederich Froebel

Play is NOT – �Just messing around��Free time so adults can get work done��A reward for seat work��A privilege to be taken away due to behavior�

Social Stages of Play

Developmental Stages of Play

The First Two years

Sensorimotor 0-12 months

• Cause and effect
• Reactivating a toy with demonstration
• Pat-a-cake or Peek-a-boo

​

​

Functional 12-24 months

• Watching, pushing, throwing, building, carrying, piling, imitating, rolling toys, doll play (carrying)
• Can activate a toy without demonstration
• Begins to use objects in more than one way
• Combines objects

​

Symbolic Play 24-36 months

• Housekeeping type play
• Egocentric
• Substitutions in play (block can be a cake)
• This marks the beginning of imaginative play
• Begins to put together 2 step play schemes (make food, feed baby)

Dramatic Play 36-48 months

• Some theme development
• Dress up
• Tea party

​

Detailed Dramatic Play 48-60 months

• Closer to reality
• Attention to detail
• Logical theme development
• Games with rules

​

The Benefits of Play

• Supports development in all areas (cognitive, self help, social, gross motor, fine motor and communication)
• Helps child explore and make sense of the world
• Facilitates how to deal with a variety of feelings
• Social interaction
• Foundation for later learning such as problem solving, attention, persistence, cooperation, story telling, creativity, imagination
• Real experiences build the foundation for abstract learning

Elements of Play

Benefits of Play

What is needed for successful play?

Uninterrupted Time

• “Indoors and outdoors, children need large blocks of time for play. According to Christie and Wardle (1992), short play periods may require children to abandon their group dramatizations or constructive play just when they begin to get involved. When this happens a number of times, children may give up on more sophisticated forms of play and settle for less advanced forms that can be completed in short periods of time.

• Shorter play periods reduce both the amount and the maturity of children’s play and many important benefits of play such as persistence, negotiation, problem solving, planning and cooperation are lost.

What is need for play?

• Uninterrupted time
• Space
• Organized play space
• Easily accessible/viewable spaces
• Materials – mix of open ended toys (can be used in a variety of ways) and close ended toys (can only be used in one way)

How to engage

Hands off

Approach

Play to teach

academics

Flexible and responsive

Adults are the facilitator of children’s play by providing the environment and then helping the children take full advantage of the activities within the environment.

“If the purpose is more important than doing it then it is probably not play”

-Dr. Stuart Brown

The process of play is more important than the product of play.

What can you do �

• Observe
• Join the play
• Show vs Ask
• Say what you see

Observing Play

• Learn to understand the child’s perspective. To do this, you must get on their level to see what they are seeing/experiencing. Don’t take the “bird’s eye view”, take the “child’s eye view. Get on the floor and look at the room/toys/centers to see what the child sees.
• Focus your observation – the closer we look, the more we learn.

​

Join the Play

• Follow the child’s lead – add to their direction
• Be aware of how the child responds to your presence
• Remember that this is the child’s chance to be in control, develop mastery and self esteem.
• Act as the child’s assistant – get materials, clarify ideas, offer suggestions
• When you attend to a child’s activity, you are modeling sustained attention. As they attend to their own activity, they are learning how to organize information.
• Remember to match the play to the child’s developmental level…don’t skip a level

​

Showing Vs. Asking

• Show a child how to make a tower bigger (through your own tower) vs asking them to make it bigger – think about the level of the child before you choose a tactic
• Allow the child to set the pace and allow room for problem solving, do not solve all the problems
• If you are bringing an educational agenda to the play, make sure you are not taking the fun out of play
• Naturally talk about concepts during play, do not drill

Information Talk�“Say what you see”

• The key element to helping the child focus is to describe what the child is doing. Pace the comments so that they do not disrupt the activity. The comments should draw attention to things she may not have noticed. You can also build in those pre-academic concepts the child is working on “I see that you put the red car on top”.
• Letting the child hear the language that is associated with what they are doing builds vocabulary, answering, storytelling, and writing content for when they are older.
• Be careful with your non-verbal cues such as eye contact (with the child and with the toys to build up joint attention), facial expressions, body posturing, and tone of your voice.
• Individualize your responses – Be Genuine

6 Common Behaviors that signal play problems

1. Wandering – Difficulty getting involved or sticking with a choice, moves to a new toy every few minutes
2. Dabbling – Stays at the activity but play lacks depth, not truly involved, repetitive
3. Anxious – So tense/anxious they can’t enjoy play, the anxiety keeps them from feeling comfortable in the room
4. Aloof – loners, remains at the periphery of the room
5. Ignored – ignored by others, go about as though they can’t be seen, may want to play with peers but ends up just watching, don’t know how to engage
6. Rejected – by peers, don’t know how to insert in positive ways into an established play

​

The End!

Thank you!