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A starting point to introduce Nurturing Norfolk Play

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Video: Introducing You & Me Play Together... 

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Video: Introducing You & Me Play Together... 

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Nurturing Play – You and me together: A Practitioner introduction to the Norfolk Early Years Project promoting high quality, inclusive play with 3-5 year olds in our early years settings.

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Introducing You and Me Together - Nurturing Norfolk Play

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Video: Nurturing Creative Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Video: Nurturing Creative Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Nurturing Creative Play – You and me together: A Norfolk Early Years initiative promoting high quality, inclusive play with 3-5 year olds in our early years settings

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Nurturing Creative Play – You and Me Together

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Video: Nurturing Caring Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Video: Nurturing Caring Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Nurturing Caring Play – You and me together: A Norfolk Early Years initiative promoting high quality, inclusive play with 3-5 year olds in our early years settings

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Nurturing Caring Play – You and Me Together

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Video: Nurturing Active Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Video: Nurturing Active Play with 3-5 yr olds

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Nurturing Active Play – You and me together: A Norfolk Early Years initiative promoting high quality, inclusive play with 3-5 year olds in our early years settings

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Nurturing Active Play – You and Me Together

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Find out more about the Norfolk ambition, coproduced with Norfolk children. All organisations and settings are being encouraged to commit to a pledge to support the Flourish ambition - you can make a play pledge here The Flourish Pledge - Norfolk County Council A suggested pledge relating to your use of NNP resources could be:

We pledge to develop rich play experiences in our early years setting, using ‘Nurturing Norfolk Play’ resources and focusing on high quality practitioner interactions to enrich learning and development in the EYFS prime areas.

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The Flourish ambition

We want Norfolk to be a county where all children and young people can flourish.

This ambition has been inspired by the things young people have told us are most important to them:

The Flourish framework

We have worked with young people to develop the Flourish ambition into a framework of impacts and outcomes. This framework forms the basis of the Flourishing in Norfolk strategy.

Impacts

Impacts are the long-term, sustainable changes we want to secure for all children and young people in Norfolk:

Family and friends: Children and young people are safe, connected and supported through positive relationships and networks

Learning: Children and young people are achieving their full potential and developing skills which prepare them for life

Opportunity: Children and young people develop as well-rounded individuals through access to a wide range of opportunities which nurture their interests and talents

Understood: Children and young people feel listened to, understood and part of decision-making processes

Resilience: Children and young people have the confidence and skills to make their own decisions and take on life's challenges

Individual: Children and young people are respected as individuals, confident in their own identity and appreciate and value their own and others' uniqueness

Safe and secure: Children and young people are supported to understand risk and make safe decisions by the actions that adults and children and young people themselves take to keep them safe and secure

Healthy: Children and young people have the support, knowledge and opportunity to lead their happiest and healthiest lives

Outcomes

Outcomes are the differences we want to make which will lead to the impacts being achieved. You can read more about Flourish, our priorities and what we're doing in the Flourishing in Norfolk strategy.

How we are using Flourish

We are working together to make Flourish the shared ambition of everyone working to improve the lives of children and young people in Norfolk. We are doing this so that we can:

Agree and use a common language to define our aims and the outcomes we want to achieve

Think about our contribution, as part of a wider set of services, to enabling children and young people to flourish

Make the best use of our collective resources to achieve the impact we need to see for children, young people and families

Understand the impact of our services and work together - so that we know what difference we are making and what else we need to do

How we will know we are succeeding

We can get data and information from across our Strategic Alliance partnership. We will also be listening carefully to how children, young people and families feel about their lives so we can find out:

How well children and young people are flourishing

How well we are addressing the factors that affect these outcomes

The impact of the support we provide

The Flourish anthem

Completely written, composed, performed and sung by children and young people from all across Norfolk, our Flourish Anthem has been created to celebrate the potential for them to Flourish in our county, their home.

View the Flourish anthem on YouTube.

How you can help

You can help make the Flourish ambition a reality by making a Flourish Pledge.
Make a Flourish Pledge
Norfolk young people tell us what Flourish means to them

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Our goals for making Norfolk a county where children and young people can flourish

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Initial Practitioner Survey - all practitioners to complete

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Initial Practitioner Survey - all practitioners to complete

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All practitioners using the Nurturing Norfolk Play resources should complete these 10 questions at the earliest opportunity. This information will enable us to monitor the impact of the play initiative, to support future developments.

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QRCode for NNP 'Reflective Practice Survey' _June 2022_

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Cambridge University Research: Learning through 'guided' play can be as effective as adult-led instruction

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Cambridge University Research: Learning through 'guided' play can be as effective as adult-led instruction

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The new study is the first systematic attempt to examine the effects of guided play specifically, which is distinctive because it uses games or playful techniques to steer children towards specific learning goals, with support from a teacher or another adult using open-ended questions and prompts.
Full research study published in Child Development Journal Can guidance during play enhance children’s learning and development in educational contexts? A systematic review and meta‐analysis - Skene - - Child Development - Wiley Online Library

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Teaching younger children through 'guided' play can support key aspects of their learning and development at least as well, and sometimes better, than traditional, direct instruction, according to a new analysis.

The research by academics at the University of Cambridge gathered and assessed data from numerous, widespread studies and information sources, which collectively documented guided play's impact on the learning of around 3,800 children aged three to eight. Guided play broadly refers to playful educational activities which, although gently steered by an adult, give children the freedom to explore a learning goal in their own way.

Overall, the study found that this playful approach to learning can be just as effective as more traditional, teacher-led methods in developing key skills: including literacy, numeracy, social skills and essential thinking skills known as executive functions. The findings also suggest that children may master some skills - notably in maths - more effectively through guided play than other methods.

The relative merits of play-based learning compared with more formal styles of instruction is a long-standing debate in education, but most of that discussion has focused on 'free' open-ended play.

The new study is the first systematic attempt to examine the effects of guided play specifically, which is distinctive because it uses games or playful techniques to steer children towards specific learning goals, with support from a teacher or another adult using open-ended questions and prompts.

This may, for example, involve creating imagination-based games which require children to read, write or use maths; or incorporating simple early learning skills - such as counting - into play. Such methods are common in pre-school education, but are used less in primary teaching - a deficit which has been criticised by some researchers.

The analysis was carried out by academics from the Play in Education, Development and Learning (PEDAL) Centre at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge.

Dr Elizabeth Byrne, a co-author, said: "It's only recently that researchers have started to conceptualise learning through play as something that exists on a spectrum. At one end you have free play, where children decide what to do with minimal adult involvement; at the other is traditional, direct instruction, where an adult tells a child what to do and controls the learning activity."

"Guided play falls somewhere in between. It describes playful activities which are scaffolded around a learning goal, but allow children to try things out for themselves. If children are given the freedom to explore, but with some gentle guidance, it can be very good for their education - perhaps in some cases better than direct instruction."

Paul Ramchandani, Professor of Play in Education, Development and Learning at the University of Cambridge, said: "The argument is sometimes made that play, while beneficial, adds little to children's education. In fact, although there are still some big questions about how we should use guided play in classrooms, there is promising evidence that it actively enhances learning and development."

Guided play has rarely been systematically studied in its own right, but the team found 39 studies, undertaken between 1977 and 2020, which had captured some information about its value compared either with free play or direct instruction, usually in the course of wider research.

By combining the results of studies which looked at similar types of learning outcome, the researchers were able to calculate how much of an overall positive or negative effect guided play has on different aspects of numeracy, literacy, executive functions or socioemotional skills, compared with other approaches. These effect sizes were measured using Hedge's g; a widely-used statistical system in which a result of 0 represents no comparative gain, and 0.2, 0.5 and 0.8 represent small, medium and large effects respectively.

The results offer significant evidence that guided play has a greater positive impact on some areas of children's numeracy than direct instruction. For example, guided play's comparative effect size on early maths skills was 0.24, and 0.63 on shape knowledge. There was also evidence that guided play better supports the development of children's cognitive ability to switch between tasks.

Alongside other positive findings, there was also no statistically significant evidence that guided play is less effective than direct instruction on any of the learning outcomes studied. In short, guided playful activities tend at the very least to produce roughly the same learning benefits as more traditional, teacher-led approaches.

The researchers offer various possible explanations about why guided play may improve numeracy in particular. One possibility is that the gentle prompting that guided play entails may be a particularly effective way of teaching children to work through the logical steps that maths-based tasks often involve.

Equally, the fact that guided play often involves hands-on learning may be important. "Children often struggle with mathematical concepts because they are abstract," Byrne said. "They become easier to understand if you are actually using them in an imaginary game or playful context. One reason play matters may be because it supports mental visualisation."

More broadly, the authors suggest that guided play may influence other characteristics which have a positive, knock-on effect on educational progress - enhancing, for example, children's motivation, persistence, creativity and confidence.

Dr Christine O'Farrelly, a Senior Research Associate at the Faculty of Education, said: "It's likely that playful activities have the sort of positive impact we saw in our analysis partly because they are acting on other skills and processes which underpin learning. If we can understand more about how guided play shapes learning in this way, we will be able to identify more precisely how it could be used to make a really meaningful difference in schools."

The study is published in the journal Child Development.

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child development centre for research on play in education

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school of the humanities and social sciences

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-faculty of education faculty of education

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school of the humanities and social sciences

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centre for research on play in education

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Learning through 'guided' play can be as effective as adult-led instruction

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Teaching younger children through 'guided' play can support key aspects of their learning and development at least as well, and sometimes better, than traditional, direct instruction, according to a new analysis. The research by academics at the University of Cambridge gathered and assessed data from numerous, widespread studies and information sources, which collectively documented guided play's impact on the learning of around 3,800 children aged three to eight.

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A new video on supporting communication using the creative bag 

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A new video on supporting communication using the creative bag 

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We explore how to use items in this bag to support communication and language development.

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A new video on supporting communication using the caring bag 

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A new video on supporting communication using the caring bag 

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We explore how to use items in this bag to support communication and language development.

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A new video on supporting communication using the Active bag 

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A new video on supporting communication using the Active bag 

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We explore how to use items in this bag to support communication and language development.

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Playful Interactions. Being a play partner. A blog from 'Tales from the sandpit'

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Playful Interactions. Being a play partner. A blog from 'Tales from the sandpit'

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A play partner is able to respond to and follow a child’s lead. This means that the child is able to stay in control of the play but enjoy the company of adults. While the adults may make suggestions or bring additional resources or provocations to the play, the adult follows what the child is interested in, playing a supportive role.

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Playful interactions. Being a play partner.

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Now more than ever we need to be advocating the benefits of play and a play based curriculum in the Early Years. I often talk about play in these articles and you will all know that I refer to child led play, freely chos...

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Best start in life [Part 1: Setting the scene]

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Best start in life [Part 1: Setting the scene]

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This research review is focused on the pre-school age range, from birth to 4 years. Its purpose is to support early years practitioners to raise the quality of early years education.

This review examines the factors that contribute to a high-quality early education. It explores literature relating to early years education, drawing on a range of sources, including academic and policy literature.
The role of play is specifically highighted here:

'Play is essential for children’s development. This includes children both leading their own play, and taking part in play that is guided by adults. In a synthesis of international studies that examined practitioners’ attitudes towards play in early education, most practitioners saw a natural link between play and learning. However, many also considered play to be different from play-based learning. Some studies highlighted that practitioners need to time interventions in children’s play carefully and skilfully if the children’s learning is to be enhanced.
There are many ways in which play can support young children’s learning and development. It is likely that, in a high-quality setting, children will experience many different types of play. This includes playing during social times with their peers, which also aids their personal, social and emotional development. There is a spectrum of play, some of which could be completely unguided (including play at home), and some of which will be guided to support particular learning. As play comes naturally to children, skilful practitioners will be able to harness it to help teach the curriculum.'

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Introduction

A high-quality early years education is vitally important. Children attend early years provision at a crucial developmental point in their lives. The education and care that they receive affects not only future educational attainment but also their future health and happiness.

This report is part of our series of subject-based curriculum research reviews. Our 2017 report 'Bold beginnings' and the more recent schools research reviews covered the Reception Year of the early years foundation stage ( EYFS), whereas this review focuses on the pre-school age range, from birth to 4 years. Its purpose is to support early years practitioners to raise the quality of early years education.

This review examines the factors that contribute to a high-quality early education. We explore literature relating to early years education, drawing on a range of sources, including academic and policy literature.

This review considers:

the early years context for children aged from birth to 4 years

staffing in the early years sector

the principles behind the early years research review series

early years curriculum and pedagogy

Subsequent reviews, to be published at a later date, will explore the EYFS 's 7 areas of learning. In all our reviews we will take into account that the areas of learning and development are interconnected. For example, planning a walk in the park to look at different types of trees may encompass shape (mathematics), local knowledge (understanding the world), new vocabulary (communication and language) and cooperation (personal, social and emotional development).

A high-quality early education can prepare children for success in their later education. During their early education, children begin to explore the building blocks of national curriculum subjects that they will go on to study. The 'Effective provision of pre-school primary and secondary education' study found that children who attended pre-school provision, of any kind, attained higher total GCSE scores than those who did not. The higher the quality of the pre-school provision, the higher the GCSE scores.

Importantly, preparing children for school and for learning separate subjects are not the only purposes of early education. Only preparing children for future study would be deficient, but so too would be early education that did not consider what children will go on to learn and do next.

Definitions

We have used the word 'setting' to mean any early years provision that children might attend between birth and the age of 4.

The words 'teacher', 'practitioner' and 'adult' are interchangeable. Our definition of 'teaching' is in the 'Teaching in the early years' section.

We use the term 'planning' to indicate the thinking and preparation that go into the curriculum. Our inspection handbooks make it clear that curriculum planning does not need to be in any specific format. It is up to providers to determine if and how they record their planning.

The early years context from birth to age 4

Early years education in different settings

The early education system up until the year of a child's fifth birthday comprises of a range of different providers, and provision has been developed and funded variably. Settings can be divided into 2 broad categories:

the maintained sector (nursery schools and nursery classes in schools)

the private, voluntary and independent sector (such as day nurseries and childminders)

Children therefore may be educated and cared for in very small groups, such as in a childminder's home, or in larger groups at day nurseries or maintained nursery schools. There are also differences in the ways settings are funded, and the expertise of staff. All of these factors mean that children could have different experiences in different types of setting.

Ambition for all

A high-quality early education is also important for pupils who have, or may have, special educational needs and/or disabilities ( SEND).[footnote 14] A case study of families of children with SEND in early education settings found that parents reported that the provision had a positive impact on their children. The most frequently reported benefits were improved social skills, greater confidence and more independence.[footnote 15]

There is also evidence that, by the end of the Reception Year in school, there is a gap between boys and girls from disadvantaged backgrounds: girls do not lag as far behind as boys. Boys who are eligible for free school meals are much more likely to fall behind in communication and language by the age of 5: in 2015, this was 38% of boys eligible for free school meals compared with a national average of 20%. The gender gap is the highest in more deprived areas.[footnote 18] These children are less able to access the curriculum and to articulate their thoughts and feelings. This can have a negative impact on their personal, social and emotional development.

These findings mean that it is important for early education providers to offer plenty of opportunities for all children to learn and practise speaking and listening.

Some children may need additional support because of the ongoing effects of COVID-19 restrictions. Although many early years settings remained open throughout much of the pandemic, and schools with early years provision for 2- and 3-year-olds were open to some children (such as those eligible for pupil premium and those with SEND), there have still been many challenges. For example, children and staff may have had multiple periods of self-isolation, and many providers had fewer children on roll after the first lockdown.[footnote 19]

Our research also found that providers were implementing several catch-up strategies. These focused on approaches to communication and language such as creating language-rich environments that emphasise interactions between adults and children. Providers were also supporting children with their personal, social and emotional development. For example, some childminders were forming networks and taking children to communal spaces so that they could socialise with each other.

Staff in the early years sector

The early years workforce

The early years workforce is large and varied. This is because of the 'split system' nature of early education, and means that practitioners may work as sole childminders, or in nursery settings and schools. Some provision is funded by the government; other provision is funded privately. The scope of the EYFS also means that teaching staff in maintained nursery schools, maintained nursery classes and reception classes are considered part of the early years workforce, although they work to school teachers' pay and conditions and hold qualified teacher status. This means that examining the early education workforce is a complex undertaking.

When examining the quality of provision in early years settings, researchers look at 'process quality' (children's experiences in the setting) and 'structural' quality (such as staff ratios and qualifications). These two aspects of quality are interlinked. For example, if staff have higher qualifications, then this leads to better outcomes for the child.[footnote 22]

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development ( OECD) has produced several reports on structural quality of the early years workforce,[footnote 23]: identifying what the sector needs to do to recruit a high-quality workforce.[footnote 24]: They include:

promoting the status of jobs in early years

boosting the qualifications of early years staff

increasing the level of pay

Other studies have identified concerning findings about the early years workforce.[footnote 25] For example, a report by the Nuffield Foundation has described the early years workforce as poorly paid and undervalued.[footnote 26] The House of Commons Education Committee considers that barriers to progression for early years teachers should be removed in order to improve the recruitment and retention of a skilled, high-quality early years workforce.[footnote 27] Practitioners have reported that a positive team culture and inclusive, approachable managers were strong motivators for staff to stay in the workplace in the longer term.[footnote 28]

Ratios and qualifications

The EYFS statutory framework sets out rules that determine the ratio of adults to children in early education settings. Generally, the younger the child, the higher the adult-to-child ratio.[footnote 29] For children aged 3 and over, these ratios are also determined by the level of qualification that practitioners hold. For example, if a practitioner in a setting has a level 6 qualification, then the permitted ratio of staff to children is one staff member for every 13 children, compared with one staff member for every 8 children if staff have lower-level qualifications. The list of ratios and qualifications for different types of practitioners in different settings highlights the complexities of the 'split system' of early education before the Reception Year.[footnote 30]

In a small-scale study in England that looked at practitioners' views about quality, almost all participants thought it was important that adults working in early years settings were well trained. They also thought it was important that staff knew the children well enough to engage them in activities that interest them.[footnote 31] High staff turnover rates could therefore negatively affect the relationships between staff and children if it means that staff do not know children well.

In 2012, the Nutbrown Review highlighted that the qualification system for early years was ineffective and overly complex.[footnote 32] Many of the qualifications available did not produce a workforce with the knowledge and skills to provide high-quality early education. The review recommended that staff should hold level 2 qualifications in English and mathematics before they could achieve a level 3 early years qualification. This recommendation was implemented by the government, who made it a requirement for early years practitioners to hold GCSEs in English and mathematics. However, from 2017, this was amended to any level 2 qualification in English and mathematics, including functional skills qualifications. This was because the GCSE requirement resulted in a recruitment shortage; currently, 33% of the early years workforce do not hold either an English or mathematics GCSE.[footnote 33] Having a qualified teacher in an early years setting has the greatest impact on the quality of provision.[footnote 34]

Continuing professional development

Continuing professional development ( CPD) is also important for good-quality early years provision.[footnote 35] A 2021 study synthesised the findings from surveys of early years managers and practitioners about CPD.[footnote 36] The study noted that surveys that are carried out by sector organisations are the primary means of finding out what CPD is taking place in the sector, and that as a result there are gaps in what we know about CPD in the early years.

The study also found that many early years managers limit staff training opportunities to those that are mandatory (safeguarding, health and safety, and first aid). Where additional training is taking place, it is often focused on SEND or English as an additional language. One of the surveys examined in this synthesis, which was carried out by the National Day Nurseries Association, found that, in 2015, 39% of nursery managers reported that they could not afford to fund any non-mandatory training.

A further Education and Training Foundation study found that practitioners were keen to participate in professional development activities, but cost is a barrier to accessing CPD.[footnote 37]

CPD helps practitioners to understand the latest research or changes to policy.[footnote 38] The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood recommends that practitioners should have easy access to the latest scientific research to inform their practice.[footnote 39]

There is evidence that access to CPD varies across the sector, and is poor in some cases. The Nutbrown Review recommended that a suite of online induction and training materials should be made available to practitioners across the sector. However, a recent Sutton Trust report noted that this has not yet been implemented.[footnote 40] This means that CPD is likely to be patchy and dependent on the approach taken by individual providers or local areas. There are several paid-for CPD courses advertised for the early years sector, some of which are offered by local authorities. However, in one survey of the sector, managers reported concerns that local authority CPD was pitched at a level aimed at inexperienced practitioners. This meant that ongoing support for professional development could be lacking.[footnote 41]

The principles behind our early years research review

This review now goes on to consider the principles that have shaped our research review, with a focus on curriculum (what is taught) and pedagogy (how it is taught).

There are many ways to construct and teach a high-quality curriculum that meets the requirements of the EYFS. Our schools subject research reviews have highlighted that there is no one way to teach a high-quality subject-based national curriculum.[footnote 42] Similarly, there is no single way to plan and teach high-quality early education. What matters is that leaders and practitioners have considered what knowledge they want children to learn and the order in which to teach it, as well as which methods are most effective for teaching. As providers face the challenge of helping children to catch up after COVID-19, they will need to think carefully about what content to prioritise, what to limit and what to leave out. By setting out the most effective ways to secure progress in each area of learning, our research reviews provide a set of guiding principles for leaders.

Establishing an evidence-based 'conception of quality' for each area of learning

We are committed to doing all we can to ensure that our inspections are reliable and valid, and to being a force for improvement.

Inspectors base their understanding of quality of education on the criteria in our inspection framework. We developed these criteria from our review of relevant research on education and from our own 3 phases of curriculum research.[footnote 43]

We have continued to improve our inspection practice by developing a well-evidenced view of what constitutes a high-quality education in each area of learning. We call this view the 'conception of quality'. It sets out principles, specific to an area of learning, that can be used to support the quality of education judgement. The principles do not specify what must be taught or how.

Selecting research

The reviews set out the research that has informed our conception of quality for each area of learning. This is not a systematic literature review. When selecting literature, we draw on research that aligns with the criteria for high-quality education, published in our education inspection framework ( EIF) and summarised in our 'Education inspection framework: overview of research'.[footnote 44]

This early years curriculum review focuses on research relevant to the areas of learning addressed in each section of the review. However, we will also look at general research on curriculum and pedagogy and any research on teaching, assessment, administrative systems and policies that is relevant to each area of learning.

As well as academic papers, the research review includes evidence from:

the Education Endowment Foundation

the Department for Education

large-scale international studies, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)

our own research and guidance

secondary evidence, such as teacher-authored blogs

Educational research is often contested. However, we hope that publishing the evidence base that we have used to develop our conception of quality in early years education will provide an insight into both the evidence we have used and how we have interpreted that evidence.

We have not tried to summarise all of the research about early years education. We have used several criteria to select the most relevant research, as explained below.

Filters we use to select research
An understanding that curriculum is different from pedagogy
In the EIF, we set out a conception of a high-quality curriculum. This is based both on our review of existing research and on our own curriculum research programme. Progress in curricular terms means knowing more and remembering more, so a curriculum needs to plan carefully for that progress by considering the building blocks and sequence in each subject. In contrast to some definitions of curriculum, we see it as different from (though of course connected with) pedagogy and assessment. Curriculum is about what teachers teach and when, and what children learn.
How children learn and cognitive science
In recent decades, we have seen a knowledge explosion in the field of cognitive science, which has given us a growing insight into how learning happens. This important body of work has informed our thinking in developing the EIF, and we believe it is necessary to take into account the way children learn to develop a high-quality curriculum. Unfortunately, some literature is based on outdated understanding, for example that children have different learning styles. We are therefore using alignment with cognitive science (as outlined in the EIF overview of research) as part of this filter.
Relevance to inspection
All of our research and evaluation work must be relevant to our role as a regulator and inspectorate. Relevance to the evaluation criteria set out in the EIF is therefore a key filter. This means that purely theoretical pieces are less likely to feature in our research reviews.
Relevance to areas of learning
We have applied the insights of cognitive science to the EIF, but the implications of these insights can vary in the context of each area of learning. Therefore, our research and reporting will be through the lens of areas of learning.
What achieves the aims of each area of learning
We do not consider what the high-level aims of education in each area of learning should be. The EYFS sets out the statutory requirements for each area of learning, so our conceptions of quality consider the nature of a high-quality education to achieve these aims.

Early years curriculum and pedagogy

Our overview of research for the EIF provides an explanation of how we understand curriculum:

Our working definition of curriculum is that it is a framework for setting out the aims of a programme of education, including the knowledge and skills to be gained at each stage (intent); for translating that framework over time into a structure and narrative, within an institutional context (implementation); and for evaluating what knowledge and understanding children have gained against expectations (impact). The curriculum lies at the heart of education. It determines what learners will know and be able to go on to do by the time they have finished that stage of their education.[footnote 45]

The areas of learning and development in the EYFS must shape the educational programmes or curriculum for children in all settings. It is crucial that all providers carefully consider what children need to learn over time so they are able to reach ambitious end points by the end of their time in the early years. High-quality curriculums are coherently planned and well sequenced.[footnote 46] Although the EYFS framework enables practitioners to decide on the detail of the curriculum they teach, it is important that they plan and sequence what they intend all children to learn, rather than it happening by chance or for some children and not others.

We consider a curriculum (or programme of learning) to be a progression model.[footnote 47] A coherently planned and well-sequenced curriculum enables children to make progress by knowing more, understanding more and being able to do more. In the early years, the curriculum enables all children to make progress in the areas of learning. In this way, early education provides the building blocks of knowledge for subjects that children will study in later years. The early years curriculum does not include formal subjects. However, it does prepare children for later learning in those formal subjects. For example, learning about kings, castles and knights from traditional story books, together with language such as 'a long time ago', helps children to develop foundational knowledge for learning history later on.

Once practitioners have decided what they want all children in their setting to learn, they need to consider the most effective ways to teach it. Sometimes it will be appropriate to show or tell children what to do through explicit teaching. For example, when they are learning something for the first time. This may be followed by opportunities for children to use and apply this new knowledge through play. At other times, it may be appropriate for children to explore something through play first and for the practitioner to intervene with guidance at appropriate points. Judging what to teach and when to teach it is a key part of a practitioner's role, and the curriculum acts as the framework on which to base those decisions.

Curriculum

This section first considers the curriculum before moving on to examine the implications of the curriculum for choices of pedagogy.

Cultural capital

Cultural capital has an impact on children's access to education. We define cultural capital as 'the essential knowledge that children need to prepare them for their future success' or 'essential knowledge that children need to be educated citizens'.[footnote 48] When judging the quality of education in an early years setting, inspectors will consider how well leaders use the curriculum to enhance children's experiences and opportunities, particularly those of the most disadvantaged children.

Sullivan, Moulton and Fitzsimons use the terms 'literary' cultural capital

and 'non-literary' cultural capital to refer to cultural activities that relate to books and reading and those that do not.[footnote 51] Some studies suggest that literary cultural capital has more impact on educational attainment than non-literary cultural capital.[footnote 52] In their own study, Sullivan, Moulton and Fitzsimons found that there was a positive correlation between higher levels of parental education, a larger number of books in the home and reading to the child at age 3, and higher scores on a vocabulary test.[footnote 53] However, the most significant factor was the parents' vocabulary: the parents who scored more highly themselves (especially mothers) had children who scored more highly at age 14. This indicates the importance of a focus on vocabulary for those children who do not benefit from a rich vocabulary at home.

Prior knowledge and the importance of knowing children's starting points

When considering the curriculum in the early years, it is important to think about the knowledge that children may already have. Effective practitioners do not make assumptions about the kind of knowledge that children may bring with them from home. For example, some children may be more familiar with well-known children's stories while others may not. Therefore, curriculum planning should include making sure that these children have the prior knowledge they need so that all children can learn what leaders intend.

As an illustrative example, imagine one child has been read 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt' several times.[footnote 54] The child has been shown the pictures and encouraged to repeat the rhyme. The caregiver has repeated the vocabulary and encouraged the child to do the same. Now imagine another child who has heard the book once. They have not picked up the rhythm of the language; they were not encouraged to repeat the vocabulary. They may not even be familiar with the settings or animals described in the book. If an early years setting plans activities around this book, such as outdoor or role play, then the child who knows the book well will have greater prior knowledge and therefore may have greater access to the activities. Practitioners need to make sure that both children are in a position to learn what was intended. A child's lack of prior knowledge should not prevent them from accessing the intended learning.

All children bring knowledge and different forms of cultural capital with them to their early years setting. It is important to value this as part of an appreciation of the unique child. The different forms of cultural capital and prior knowledge that children bring with them can also contribute to an understanding and celebration of diversity. This can help children to be more familiar with a range of traditions, customs and cultures.

Just as no 2 children are the same, no 2 settings are the same. Some settings may have higher numbers of children who speak English as an additional language, while others have higher numbers of disadvantaged children and/or those with SEND. This means that practitioners and leaders should construct a curriculum that considers the local context, while ensuring that they have high expectations for all children. If practitioners know all of the children well,[footnote 55] they are more likely to be aware of the knowledge the children have brought from home or other settings, and the interests they have already formed. If practitioners know the children's starting points, this will help them to consider what knowledge each child needs to acquire to reach the ambitious end points of the curriculum.

These points indicate that, having decided on the knowledge that all children should gain, the practitioner should take into account the child's prior knowledge when planning activities and experiences to teach the curriculum. Some children will have come from homes where they have not had the opportunity to explore and develop their interests. It does children a disservice to plan learning that is based only on their pre-existing interests and does not give them the chance to develop new ones.

It is important to ensure that all children have the opportunity to really develop and talk about a full range of interests. This is because some may have been encouraged to develop an interest in books but not sport; others may have been taken to art galleries and given support to draw and paint but have not experienced much music. In their setting, this might mean that these children are keen to take part in book-related activities or seek out the painting table, but do not choose active play or explore music-making. The consequence of planning based purely on a child's interests is that the curriculum begins to narrow for them at a very young age.

Teaching in the early years

This section considers what research says about effective teaching for young children. The definition of teaching in our early years inspection handbook sets out the broad use of the term, which is used to describe a range of pedagogical approaches.

Teaching is a broad term that covers the many different ways in which adults help young children learn. It includes their interactions with children during planned and child-initiated play and activities, communicating and modelling language, showing, explaining, demonstrating, exploring ideas, encouraging, questioning, recalling, providing a narrative for what they are doing, facilitating and setting challenges. It takes account of the equipment that adults provide and the attention given to the physical environment, as well as the structure and routines of the day that establish expectations. Integral to teaching is how practitioners assess what children know, understand and can do, as well as taking account of their interests and dispositions to learn (characteristics of effective learning), and how practitioners use this information to plan children's next steps in learning and to monitor their progress.[footnote 56]

When practitioners are clear about what children already know and can do, and what they need to learn next, then they can decide what to teach the children and how best to use their time with them to ensure that they learn the intended curriculum. Every interaction a practitioner has with a child is an opportunity for teaching and learning.

Executive function

Executive function (also known as cognitive control) refers to mental processes that begin to develop from birth and are considered essential for learning, as well as for cognitive, social and psychological development.[footnote 57] Researchers in cognitive science agree that there are 3 core areas of executive function:

inhibition (self-control of behaviour and attention)

working memory (holding information in mind and working with it)

cognitive flexibility (changing approaches to a problem, and switching between tasks)[footnote 58]

Essentially, executive function makes it possible to mentally play with ideas and successfully navigate challenges, and to stay focused while doing so.

Implications of executive function for early years teaching

Findings from research on executive function have implications for the ways that young children are taught, as well as the ways that babies are cared for and interacted with from birth. Teachers should consider what we know about executive function, how children's executive function develops and what early education can add to that development.

Considering executive function has several implications for early years teaching:

Research from cognitive science highlights that the practice of retrieving knowledge at intervals over time helps children to remember that knowledge in the long term.[footnote 61] This means that learning should be revisited periodically to ensure that it has been remembered - that it has entered the long-term memory, which reduces demand on the working memory. This also means that, when new knowledge is taught, it can be integrated with existing knowledge.

Young children do not actively choose to use their executive function (as older children do); they use it in response to environmental demands, such as when an adult encourages them to.[footnote 62] This means that it is not sufficient just to provide opportunities for children to take part in activities (such as setting up an outdoor area). Practitioners need to guide children towards engaging with activities. This is also an equality issue: research from the University of Bristol, for example, has shown that boys participate less in the types of activities that support language and literacy development, and are given less encouragement in settings to do so.[footnote 63]

Executive function demands need to be continually and incrementally increased or they will not improve.[footnote 64] This means that practitioners should be aware of what children already know and are able to do in terms of inhibition, working memory and cognitive flexibility, so that they can provide opportunities and teaching activities that will continue to develop the children's executive function. This is important, because children's executive function will develop at different rates.[footnote 65]

The role of play

Play is essential for children's development. This includes children both leading their own play, and taking part in play that is guided by adults. In a synthesis of international studies that examined practitioners' attitudes towards play in early education, most practitioners saw a natural link between play and learning. However, many also considered play to be different from play-based learning. Some studies highlighted that practitioners need to time interventions in children's play carefully and skilfully if the children's learning is to be enhanced.[footnote 66]

There are many ways in which play can support young children's learning and development. It is likely that, in a high-quality setting, children will experience many different types of play. This includes playing during social times with their peers, which also aids their personal, social and emotional development. There is a spectrum of play, some of which could be completely unguided (including play at home), and some of which will be guided to support particular learning. As play comes naturally to children, skilful practitioners will be able to harness it to help teach the curriculum.

The purpose of play

Play is an important and enjoyable part of children's early education. When planning for play, practitioners should consider whether children are learning something new or are consolidating previous learning. Thinking about what children already know can help practitioners consider how much adult support and guidance the children require in their play. If children are learning something for the first time, it might be more appropriate for them to be taught it explicitly.

In a mathematical context, for example, studies have indicated that play is important for encouraging interest and enthusiasm, but that some guided instruction from a teacher is also needed, as this provides structure to the learning.[footnote 67] Otherwise, children do not make connections between what they are playing with and mathematical ideas.

In physical play, children may throw and catch independently, but if they do not know how to do so effectively, a practitioner could join in the play to model this. Otherwise, children could go on not knowing how to throw and catch effectively, which could later affect their ability to play team sports.

It is not necessary for an adult to be physically present to support play. Practitioners can support children by planning how to use play areas within the setting. Book corners and room displays can provide stimulus material that encourages further play, building on teaching that has taken place. These activities should be planned carefully so that children are able to make connections between what is set out and what they have already learned. This gives them opportunities to use and apply the knowledge and vocabulary that they have already learned during their play.

Practitioners should consider whether children are encouraged and supported to take part in all types of play, not just those that conform to their previous experience and preferences.

Play in the early years should be an enriching experience for all children. Adults should ensure that children do not miss out because they lack the prior knowledge they need to take part in play activities. For example, children who have not used glue and paint before may need careful support to help them enjoy the full range of creative play opportunities on offer. It does children a disservice if they only take part in play in which they have a previous interest or enthusiasm.

The role of explicit teaching

Explicit teaching is an approach to teaching where the practitioner introduces information or skills through direct instruction. In the context of early education, it can be an effective way to teach children specific knowledge, for example early mathematical concepts such as counting or how to fasten the buttons on a coat.[footnote 68] This is because explicit teaching can make clearer the steps of learning, as practitioners demonstrate and explain the steps.[footnote 69] In the EYFS, explicit teaching is likely to be for very short periods of time and take place in different areas of a setting. It can also be followed by other forms of teaching, such as guided play.

Based on this research review, high-quality curriculum and pedagogy may have the following features:

The curriculum considers what all children should learn. It offers plenty of opportunity for children who are disadvantaged or who speak English as an additional language to learn and practise speaking and listening.

Practitioners choose activities and experiences after they have determined the curriculum. The most appropriate activities and experiences then help to secure the children's intended learning.

Adults think carefully about what children already know and can do when deciding what to teach first.

Children with gaps in their knowledge get the additional teaching they need so that they can access the same curriculum as their peers.

Practitioners consider a child's interests when choosing activities while also expanding interests further, so that children make progress in all areas of learning.

Children's play is valued and is used to teach many aspects of the curriculum. Their learning through play is enhanced by skilful adult intervention.

Explicit teaching is used to introduce children to new knowledge and followed up by opportunities to practise new learning through play.

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Best start in life part 1: setting the scene

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A high-quality early years education is vitally important. Children attend early years provision at a crucial developmental point in their lives. The education and care that they receive affects not only future educational attainment but also their future health and happiness. This report is part of our series of subject-based curriculum research reviews.

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How We Play - National Institute for Play

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How We Play - National Institute for Play

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This page describes the most common types of play in terms of their manifestation and importance to young children

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We use cookies to understand website use and to enable features like embedded videos. By clicking "Accept," you consent to the use of all of these cookies. We do not sell any user's personal information. Read More

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How We Play - National Institute for Play

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Play isn't the same for everyone. Find out about the different types of play and how they interact with your play personality

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Supporting high-quality interactions in early years (EEF blog)

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Supporting high-quality interactions in early years (EEF blog)

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EEF’s Fliss James unpicks the evidence on how to ensure that interactions with young pupils are of the highest quality.

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So, what are features of high-quality interactions and what can we learn from exploring the evidence?

1. The role of the adult is to be attuned and responsive.

Establishing warm, trusting and responsive relationships with young children is at the heart of early years practice. The importance of attending to children's social and emotional well-being and development has been found to have a positive impact on language development, as highlighted in the evidence review carried out as part of the EEF funded Manor Park Talks pilot (Ang and Harmey, 2019)

The following strategies encourage children to engage in conversational interactions:

Maintain eye contact: look expectantly at children as you engage in conversation with them.

Be warm and receptive: welcome children's attempts to communicate

Promote friendship: foster children's friendship skills, emotional understanding and emotional expression.

Promote cooperation: offer children opportunities to ​'practice' friendship skills such as sharing by encouraging cooperative games and acknowledging and valuing positive behaviours.

The role of the adult is to listen to children and encourage sustained back and forth conversations.

Active ​'serve and return' interactions between the child and the adult pave the way for conversation, providing children with the blueprint for turn-taking. Adults can harness the power of conversation by engaging with children in the following ways:

Make time to sensitively join in with children's play: follow their lead and establish shared attention on the child's focus of interest.

Listen carefully and scaffold language responsively, expanding and extending on what the child says.

Model talking about what the child sees and does. Put simply, comment more, question less.

Engage in back and forth conversations that involve multiple turns. Aim for involving children in more than four conversational turns.

Make it meaningful. There are plenty of social opportunities each day, such as ​'snack time', so take time to exploit day to day routines and activities.

Go beyond the ​'here and now'. It is important to start to use (from around 3 years of age) to broaden children's understanding of word meanings. And so, engage in pretend play, talk about past and future events, offer explanations and more.

Wait! This is a golden rule: always give children time to listen, process and respond.

As early years educators, we have the privilege of building on the essential foundations caregivers have established. We can see from the evidence through the power of responsive, stimulating conversational interactions we can really make a difference to the ​'most powerful learning machine in the universe'.

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new-born babies engage in interaction with their caregivers. each child is hard-wired to seek out and respond to interaction

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babbles and smiles.  as alison gopnik and colleagues state

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"the greatest mind that has ever existed

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the most powerful learning machine in the universe."   the science is clear: brains are built not born  . nurturing

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responsive interactions are vital for healthy neural development. what does this mean for educators of young children in early years settings

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nursery and reception classes?  the evidence on high-quality interactions  we know from several decades of research that high-quality early childhood education and care (ecec) has a positive effect on children’s educational

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behavioural and social development. effective early years provision combines care with education

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focusing on both social and cognitive development.  the eef’s  preparing for literacy  guidance report identifies seven evidence-informed recommendations which underpin high-quality early years provision.  the report highlights the need to prioritise the development of young children’s early communication and language

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with an emphasis on supporting educators to engage in high-quality interactions:  “a distinction is sometimes drawn between talking with children and simply talking to children; talking to children tends to be more passive

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while talking with children is based on their immediate experiences and activities and is likely to be more effective.”  so

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what are features of high-quality interactions and what can we learn from exploring the evidence?  1. the role of the adult is to be attuned and responsive.  establishing warm

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trusting and responsive relationships with young children is at the heart of early years practice. the importance of attending to children’s social and emotional well-being and development has been found to have a positive impact on language development

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as highlighted in the evidence review carried out as part of the eef funded manor park talks pilot (ang and harmey

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2019)  the following strategies encourage children to engage in conversational interactions:  maintain eye contact: look expectantly at children as you engage in conversation with them. be warm and receptive: welcome children’s attempts to communicate promote friendship: foster children’s friendship skills

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emotional understanding and emotional expression. promote cooperation: offer children opportunities to ‘practice’ friendship skills such as sharing by encouraging cooperative games and acknowledging and valuing positive behaviours.   the role of the adult is to listen to children and encourage sustained back and forth conversations.  active ‘serve and return’ interactions between the child and the adult pave the way for conversation

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providing children with the blueprint for turn-taking. adults can harness the power of conversation by engaging with children in the following ways:  make time to sensitively join in with children’s play: follow their lead and establish shared attention on the child’s focus of interest. listen carefully and scaffold language responsively

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expanding and extending on what the child says. model talking about what the child sees and does. put simply

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question less.  engage in back and forth conversations that involve multiple turns. aim for involving children in more than four conversational turns. make it meaningful. there are plenty of social opportunities each day

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so take time to exploit day to day routines and activities. go beyond the ‘here and now’. it is important to start to use  ‘decontextualised talk’  (from around 3 years of age) to broaden children’s understanding of word meanings. and so

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offer explanations and more. wait! this is a golden rule: always give children time to listen

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process and respond.  as early years educators

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EEF blog: Supporting high-quality interactions in early years

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So, what are features of high-quality interactions and what can we learn from exploring the evidence? 1. The role of the adult is to be attuned and responsive. Establishing warm, trusting and responsive relationships with young children is at the heart of early years practice.

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Learning, Playing and Interacting - Good Practice in the Early Years Foundation Stage

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Learning, Playing and Interacting - Good Practice in the Early Years Foundation Stage

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Playful learning & playful teaching: A playful approach supports learning because:
• playful children use and apply their knowledge, skills and understanding in different ways and in different contexts
• playful practitioners use many different approaches to engaging children in activities that help them to learn and to develop positive dispositions for learning.

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Highlights

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Longitudinal indication for the link between simple symbolic action and symbolic development.

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Simple symbolic actions link to babbling and complex symbolic outputs.

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Frequency at initiation of babbling associated with initiation of complex symbolic behaviors.

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Results support a direct-path hypothesis and an indirect one, rather than a dual-path hypothesis.

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Mother's responsiveness is related to the production of symbolic play.

Abstract

Symbolic play and language are known to be highly interrelated, but the developmental process involved in this relationship is not clear. Three hypothetical paths were postulated to explore how play and language drive each other: (1) direct paths, whereby initiation of basic forms in symbolic action or babbling, will be directly related to all later emerging language and motor outputs; (2) an indirect interactive path, whereby basic forms in symbolic action will be associated with more complex forms in symbolic play, as well as with babbling, and babbling mediates the relationship between symbolic play and speech; and (3) a dual path, whereby basic forms in symbolic play will be associated with basic forms of language, and complex forms of symbolic play will be associated with complex forms of language. We micro-coded 288 symbolic vignettes gathered during a yearlong prospective bi-weekly examination ( N = 14; from 6 to 18 months of age). Results showed that the age of initiation of single-object symbolic play correlates strongly with the age of initiation of later-emerging symbolic and vocal outputs; its frequency at initiation is correlated with frequency at initiation of babbling, later-emerging speech, and multi-object play in initiation. Results support the notion that a single-object play relates to the development of other symbolic forms via a direct relationship and an indirect relationship, rather than a dual-path hypothesis.

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Longitudinal indication for the link between simple symbolic action and symbolic development. * Simple symbolic actions link to babbling and complex symbolic outputs. * Frequency at initiation of babbling associated with initiation of complex symbolic behaviors. * Results support a direct-path hypothesis and an indirect one, rather than a dual-path hypothesis.

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Learning in Action - What Children Learn from Block Play

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Block Play Alongside Small World Resources (Published by Early Excellence)

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Block Play Alongside Small World Resources (Published by Early Excellence)

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EEx Blog 26.4.22
Some areas of provision and collections of resources are most effective when used in relation to others. One good example of this is the small world and block area.

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Decisions you make about how you organise and arrange your classroom will have a big impact on the quality of the learning that occurs there. Well organised, well planned provision areas provide meaningful opportunities for independent exploration, effective interactions and focussed teaching. Some areas of provision and collections of resources are most effective when used in relation to others. One good example of this is the small world and block area.
So, what would this look like and how might it be organised?
Well, to get the best out of both areas, they should be situated together. In this way, children will be able to use the blocks to create their own story settings and scenes for the small world characters they choose. This will be far more effective than providing the children with a prepared or manufactured small world setting, such as a dolls' house or toy castle as it will engage them in the process of building, encourage them to share their ideas and talk about what they know and enable children to modify their ideas as they play.

For small world and block play to be effective, you'll need a clearly defined area where children can access the resources as independently as possible. Create the space away from any high traffic areas in your classroom and provide enough room if possible, for large, elaborate buildings and story settings to take shape. A carpet or rug will deaden the noise and make the space more comfortable for the children to kneel.

Now, what about resources? You'll need a good selection of wooden blocks which offer lots of possibilities for exploration and discussion. The blocks should be of different sizes and should also include a wide range of mathematically regular shapes: cubes, cuboids, cylinders, cones - as well as more unusual ones such as reels or natural wooden pieces. In addition to this, you might want to add different shapes and sizes of wooden boards so that the children can link towers together and also create floors within buildings. As you're planning this space, you might also want to consider other materials to spark the children's curiosity and imagination. Mirrored or clear perspex blocks, wooden arches and doorways can be a great imaginative starting point for young children's ideas. You might also want to consider reclaimed materials such as cardboard cylinders, buttons and plastic reels; the more open-ended the better!

Now we'll need to consider how these blocks are stored and organised in order to promote independence and to maximise the number of learning opportunities provided. Ideally, blocks should be stored directly onto an open shelf so that the children can readily access them. Shadow backing on each shelf promotes easy access and, done well, can lead to discussions around shapes and their properties. For this you'll need a roll of sticky backed plastic; this can be cut out and stuck directly onto a shelf to provide a place for each shape of block. Store some shapes together so that the children are encouraged to recognise both the parts and the whole. For example, two semi -circular, arched shapes placed together will create a circular shape.

For a Key Stage One Block area, labelling could include a further degree of challenge. In this way, you might include cylinders set out as an array (labelled as 3 + 3 +3 etc): measurements can be included effectively too: cylinders could be labelled as 15cm cylinders or 10 cm cylinders, for example. With effective adult support, this level of detail promotes discussion and the use of correct terminology.

As the children's ideas develop, and as they become particularly interested in themes or concepts, you'll want to enhance your provision with other materials to challenge their thinking further. Collections of big rolls of paper and pens, when modelled by an adult, are a great way of engaging the children in story mapping and writing as part of small world and block play. At other times, mirrors or different light sources can prompt further explorations of reflection, light and shadow.

And what about the adults? Well, if we've thought through all the learning opportunities in such a detailed way, then it's also important to consider the adult role in this space too. Well planned resources and experiences provide a range of learning opportunities but these need to be maximised by the adults in the setting. Adults should use the correct names of shapes when talking about the block area and engage with the children's ideas within this space. Consider where there are times in the day for the children to talk about what they plan to do or to review what they have already done within this space. Conversations like these are an opportunity to celebrate and value their learning and can take children's learning to a new level, reinforcing new vocabulary and challenging their ideas and concepts.
Key questions to ask yourself:
How often does your team engage with children in this area throughout the day?

Do adults use the space, when appropriate, for directed activities including maths and literacy?

Do they facilitate and support the children's learning in the small world and block area on a regular basis?

Are children's ideas in the small world and block area seen as stories and celebrated as such?

Lots to think about! Our audit tool of small world resources is a great place to start if you're not sure which small world figures, characters and creatures should be available for the children to use alongside the blocks. If you are looking to plan your areas of provision, order our GUIDE TO CONTINUOUS PROVISION today.

This fully illustrated guide with planning documents includes:

A three-part illustrated overview of what, why and how

A useful set of discussion points to support the review of current provision

A full set of Continuous Provision Plans, one for each area

Guidance on how to use the plans with your team

Blank formats to help you create your own plans

Let us know how you get on! You can share your photos with us on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram.

We also offer our EYFS and KS1 CPD webinar programmes which explore key principles of continuous provision and consider how an effective environment, carefully planned and organised, promotes a broad range of learning opportunities for children.

You can engage with us @earlyexcellence on our social media channels where we would hear from you and don't forget to visit our website regularly to find forums, workshops and webinar training courses to inspire you - as well as our Early Years Resources Shop.
We'd love to hear from you!

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Block Play Alongside Small World Resources

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Some areas of provision and collections of resources are most effective when used in relation to others. One good example of this is the small world and block area. For small world and block play to be effective, you'll need a clearly defined area where children can access the resources as independently as possible.

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Play Scotland Resources Archive - Play Scotland

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“There is a vital need to connect research, practice and policy to meet the play needs of children and young people, families and communities.”
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Resource library
The Play Scotland resource library provides a wide range of free to download and use play and related publicat…

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Abstract

Children with autism are often described as having deficient play skills, particularly symbolic play. We compared the play of 35 children with autism to 38 children with other developmental delays. All children were preschool-age and produced less than 20 different words. Results indicated no significant differences across the two groups in their play. Children with autism engaged in more conventional play, that is, putting objects together according to how the toys were constructed (e.g., pieces in a puzzle, lid on a teapot). Results also indicated high correlations between play, language, and cognitive measures. Findings indicate that play relates to language and cognitive levels yet may not discriminate children with autism and children with other developmental delays early in their development.

Keywords: Autism, Symbolic play, Developmental delays, Preschool, Cognition, Language delays

Introduction

Children engage in symbolic play by using one object to represent another object or event (e.g., use a bucket for a hat). Studying children's play may provide insight into underlying symbolic understanding that might not be obvious through other cognitive and language assessments. Several studies have reported deficits in symbolic play of young children with autism, and some propose a distinctive play deficit ( Sigman and Ruskin 1999; Ungerer and Sigman 1981). Other researchers have reported similarities when comparing symbolic play of children with autism to typically developing children ( Dominguez et al. 2006), and to children with other developmental delays (DD) ( Libby et al. 1997). The aim of the present study is to address these contradictory reports by examining different play behaviors of children with autism and other DD by using comprehensive play measures.

Play Differences and Similarities

Efforts to illuminate the possible distinctive play abilities of typically developing children and children with DD including autism have focused on defining specific developmental levels of play ( Belsky and Most 1981; Libby et al. 1997). In one of the first studies to validate a developmental progression of play, Belsky and Most showed that infant play behavior followed a sequence from mouthing and simple manipulation of toys, to recognition of conceptual relationships between objects (i.e., functional play), to increasingly decontextualized play (i.e., symbolic or pretend play). The outcomes suggested that children's play was a valid and reliable way to evaluate progressively complex and cognitively demanding behaviors, and paved the way for the development and use of sequential play classifications ( Lifter 2000; Lifter and Bloom 1989; Lifter et al. 1993).

Pretend or symbolic play typically develops in children around 18-24 months. During symbolic play children pretend that an object is something it is not (e.g., a block is a car), or assign properties to an object that it does not have (e.g., holds bottle to dolls hand as if it could hold it; Baron-Cohen 1987). Prior to the development of symbolic play, children engage in functional play. Actions on toys reflect an appropriate use of the object (e.g., put puzzle together, put cup on saucer). Assessing play of children with autism and other DD may provide insight into underlying symbolic understanding not apparent through other cognitive and language assessments. In fact, assessment of symbolic play is included as part of some diagnostic assessments (e.g., the Autism Diagnostic Observations Schedule, ADOS; Lord et al. 1999).

Deficits across all of these levels of play have been identified in children with autism. Williams et al. (2001) found that young children with autism engaged almost exclusively in simple play acts with the same objects compared to children with Down syndrome (DS) and typically developing children who demonstrated more complex play routines with a variety of objects. Sigman and Ruskin (1999) found that children with autism engaged in less varied symbolic play than children with DS or DD. Early studies reported less engagement in and fewer number of functional play acts, less pretend doll play, and shorter play sequences ( Sigman and Ungerer 1984; Ungerer and Sigman 1981). To measure functional play, these authors constructed a checklist with 62 objects and asked a nurse to identify objects that she believed the child could use in a functional way; children's actions on objects was not observed in a play context. Further, play skills of a comparison group of typically developing children or those with other DD was not assessed.

Some research on children with autism has shown more similarities than differences in play, however. Dominguez et al. (2006) found that although children with autism showed less interest in specific types of toys (e.g., construction toys, dolls, and house toys) than peers without disabilities, there were no differences in overall rates of functional or symbolic play behaviors. In this study, the authors combined functional and symbolic types of play into one behavioral category. Others have found that children with autism engage in symbolic play and can attend to and imitate symbolic play acts (e.g., cook an egg, or feed a doll) similar to mental-age matched children ( Warreyn et al. 2005). Similarly, when differences in age and developmental levels were considered, Naber et al. (2008) reported no differences in length of play time or time spent in manipulative, functional, or symbolic play between groups of children with and without autism. Warreyn et al. used a more conservative method of scoring symbolic play, in that the child had to express a vocalization or story in combination with the symbolic act. The play context used in Naber et al. was free play with a familiar play partner, the mother.

Other studies have shown that children with autism do demonstrate an understanding of symbolic play, and demonstrate higher play levels in structured situations ( Jarrold et al. 1993, 1994; Libby et al. 1997). Jarrold and colleagues reasoned that perhaps difficulties reported for children with autism relate to a performance deficit verses a competence deficit. That is, a lack of spontaneous play may not be due to an inability to play symbolically (competence in), but under the right conditions they can exhibit (performance in) pretend play similar to language matched controls. The comparison group of typically developing children in Libby et al. (1997) often told the examiner "no" when asked to use toys in a pretend way (e.g., use a block as a cup and pretend to drink); whereas the children with autism imitated the act without protest. Libby et al. suggested that the children with autism may have successfully imitated symbolic acts due to the adult-guided context, possibly without interpretation of the act as symbolic.

Relationship of Play, Language and Cognitive Skills

Are play skills commensurate with other cognitive skills or do they reflect a different construct that may independently relate to language within and across various diagnostic groups? Symbolic play has been related to language development in both typical populations ( Kelly and Dale 1989; Laakso et al. 1999; McCune-Nicolich 1981) and in children with autism and other DD ( Cunningham et al. 1985; Kasari et al. 2001; McDonough et al. 1997; Sigman and Ruskin 1999; Stone et al. 1990). Typically developing toddlers using single words engage in more symbolic play than toddlers not using words. Eisert and Lamorey (1996) reported significant relationships between play and language development, with developmental level a stronger predictor of play level than chronological age.

Similar relationships between symbolic play abilities and later language skills have been documented for children with autism, DS, and DD. Sigman and Ruskin (1999) compared the number of different functional and symbolic play acts for preschoolers with autism, DS, DD, and typically developing (TD) children. The children with autism engaged in significantly fewer functional play acts only compared to the children with DS; and less varied symbolic play skills than all the other groups. Children with autism who showed a higher number of different functional play acts between the ages of 2 and 6 years had higher expressive language skills 7-10 years later. These groups were not matched on language age. Further, preschoolers with autism who play with a wider variety of different toys have been reported to show greater gains in expressive vocabulary 1 year later ( Sigman and Ruskin 1999; Yoder 2006).

Unfortunately, some studies do not describe child characteristics as related to receptive and expressive language skills, severity of autism symptoms, and some lack a comparison group ( Libby et al. 1997; Ungerer and Sigman 1981; Yoder 2006). Attending to language differences as a mediating variable is important given the wide range in degree of severity of language performance in children with autism and other DD. One way to accomplish this is to examine differences in play of children with autism compared to those with other DD at similar communication levels. For example Warreyn et al. (2005) reported that children with autism with more developed language skills tended to engage in more symbolic play than children with lower language. Hence, controlling for cognitive level would seem to be important for determining the specificity of play deficits across populations.

In summary, reports describing play development of children with autism and other DD have drawn similar conclusions in some areas, and conflict in others. As described above, possible reasons for these contradictory findings include: (a) sensitivity of the coding and play measurement system, (b) the sampling context in terms of play partner, number and type of toys, and structure, (c) varying definitions of functional and symbolic play behaviors across play taxonomies, and (d) a lack of reporting on severity of language deficits and autistic symptoms. The present study was designed to address inconsistencies in these reports by assessing play behaviors of children with autism and other DD with similar language abilities, using free play and thematic (structured) play sets.

The current study focuses on two sets of research questions. The first question addresses contradictory findings on whether or not there are significant differences in play behaviors of children with autism and children with other DD. Based on previous research showing marked deficits in attending to, imitating, and responding to actions and social behaviors of others, we are also asking about the specificity of a play deficit for children diagnosed with autism. We hypothesized that preschoolers with autism would demonstrate more limited symbolic play skills compared to preschoolers with other DD.

The second set of questions focuses on the nature of play, and cognitive and language development. Specifically, what are the relationships between play, nonverbal cognitive measures, and language measures for pre-schoolers with severe communication delays and autism or other DD? We predicted that child performance on our measures of play would correlate to standardized measures of cognitive and language performance for both children with autism and other DD. Secondarily, we were interested in examining the relationship between play and language after controlling for cognitive development. Gaining insights into possible parallels between play and language will be important in our longitudinal analyses of language growth for these two populations as we follow their development over the next 2 years.

Methods

Participants

Play assessments were completed on 73 preschool children with developmental disabilities between the ages of 37 and 71 months, with an average age of 49.5 months. Thirty-five children had a diagnosis of autism (mean age 49.2 months), and 38 had other DD (mean age 49.7 months). All 73 participants were part of a larger longitudinal study investigating child and environmental predictors of communication success; therefore, the groups were not equally matched in number. Of the participants with autism, 6 were girls and 29 were boys. There were 11 girls and 27 boys in the group with other DD (see for demographic participant information). At the start of the study, each participant was administered all subtests on the Mullen Scales of Early Learning (MSEL, Mullen 1995) and the Preschool Language Scale-4 (PLS-4, Zimmerman et al. 2003) (see ).

Table 1

Table 2

Participants were selected based on the following: (a) chronological age between 3 and 6 years and attending preschool, (b) expressive vocabulary of less than approximately different 20 words (included spoken words or signs), (c) score of more than one standard deviation below the mean on the MSEL ( Mullen 1995), (d) eligible to receive special education services through the school district, (e) motor skills sufficient to select a symbol or activate a switch with at least one hand or arm, and (f) vision corrected to 20/80 or better in at least one eye and hearing levels 25 dB HL or better in at least one ear.

A diagnosis of autism was reported for 35 participants based on meeting a minimum of three of the following four criteria: educational or clinical diagnosis of autism by school district personnel or a credited agency not affiliated with the authors' research lab, results on the ADOS ( Lord et al. 1999), results on the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS, Schopler et al. 1993), clinical features defined by DSM-IV ( APA, 1994), and scores of 15 or above on the Social Communication Questionnaire (SCQ, Rutter et al. 2003). The SCQ was administered to parents by project staff. Completion of all other diagnostic assessments was confirmed through parent report.

Materials and Measures

Toy Sets

Five play sets were used to assess children's play in unstructured (Set 1) and semi-structured (Sets 2-5) activities for a total of 15 min of play (3-min per set) with an examiner. These play sets and activities were adapted from Kasari et al. (2001, 2006). We wanted to observe children's spontaneous play behaviors; therefore, only one symbolic play act was modeled for the child for each toy set. If the child immediately imitated the examiner's symbolic act, it was not coded. Reported play deficits for this population may stem from difficulties orienting to and imitating the salient actions of others ( Wetherby 2006). Thus, we reasoned that one modeled act with one toy from an array of toy options would not markedly influence independent play behaviors. See for play sets and examples of symbolic play acts modeled by the examiner.

Play Level Measure

The play measure used to assess participants play development was based on research by Lifter (2000; Lifter and Bloom 1989; Lifter et al. 1993), specifically the Developmental Play Assessment (DPA) Instrument. The DPA consists of eight play levels, and 15 play categories within these levels. For this project, we included 11 of the 15 DPA play categories. The four levels not included were single scheme sequences, multi-scheme sequences, sociodramatic play, and thematic fantasy play. We did not include these four levels because the early work of Lifter et al. showed that preschool children with DD rarely demonstrated these higher level play skills. The 11 categories comprised four Play Levels: Level 1: Indiscriminate Actions, Level 2: Functional Play/Object Use, Level 3: Functional Combinatorial, and Level 4: Symbolic Play (see and Lifter et al. 1993 for details). Level 1, Indiscriminate Actions (i.e., mouthing, shaking, banging, and inspecting) were considered undifferentiated play, and therefore were not included in any play measures or analyses.

On-Line Play Coding Program

All play categories were entered into an on-line play coding program modeled after one created by Tapp and Yoder (2001) and adapted for this study. The program consisted of a list of every type of toy in each toy set and a list of 'anticipated' play actions, that is, a list of actions that we predicted or expected a child would perform with each toy or combination of toys. We were interested in the number of unique actions on each toy, and did not code the same action used with the same toy (e.g., child puts puzzle piece in twice, only counted as one play act; child puts a block in shape sorter then puts block in a cup coded as two acts). Based on the types of toys in each set, anticipated actions were not possible for every play category. For example, in play Set 1, unstructured play, no doll was present therefore Doll as Agent did not have any anticipated actions. Possible anticipated play actions ranged from 6 to 11 across the five play sets. We included a category called "Unexpected Substitutions" in order to capture each symbolic play act that was not predicted. Coders were able to enter a code for this unexpected symbolic play act.

Coding Play Behaviors

Play skills were coded in three ways. First, we calculated a weighted play score. Similar weighting procedures have been used to measure other areas of development such as communication ( Greenwood et al. 2003; Luze et al. 2001). We calculated weighted play by assigning one point for any Level 2 play act, two points for any Level 3 act, and three points for any Level 4 act. Thus, each different play act (or unique action) was assigned a score of 1, 2, or 3. For example, a child who took two nesting cups apart received one point for that act (Level 2, Functional Play-Takes apart combinations), and a child who put a piece of sponge on a spoon and fed a baby doll received three points for that act (Level 4, Symbolic Play-Substitutions). Each unique play act was assigned a score, and then these scores were totaled to obtain a weighted play score for each child reflecting complexity of play across all toys played with. Scores were continuous and we included individual child scores in our analyses.

Second we calculated an 'object interest' score, which assessed each child's differentiated intentional actions on objects. Object interest was assessed given reports of a restricted range of interest in a variety of toys for children with autism and those with other DD ( Bruckner and Yoder 2007; Sigman and Ungerer 1984). Across all five play sets, the total number of times a child acted on a different toy (e.g., puts shape in shape sorter; stacks blocks, or opens toy phone) was counted and summed per child. If two toys were acted on in combination, both were counted. For example, placing a cup on a saucer would count as two objects of interest.

The third play variable was the highest level of play that was described as emerging and/or or mastered based on the type and number of play acts observed in play levels 2, 3 and 4 (not including Level 1: Indiscriminate actions on objects; see ). Emerging was defined as demonstration of a minimum of two different play acts at one level. Mastered was defined as demonstration of four or more play acts at one level. These definitions were based on research by Lifter et al. (1993) and Kasari et al. (2006).

Cognitive and Language Measures

Nonverbal cognitive ability was calculated by combining the Fine Motor and Visual Reception subtest raw scores on the MSEL, following the work of Wetherby et al. (2004) and Yoder (2006). These two subtests do not assess expressive language or speech production. This MSEL nonverbal cognitive measure was used in the correlational analyses, as were the raw scores obtained on the PLS-4 ( Zimmerman et al. 2003). Although there was a range of cognitive and language abilities across the two groups, both groups demonstrated significant developmental delays as evidenced by the outcomes of these two assessments (see ). The children with DD had slightly superior receptive language skills compared to the children with autism on both the Mullen and the PLS-4 auditory comprehension subtests.

Procedures

Examiners were instructed to arrange the toys in the play sets in specific ways to elicit a wider variety of anticipated play acts (e.g., some pop beads together and some apart, puzzle pieces outside of the puzzle, and doll sitting up or laying down). With the exception of the first free play toy set, the examiner modeled one symbolic play act using each pretend object (i.e., for toy sets two through five, see ). After this model, a timer was started and the child could play with an array of toys within each toy set for 3-min. The examiner was instructed to touch or play only with those toys that the child had already picked up or played with. It was acceptable to imitate the child's actions on a toy, but not to play with a toy in a way the child had not demonstrated (i.e., that may prompt child to use a higher level of play). If a child fixated on a specific toy for 1-min or longer in a perseverative way, that toy was replaced with another one. Examiners were trained to limit language facilitating strategies.

Each play session was videotaped on a Flip mino HD camera, uploaded to a computer in the research lab and then burned to a DVD. A trained research assistant (RA) opened the on-line play coder program on a desktop computer and observed the child's play on the DVD via Windows Media or VLC Media Player. The RA stopped the tape at each instance of a different play act on a toy and entered the time in minutes and seconds. The RA then selected the appropriate Play Set (1 through 5), and the specific toy that was acted on. The RA then selected the child's action from a drop down menu of all anticipated actions listed in the program for that toy. This continued until all play acts on objects in each set were coded. Symbolic play acts that occurred within 5-s of the examiner's model were not coded.

Inter-Rater Reliability

Four RAs were trained on the play coder program, and were considered reliable when their agreement with the first author was at a minimum 80% inter-rater agreement on total play actions over three different play assessments. Percent agreement was calculated by dividing the total # of play acts matched by both coders by the total # of acts observed by the primary coder plus the # of acts observed by the secondary coder. A total of 40% (29 of 73) of the play assessments were randomly selected and coded by a second RA to measure inter-rater reliability. The average inter-rater reliability was 88.3% (range 67-100%). Interclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) were also calculated for the weighted play score and object interest. The ICC for the overall weighted play score was quite high at .99. The ICCs for the individual play types that were combined to form the weighted play score were also quite high ranging from .87 for Takes Apart Combinations to .99 for Child as Agent and Specific Combinations. For the measure object interest, the ICC was 1.00. Another play outcome variable of interest in the current analysis was highest play level mastered. Twenty-three of the 29 play observations that were coded for reliability had sufficient play acts (4 play acts) within a category to have mastered that play level. Of these 23 mastered level scores, 21 (91%) were consistent between the primary and secondary raters. The two discrepancies resulted from very small differences in the number of substitution play acts observed (e.g., for one child the primary coder observed three and the reliability coder observed five substitutions; for a second child, the primary coder observed four and the reliability coder observed three substitutions). This small difference resulted in a different highest play level mastered score between the raters.

Analysis Approach

To test if the play skills of the children with autism were significantly lower than those of the children with other DD, independent samples t tests were used to examine differences between the two groups on average weighted play and average object interest scores. In addition to analyses of the main levels of play, between group differences were also investigated in the play subcategories (across categories 2 through 11, see ). Independent samples t tests were also used to compare the rates of each of the individual types of play acts. We also used descriptive statistics to summarize the proportion of children in each group who were emerging or had mastered specific play levels and z tests to determine if the proportions were significantly different across groups. We used Pearson correlations to determine if cognitive and language abilities (raw scores on MSEL and PLS-4) were related to play (average weighted score) and also used partial correlations to control for the relationship with nonverbal skills. Raw scores were used in the analyses due to limited variability in this sample in standard scores, with most scores at or near the bottom of the possible standard scores for a given age

Results

Group Differences in Play Levels, Object Interest, and Mastery

The first question to be addressed in the analysis was whether there were differences in play behaviors between children with autism and those with other DD. There were three different but related play outcome variables of interest used to address this question: total weighted play score (based on play levels), object interest, and highest play level mastered. Means and standard deviations for weighted total play and object interest for each group are presented in . Shapiro-Wilk Tests for normality of weighted total play scores within each group indicated that the scores were not significantly non-normal. Levene's Test of Equality of Variances was significant indicating that the variance of the autism group was significantly smaller than the variance of the DD group. Therefore, the Welch-Satterthwaite correction was used to compare the mean weighted total play scores. The weighted total play scores were not significantly different across groups ( t(67.9) = −.40, p = .69, d = −.09). Additionally no significant differences between the two groups were found for object interest scores ( t(71) = −.94, p = .35, d = −.22).

Table 6

In order to determine if there were differences between the two groups on emerging symbolic play, a z test for the difference in two proportions was used. Ten of the 13 children in the autism group (26%) and 10 of 38 children in the DD group (29%) met the criteria for emerging at the symbolic level of play (at least two acts). These proportions were not significantly different from one another ( z = −.05, p > .05). Similarly, there were no significant differences in levels of play mastered ( z = .10, p > .05). Across the different categories, three (9%) of the children with autism had mastered symbolic play (Level 4) compared to two (5%) of the children with other DD. Twenty-one (60%) of the children with autism had mastered functional combinatorial (Level 3) play, compared to 20 (53%) of the DD children. These were not significantly different proportions, z = .40, p > .05. Finally, five children in both groups (14% of the children with autism; 13% of children with other DD) had mastered functional play/object use (Level 2). These were not significantly different proportions, z = −.20, p > .05. Overall, there were no significant group differences in the play outcomes of the two groups of children across any of the three play measures.

Group Differences in Play Subcategories

Analysis of the specific subcategories of symbolic play revealed that the groups were similar in this regard as well. Twenty (57%) of the children with autism performed at least one substitution play act, compared to 21 (55%) of the children with other DD. These were not significantly different proportions, z = −.07, p > .05. One child with autism engaged in at least one symbolic play act that involved 'doll as agent' compared to three children with other DD; however, this difference was not significant, z = .43, p > .05. The only play category with a significant difference between groups was the 'presentation combination' category ( t(71) = −3.27, p = .002, d = .76); in that children with autism averaged 2.14 play acts while children with other DD averaged 1.16 play acts. This is considered to be a moderate effect size ( Cohen 1988).

Group Differences in Cognition and Language

We investigated the possibility of group differences in cognition and language by analyzing raw score mean differences on the tests of cognitive and language development across groups (see ). Tests for normality indicated that PLS-4 Auditory Comprehension scores were not normally distributed for either the autism or DD groups. Additionally, the MSEL Receptive Language raw score was not normally distributed in the autism group. Examination of the distribution of scores indicated that a few children in each group scored exceptionally high for their group and that variability was larger in the DD group. presents the box plots for these language comprehension scores and shows the distributions for both groups.

Independent samples t tests using the Welch-Satterthwaite correction indicated that children in the two groups differed in terms of their receptive language abilities as there were significant mean differences on the PLS-4, Auditory Comprehension Raw Score ( t(59.40) = 2.50, p = .015, d = .58) and the MSEL Receptive Language Raw Score ( t(69.04) = 2.03, p = .047, d = .47). For both receptive language measures, the means for the DD group were significantly higher than the means for the autism group. No significant differences between groups were observed for expressive language abilities ( t(71) = −.85, p = .40) or nonverbal cognitive skills (i.e., Fine Motor and Visual Reception subtests of the MSEL) ( t(56.26) = −.47, p = .15).

Relationship of Play, Language, and Cognitive Measures

The second set of questions examined the relationship between play, language, and cognitive behaviors, and the effect of group on this relationship. Preliminary Pearson correlations were examined between weighted total scores and cognitive (MSEL) and language (MSEL, PLS-4) raw scores. Weighted total score was the only play measure we included in these analyses because all three of the play measures were highly correlated with each other, and the weighted total score appeared to be the best reflection of overall play level. We calculated correlations within each group (autism and other DD). For the children with other DD, results indicated significant correlations ranging from .44 to .71 ( p < .01 for all) between weighted play scores and raw scores on the MSEL Receptive, MSEL Expressive, PLS-4 EC, and PLS-4 AC. Correlations between weighted play and MSEL Composite and MSEL nonverbal (i.e., Fine Motor and Visual Reception subtests) raw scores were even higher, at r = .83 and r = .84 respectively for the DD group. For the children with autism, correlations between weighted total play and raw scores on the MSEL Receptive, MSEL Expressive, PLS-4 EC, and PLS-4 AC were notably smaller and not statistically significant. Correlations were statistically significant between weighted play scores and raw scores on the MSEL Composite (r = .49, p < .01) and MSEL Nonverbal (r = .50, p < .01) for the autism group. The MSEL Composite raw score includes performance across all four subtests. When partial correlations controlling for the effect of cognitive development were examined (partialing out the nonverbal scores from the MSEL), none of the correlations for either group remained significant. For the DD group, all correlations which were previously significant were now less than .10. For the children with autism, correlations which were insignificant before remained insignificant after controlling for nonverbal IQ.

Discussion

In this study, we utilized a systematic observational paradigm to measure and determine differences in play skills of developmentally delayed preschool children with and without autism. All children had severe communication impairments. We were unable to confirm our hypothesis that preschool children with autism would engage in fewer symbolic play acts. Results revealed no significant differences between the two groups of children in level of play, or expressed interest in playing with different toys. Our data showed a likeness across the groups in terms of emergence and mastery of symbolic play; although for all children, symbolic play was the least frequently observed type of play. We also failed to find any group differences in diversity of object play. Thus, in contrast to other findings, the level and diversity of functional and symbolic play of children with autism was not lower than that of children with other DD. These results add support to research documenting more play similarities than differences between preschoolers with autism and other DD ( Dominguez et al. 2006; Naber et al. 2008); specifically for children with similar expressive language skills.

We were somewhat surprised that overall, the children with autism did as well as the children with other DD on our play measures. Given the comparable play behaviors across the two populations, the results do not provide evidence for a specific play deficit for children with autism. It is possible that we did not find significant differences between the two groups due to recruiting children who were nonverbal or minimally verbal, lending to greater expressive and cognitive similarities across the groups. Although the children were not matched on cognitive and language skills; they were placed in each group based on our recruitment criteria. Thus, group differences may have, in effect, been erased by recruiting participants with a narrow range of language and cognitive abilities.

Play deficits characteristic of young children with autism may be due to difficulties orienting to and imitating caregiver's actions on objects ( Wetherby 2006). Such difficulties may disrupt turn-taking and lead to less developed knowledge and mental representations of objects and events ( Yoder 2006). Thus, a limited interest in and ability to act on objects appropriately in play contexts may be due to a problem in social learning ( Bandura 1977), or a lack of attention to adult models and reinforcement. For example, recreating action schemas in a pretend play sequence such as feeding a baby doll, burping the doll, and putting the doll to bed requires orienting to the social actions of others, a significant challenge reported for individuals with autism compared to those with other DD such as DS ( Sigman and Ruskin 1999). We need more studies to confirm if social learning problems, and/or difficulties attending to salient actions of others, are at the root of reported play deficits for this population. We did find one play difference between the two groups, in that the children with autism combined toys together in a conventional way (e.g., putting a puzzle together, nesting cups, and matching shapes in shape sorter) more so than children in the DD group. This type of play behavior may be easier for children with autism to recreate as it requires an understanding of how objects go together based on knowledge of object properties, a skill less dependent on adult models to learn.

The most common type of play across both groups of children was functional play. They played with objects in conventional ways (e.g., stacked blocks), related objects to self (e.g., brought toy phone to ear to talk), and extended actions to others (i.e., fed examiner with a bottle). Although limited, symbolic play was not completely missing from their play repertoires. For example, a few children would place the sponge on a spoon and pretend to feed the baby doll. Although more children with other DD engaged in symbolic play with dolls, this difference was not significant. Hobson, Lee, and Hobson (2009) posed a cognitive based view for this apparent lack of pretend play by some children with delayed language. Difficulties assigning meaning to toys in a pretend way may be due to limitations in identifying and adopting other people's perspectives. This cognitive view has been discussed as relevant for children with autism; however in the current study, children without autism demonstrated a similar absence of pretend play. Perhaps, regardless of an autism diagnosis, preschool children with significant language and cognitive deficits have not yet developed the cognitive underpinnings and social understanding necessary to play with toys symbolically.

In order to better understand play development of children with autism or other DD, it will be necessary to examine current play taxonomies and find more consistent and sensitive methods to measure more subtle developments in play. For example, decontextualized play described by Belsky and Most (1981) included 'pretend self' and 'pretend other' (or Child as Agent) behaviors. These same behaviors were categorized as 'elaborated functional play' in later research ( Williams et al. 2001), and more recently categorized as a subtype of symbolic play ( Dominguez et al. 2006; Stanley and Konstantareas 2007). Williams et al. (2001) found play differences only when elaborated or combined play and pre-linguistic behaviors were examined. Children with autism spent less time playing with multiple objects at the same time, or using vocalizations and/or gestures in play. Further, children with autism engage in fewer symbolic play behaviors that involve attribution of false properties and making reference to an absent object ( Libby et al. 1998). These authors suggest there is greater contextual support for substituting one object for another, whereas decontextualized symbolic play requires the child to construct ideas based on events removed from the immediate context. These categories of symbolic play require relatively advanced language abilities. Our participants were all beginning communicators, so the fact that we did not find any differences across groups may reflect floor effects for these more advanced play behaviors. Assessing sequential and elaborated play, or combinations of concurrent play and language behaviors, may be more sensitive to identify differences across populations of children with developmental disabilities.

Relationships between play, language, and cognitive skills have been examined repeatedly across populations of children with varying cognitive and language developmental profiles. Our results showed high correlations between play, language, and cognitive measures, indicating that play is commensurate with these measures and perhaps does not add any unique insights into a child's language abilities; at least within a single time point comparison. Over time, however, play skills have been found to predict later language outcomes, and studies examining children's communication growth have emphasized the importance of including play as an important prelinguistic treatment goal ( Yoder 2006). Through our ongoing longitudinal study we will be able to evaluate how play develops over the pre-school years, and determine if play differences between children with autism and other DD emerge during the transition from pre-linguistic to linguistic communication.

Limitations

It could be construed that the adult modeling of a symbolic play act at the beginning of each play set and replacing toys if a child fixated on a toy, may have inflated the child's symbolic play or object interest behaviors. Even though we did not give a child credit for spontaneous symbolic play if their action immediately followed this model, it is possible that the children imitated this model within the 3 min play set. When models are provided, children with autism can imitate symbolic play acts even better than children with DS and typically developing children ( Libby et al. 1997); however, even when no play models are provided children with autism continue to produce symbolic object substitutions at comparable rates to these same groups of children ( Libby et al. 1998). When symbolic play models are provided, it would be beneficial to evaluate how often a child imitates this model, and perhaps code only novel symbolic acts to determine if the child truly understands symbolic play. In relation to object interest, few children in the current study required this modification in test administration, and replacement of toys was comparable across the two groups.

One possible explanation for our findings of no significant group differences is that the sampling context did not allow the child to express the range and 'type' of play skills he/she was capable of. For example, the majority of our participants were boys (75%) and two play sets, the Tea Set and Grooming, may have been less appealing to their interests, and concurrently affect motivation to engage in play. Further, the coding system was based on what adults 'anticipated' the child would do in a specific play situation. Observing play behaviors of typically developing children engaged with the same play sets and adding their play acts to the coding system is one future option. Also, adding sequential play actions to the coding system, and perhaps tracking multiple acts on different toys may lead to greater group differences. On the flip side, the play context in this study was very structured with the exception of the initial warm-up. The sets of toys included specific objects that could be used to pretend; therefore, the context may have led to a higher number of symbolic play acts than would have been observed in a less structured, free play context.

Conclusions

In summary, we did not find group differences in quantity of play with different objects and symbolic play behaviors between preschoolers with autism and other DD. This is most likely because we recruited participants at similar language and cognitive stages of development. Future research using common classification systems is needed to illuminate reported play discrepancies and behaviors of young children with DD. This task may also be accomplished by breaking down current classification systems into more detailed behaviors, and including a wider range of symbolic play behaviors that children may engage in without much effort. As expected, strong correlations were found between play, language, and cognition, and the correlations were so strong that when the nonverbal cognitive measures were partialled out, play no longer correlated with language. Over time, our longitudinal analyses may complement current research and show that play is a significant predictor of language, and other early communication skills.

Acknowledgments

The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health-National Institute on Deafness and other Communication Disorders (R01 DC 007684); and the National Institutes of Health-National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (P01 HD 018955). We would also like to thank the core support service of the Kansas Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center, University of Kansas, funded by National Institutes of Health-National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (P30 HD 002528). We gratefully acknowledge our project coordinators and research assistants for their diligent efforts on this project, and the participating families for their time and ongoing support.

References

Naber F, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, van IJzendoorn MH, Swinkels S, Buitelaar JK, Dietz C, et al. Play behavior and attachment in toddlers with autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. 2008;38:857-866. [[PMC free article] [PubMed] Google Scholar]

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Symbolic Play of Preschoolers with Severe Communication Impairments with Autism and Other Developmental Delays: More Similarities than Differences

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Children with autism are often described as having deficient play skills, particularly symbolic play. We compared the play of 35 children with autism to 38 children with other developmental delays. All children were preschool-age and produced less than 20 different words. Results indicated no significant differences across the two groups in their play.

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Simple language activities for preschoolers can be powerful. By encouraging language development through play, you create an environment for language activities to occur naturally. Let's play and build some valuable communication and language skills.

Language learning comes naturally, and children are born with all they require to develop their language skills. Therefore, as long as we expose children to language in early childhood, they will learn to speak. Furthermore, we also know that they quickly soak up words for communication and language development early. I am sure you recall a time your toddler or preschooler repeated something you said, and you wished they hadn't?

Even though language development in children begins at birth and occurs naturally, it does not mean that we, as parents, can not enrich their language learning and development environments.

Our role is to interact, listen, read, sing, talk, and play with them to build communication and language skills. By making eye contact, speaking directly and clearly, introducing and repeating new words, and using complete sentences, we model and encourage strong communication skills.

What a privilege and pleasure to play a role in your child's language learning!

The Importance Of Language Development

The importance of language development in early childhood is vital to a child's social-emotional development as well as brain and cognitive development. Language and communication skills are an essential developmental task and support overall growth in your child's early years.

Our language skills determine how we communicate, relate to others, and experience life. Envision a world where you could not learn, express yourself, build relationships, or communicate your needs and wants. Admittedly, that is not what we want for our children.

Furthermore, as your child begins to watch, listen, and explore the world around them, they learn how to express their ideas and emotions.

Play And Language Development

Ah! Play, is it really that important to language development in preschoolers and toddlers? The answer is YES! If you have been around Discovery Building Sets much, you will see that all children need more time to play (adults too!)

So, how do you encourage language development in toddlers and preschoolers? Language development through play, includes reading, singing, talking, playing games, block play, and more.

How To Include Language Learning Into Daily Play:

Create a space for language activities to occur naturally-a welcoming environment where children can explore, play together, and play on their own.

Provide open-ended materials, like arts and crafts, playdough, pretend play, and block play area props. The larger the variety of materials offered increases the exploration opportunities. Just look around the house, and you will be amazed at what kids can use to play. Through play, your child can ask questions, increase vocabulary, and you can model language, boosting their language skills.

Build on what interests your child. As an illustration, if your child is curious about penguins, read books about penguins. Talk and sing songs about them. Enjoy other activities like a field trip to the aquarium or zoo to see the penguins. Use these opportunities to develop language skills and increase their vocabulary all through play and exploration.

This is not a time for worksheets and memorization, but instead, let them wonder and ask questions. Then together, find the answers.
What To Remember When Incorporating Language Activities For Preschoolers Into Play:

Actively listen to your child.

Talk, talk, and talk some more about what you are doing throughout the day. For example, "Let's go have some breakfast. After breakfast, we can get dressed and go to the park."

Gently correct mistakes by repeating the sentence back with the proper word usage and pronunciation.

Encourage and praise proper language and communication skills.

Repeat new words to develop vocabulary.

Ask open-ended questions that require more than one-word answers. Such as asking, "What are you doing?" will provide a more extended response than "Are you playing with your blocks?"

Use follow up questions for more details. For example, if your child said "blocks" to the above question, you could ask, "What are you building with your blocks?"

Model more elaborate sentences and phrases. For instance, if your child answered "house," you could respond with, "Oh, you are building a house with your blocks." You could further the conversation by asking more questions like, "Why are you building a house?" or "Who will live in the house?"

Keep screen time to a minimum. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends, "For children 2-5 years, limit screen use to one hour a day of high-quality programming and co-view with children."

Language development activities for preschoolers should be natural, not forced. Remember, you are just having conversations!

Language Activities For Preschoolers

When deciding what language activities for preschoolers to provide, remember the focus is on encouraging your child's verbal development. Create opportunities to engage in group games that foster conversation. Build language skills for preschoolers with listening activities. Try recording your child talking with you and play it back. They love to hear themselves!

Each of these preschool language development activities is simple, playful, and fun! While also building your child's language and confidence.

Storytelling

Who doesn't love a good story? Well, storytelling is also one of the best language development activities for preschoolers. There are several methods to create storytelling activities, but they all follow the same principle. Get your child talking by encouraging them to tell or retell stories.

Create A Story Basket Or Bag

Again, there are multiple ways to build a storytelling basket, bag, box, or bin. Ideally, you want to collect things from around the house based on a theme that will inspire a story. It can be any combination of loose parts and characters, either based on a book you are reading or not.

For example, you may have spent the day at the beach previously, and you want your child to tell a story about that day. You could include a small bottle of sand, shells, small pieces of fabric, little paper umbrellas, tiny pretend food, and small figurines.

Now open the top of the container and encourage your child to tell a story with the objects. You could create a little rhyme to use each time, like, "What story will we tell today?" "Open the top and see who has come to play!"

You may also want to have available paper, crayons, markers, or colored pencils to expand the story potential with a background or landscape.

Use Photos Or Wordless Picture Books

In this method, you use wordless picture books or photos to prompt storytelling. Try some of these variations based on your child's language skills.

If your child is not yet using their expressive language skills, you can have them point out items in the book or pictures as you tell the story. Connecting the story they hear with the photographs is helpful if your child is not yet talking.

If your child has some expressive language ability, they can start by describing what they see in the photos or books. For example, "What is the character doing?"

Finally, if your child has well developed expressive language skills, you could ask them to describe not only "What the character is doing," but also "What they are thinking?"

Tell Your Child Stories

Create stories based on your child's interests with characters, adventure, and a happily ever after ending. Make it playful, maybe something from your childhood, or entirely make-believe.

We had a camping tradition when our kids were small. When it was time to quiet down for the night, dad would tell them a story. They got to choose the subject of the story, and he would make it up on the fly. Sometimes they would chime in and build on the plot, but mostly, they just loved to listen. Why not create a storytelling tradition of your own?

Block Play

is one of those activities that is easy to add to your daily routine and fosters communication and early language development. Have you ever noticed how the block play area is a magical place for toddlers and preschoolers?

When playing with wooden building blocks , your child learns new words that describe the block's colors, shapes, and sizes. Or perhaps they might name the parts of their fort or tower, like the "window," "door," or "gate."

Furthermore, block play inspires imaginative play, and this is where communication and language skills really develop. Pretend, or fantasy play invites dramatic adventures and storytelling. Preschoolers love to narrate what they are doing. As their story develops, so does their language and communication skills.

Also, building with blocks provides opportunities for social interaction. This time is when children learn to interact with others, communicate, figure out how things work, collaborate, and work through their problems. During block activities , you can engage with your child by asking interesting questions about what they are building.

Building sets and blocks for toddlers are available in various materials, shapes, sizes, and colors. So, select one that is age-appropriate and sparks your child's interests.

Music Activities

What child doesn't love a good rhyming or silly song? They love to sing, dance, and move to the music. So, what better way than to develop language skills with music. By memorizing and repeating the words, they build vocabulary and thereby develop their language skills.

A win-win way to engage them is while driving in a car. Put on a favorite CD and together sing some silly songs and rhymes. This might even make them forget the age-old question, "Are we there yet?"

Sing Songs Or Rhymes Like One Of These:

Engage In One Of These Favorite Musical Circle Games

As a bonus, use instruments purchased or homemade (pots and pans with wooden spoons) to play along.

Arts & Crafts, Painting, And Playdough

These open-ended materials are wonderful for vocabulary building and conversation-starting preschool language development activities. They can describe what they are making. Or express their feelings about the picture they painted.

Language Development Games

Games, like board games, card games, or outdoor games, encourage social interaction and build vocabulary related to the game. You will want to be sure the game is age-appropriate, and your child has the vocabulary necessary to enjoy playing the game.

Describe Me Bags

This activity focuses on getting your child to describe things.

You need some type of bag (cloth works well) to place the objects so they can not be seen.

Next, collect everyday items from around the house, such as a crayon, a small magnetic wooden block , a spoon, and more. Place all the pieces into the bag.

Lastly, your child is going to put their hand into the bag, feel one of the items without looking, and then describe it to you until you can guess what it is.

Sensory Play

Sensory activities are about getting your child to use all of their senses-while building receptive and expressive language skills. Look for items with a variety of textures and sizes like magnetic blocks , pasta, corks, pebbles, buttons, and so on. You can also use things like finger-paints, shaving cream or dried beans, rice, or oats.

Focus On These Activities For Language Development In Preschoolers

Ask Questions - Such as, "What color is the square block?"

Follow Directions - For instance, "Bang two blocks together."

Inference - For example, "If we mix red and yellow playdough, what will we get?"

Expand Vocabulary (plurals, verbs, prepositions, and adjectives) - For instance, "Roll the yellow playdough into a ball and put it on top of the blue."

A sand play area is terrific for sensory activities or constructive play that includes digging, building, and playing.
Use Their Senses To Introduce New Vocabulary Words

Receptive Language Activities

Receptive language skills are the ability to comprehend words, sentences, what is read, and what others say. Typically developed first, these skills are essential for successful communication. Without the ability to hear and understand language, it is difficult for a child to learn, express themselves, or to build relationships.

Explore the receptive language activities for preschoolers to develop your child's receptive language skills.

Play Every Day

Language learning should be fun! It is something that can easily be included in your everyday play and activities. During play, it is simple to use and model position words such as "over," "under," "top," or "bottom." Or action words like "hopping," "running," "swinging," or "jumping."

Let your child lead, be creative, and encourage their imagination and creativity while playing.

"When we make PLAY the foundation of learning, we teach the WHOLE child." - Vince Gowmon

Read, Read, And Read Some More!

Do you see a common theme here? It is never too early to begin reading to your child. Reading is crucial to their language development, including both receptive communication skills and expressive communication skills.

In this case, we are focusing on receptive language activities. While reading, expand their vocabulary by pointing to and labeling pictures in the book. Encourage them to find and identify things. Recap what is happening in the story. Ask questions about the main parts of the adventure to boost comprehension.

Furthermore, you can encourage a love of books by reading daily. Start simple with picture books and graduate to longer ones as the child's language skills develop. Visit the library or bookstore for storytimes to foster a lifelong love of reading.

Puzzles

Puzzles are another fantastic way to focus on receptive language skills. The aim is to engage in conversation while putting together the puzzle. For example, have your preschooler or toddler find a specific piece. You can ask, "Find the duck." and "What sound does the duck make?" If the puzzle is about animals on the farm, you can talk about "What else do you find on the farm?" Keep the conversation going as long as your child is engaged and enjoying themselves!

Scavenger Hunt

Scavenger hunts of any kind are brilliant for building language skills as well as gross motor development . Just think about all the running around and finding things the kids do. What a blast!

However, to focus on the language development aspects, let's create a list and hunt for the items. It is easy to incorporate this into another activity like cooking, painting, or gardening. Let's say you want to bake cookies. You create the list (include pictures) for your preschooler to "shop" for the items around the house.

Help them complete the list with questions or directions, such as "Where do we keep the butter?" or "You can find the flour in the pantry." Follow up by baking the cookies together, which further develops their expressive language skills.

Games That Stimulate Language Development
Do you remember any of these classics?
Activities and games that target active listening and following directions are perfect for receptive language development. These skills are vital to building effective communication.

Simon Says

Red Light, Green Light

Follow The Leader

For more games and activities to build communication skills, see this post on Social Activities For Toddlers And Preschoolers.

Expressive Language Activities

Expressive language skills are the ability to use gestures, words, sentences, and signs to express meaning to others. Therefore, the following expressive language activities for preschoolers support expressive language development.

When engaging your child's expressive language skills through block play or activities, it helps to remember the following tips:

Engage in conversation.

Ask open-ended questions.

Talk about what you are doing.

Have your child narrate their actions.

Use language to take turns, request items, and give instructions.

Read, Read And Still Read More!

We previously discussed receptive language activities for preschoolers; however, here, we will focus on expressive language activities.

Books are amazing! They provide so many ways to explore and develop language skills. As we said earlier, it is never too early to start reading to your child.

Read age-appropriate books and ask lots of open-end questions. Questions that require them to respond with more than one word. For instance, "How do you think she is feeling?" "What do you think the dog will do next?" or "Tell me what is going on in this picture?" All of these questions will require your child to process the question and then use their words to express the answer.

Picture books are excellent for introducing younger toddlers to expressive language skills. In this case, your questions can be more direct, like "What color is this?" and "What is this?" These will be one-word answers which are age-appropriate. You can help model language by expanding on your child's responses and reply, "Yes, that is a whale. He is a blue whale."

Select books that relate to your child's interests. For example, looking at a book about the ocean presents various vocabulary words associated with the sea. Encourage your child to identify and name items in the pictures.

Imaginative Play

Pretend play, fantasy play, or imaginative play are like language development on steroids. Children tend to focus and develop more complex, expressive language skills during this time. There is so much language flying around that it is like being in the front row seat of the theater. We wrote a post on the benefits of imaginative play that you can read.

Pretend play is magical and requires your child to use their creativity . Encourage your child to elaborate their storytelling by asking questions such as "Where should we go?" "Who would you like to come with us?" and "What shall we take with us?"

These open-ended questions help build the sequence of events and storyline, helping your child develop language skills and confidence. Most important, be a part of the fantasy play and language learning experience.

"When children pretend, they're using their imaginations to move beyond the bounds of reality." - Fred Rogers

Use These Ideas To Boost Your Child's Imaginative Play:

Dress up and have a tea party.

Set up a pretend kitchen and cook something delicious.

Build a make-believe hospital and take care of their dolls or stuffed animals.

Create a corner store and go "shopping."

Play "house," "go to a party," or "get married."

Assemble a racetrack for their cars.

Construct a repair shop for their toy cars.

Additional Ways To Expand Your Symbolic Play And Language Development:

Dress-Up Chest

Collect old shoes, hats, and accessories from garage sales, thrift stores, or party stores. Add former Halloween costumes when the event is finished. Dress up is such a fun way to increase their vocabulary and language skills.

It can't be repeated too often, engage in conversation, and ask those questions. Talk about "Who are we going to be?" "What are we going to wear?" and "Where will go once we are dressed up?" Be part of the fun and dress up!

Add A Telephone

This is something every toddler and preschooler should have in their play area. Even the quietest child will engage in conversation with a pretend phone.

Other Props

Adding props, like dolls, cars, trains, toy animals, play food, and other household items to both your pretend play and block play areas, adds additional vocabulary and language opportunities.

Puppet Play

Puppets are a playful way to interact and create dialog. Children love playing with puppets and creating a show for the family. They can recreate a favorite story or ultimately make up a new one. The possibilities are endless.

Furthermore, puppets are a way for children to feel comfortable expressing themselves. Your child can speak through the puppet or even have a conversation between two puppets.

Cooking

Remember the scavenger hunt previously where you "shopped" for the cookie baking items? Well, here is where you can continue that activity focusing on expressive language development through the sequence of events. In this activity, you both will describe the recipe ingredients and steps.

Begin by looking over and reviewing the ingredients they collected. Read through the recipe, talking about each of the steps. Next, have them describe what you are doing, or what they are doing, what you have done, and what they think comes next. Continue the dialog throughout the process by asking them, "What do I need to do next?"
Which language activities for preschoolers will you try next?
Whether you tell stories, sing, or build a repair shop with magnetic blocks , you want to get your kids engaged in conversation and using their language skills. Simple but powerful things like puzzles, games, or pretend play, all increase your child's language development.

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Simple And Powerful Language Activities For Preschoolers

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Simple language activities for preschoolers can be powerful. By encouraging language development through play, you create an environment for language activities to occur naturally. Let's play and build some valuable communication and language skills. Language learning comes naturally, and children are born with all they require to develop their language skills.

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Playing with dolls encourages children to talk more about others' thoughts and emotions, a study has found.

The research suggests that playing imaginary games with dolls could help children develop social skills, theory of mind and empathy. The neuroscientist who led the work said that the educational value of playing with Lego and construction toys was widely accepted, but the benefits of playing with dolls sometimes appeared to have been overlooked.

"When children create imaginary worlds and role play with dolls, they communicate at first out loud and then internalise the message about others' thoughts, emotions and feelings," said Dr Sarah Gerson, a neuroscientist at Cardiff University and the lead author. "This can have positive long-lasting effects on children, such as driving higher rates of social and emotional processing and building social skills like empathy that can become internalised to build and form lifelong habits."

The study, funded by the manufacturers of Barbie and published in the journal Developmental Science, involved 33 boys and girls, aged between four and eight who were given a collection of Barbie dolls and accessories such as an ambulance or horse to play with.

They were left to play spontaneously, but their speech was monitored and they were also fitted with a specialised cap containing a form of brain imaging technology called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The technique measures changes in blood oxygenation by shining light through the skull, which makes it possible to track brain activity while the subject is freely moving around.

The study found that the children talked more about others' thoughts and emotions, a concept known as internal state language, when playing with the dolls, compared with playing creative games on a computer tablet, such as a hairdressing game or a city-building game with characters.

They were also more likely to address the dolls in the second person, talking to them directly, whereas the characters on the computer screen they tended to refer to in the third person. No difference was observed between boys and girls.

"Internal state language can indicate that a child is thinking about other people's thoughts and emotions while playing with dolls," said Gerson.

Benjamin Mardell, who researches the pedagogy of play at Harvard Graduate School of Education and who was not involved in the work, said: "The hypothesis that playing with dolls provides a scaffolding for young children to take the perspective of another, even if that other is inanimate, seems very reasonable. And that they see language use in this regard is good confirmation of the hypothesis."

Mardell added that the findings ought to apply to any kind of role-play toy, rather than being specific to Barbies. "I'd take a broader view of what a doll is," he said. "[It could be] any object that the child can invest a sense of other into - a stuffed animal, an oven mitt that talks to them, or even an imaginary friend."

Children typically start to show signs of internal state language around the age of four. At this age, they begin to voice their thoughts aloud, indicating that they are considering the thoughts, feelings and desires of themselves and others.

"These skills are really important for interacting with other people, learning from other people, and navigating a variety of social situations," Gerson said. "It becomes important for making and sustaining friendships, and how they learn from their teachers, and parents."

The study also found that the children had increased brain activity in the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS) region when they spoke as though their dolls had thoughts and feelings. The pSTS region is believed to be involved in the development of social and emotional processing skills.

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Playing with dolls helps children talk about how others feel, says study

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Playing with dolls encourages children to talk more about others' thoughts and emotions, a study has found. The research suggests that playing imaginary games with dolls could help children develop social skills, theory of mind and empathy.

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Why is storytelling important to children?

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Former CBeebies presenter and dad Alex Winters went on a mission to find out just what’s so important about stories.

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Parachute Fun for Everyone - 10 Best Parachute Games (EYFS friendly) for early years children, parents and teachers.

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Don't let your pre-schoolers forget how to play

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Don't let your pre-schoolers forget how to play

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"Play is enough. Play is enough. Play is enough. This should be our educational mantra for the first 5 years... We must fiercely protect this precious, ever shrinking window of time for our children" Janet Lansbury, Elevating Childcare

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As hard as it is to believe, there are children as young as 4 or 5 already showing signs of stress and burn-out because parents and teachers are misinformed about their educational needs. Some have even been mis-educated to the extent that they've forgotten how to play.

I had a spontaneous meeting with my children's former preschool director recently, and boy, did she need to vent. She shared with me that another preschool in our neighborhood suddenly closed late last summer, and several desperate parents begged to enroll in her school at the last minute.

But difficulties arose because these families were switching from a school with a much different philosophy, one focused on teacher directed structured learning and academics rather than free play. So transitioning these children into the relaxed, child-centered, developmentally appropriate school my children once attended was a major adjustment for the teachers and parents...and especially the children.

If these new students were willing test subjects rather than innocent children, the staff might have appreciated this experience as a valuable training session, because they vividly illustrated the unfortunate result of what not to do.

The children's attempts at play with peers were rigid, tense, directive and one-note: "Okay, I'm the big sister and you're the mommy and you're the little brother and you're the friend. The little brother and I are going to run away."

"Running away" was apparently the predominant (and just about only) thing they wanted to pretend. They also seemed fixated on being teenagers: "Let's pretend we're teenagers and run away". It was as if they wanted to escape from childhood, which is disturbing, because I think most of us recall childhood as a free and happy time to escape to.

According to the director, most of these children's parents have "bought in" to the idea that they need to sign their children up (since before they were 2 years old) to every class available: gymnastics, art, swimming, dance, piano, violin, etc. At least 5 days per week these children have not only preschool (and, previously, an overly structured one), but also "enrichment" classes.

As we were talking, a toddler and his family appeared and descended some steps nearby. This was an obvious challenge for the toddler, who held his father's hand. "This boy is taking violin lessons", the director said quietly to me. "He's good, but..."

What parents don't realize is that each of these learning opportunities requires children to conform to a set of rules (attire, etc.), and be directed, taught, sometimes even tested. In even the loosest, most playful of these classes, children sense that some sort of performance is expected of them.

So activities that might sound interesting and enriching to us create at least some level of pressure for our toddlers and preschoolers. The more of these situations children have to endure each week, the more pressured they feel. Instead of learning through the play they choose - tinkering, exploring, creating, daydreaming - they must spend most of their time being quiet, listening obediently, imitating, trying to "get it right".

I'd want to run away, too.

This preschool includes a child-centered chapel service once each week. Usually, the preschoolers jump out of the pews and dance and sing along to the music. The new group of children sat quietly. They had been taught well. Too well.

Yes, it's true that Kindergarten has transformed into First Grade. Yes, children will need to learn academics, listen and sit still. But that certainly doesn't mean that these lessons should be straight-jacketed onto them in the toddler and preschool years. In fact, the funneling down of structured learning is all the more reason to let children play while they can. We must fiercely protect this precious, ever shrinking window of time for our children.

Play is enough. Play is enough. Play is enough. This should be our educational mantra for the first 5 years.

The director said that towards the very end of the school year, the new group of children finally began to let go a little and figure out how to play with their friends on the playground. But several of the new families won't be returning. The director hadn't satisfactorily addressed their concerns that their children weren't "learning anything".

***
I share more about early childhood play and learning in Elevating Child Care: A Guide to Respectful Parenting
(Photo by Jude Keith Rose)

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Don't Let Your Preschoolers Forget How To Play - Janet Lansbury

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As hard as it is to believe, there are children as young as 4 or 5 already showing signs of stress and burn-out because parents and teachers are misinformed about their educational needs. Some have even been mis-educated to the extent that they've forgotten how to play.

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Learning through play in the early years: A resource book

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Learning through play in the early years: A resource book

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This booklet has been compiled by the Early Years Interboard panel in response to requests by practitioners in Early Years settings for guidelines on provision and progression in play. The methodology and suggested progression in this document is appropriate for the proposed Foundation Stage as recommended by CCEA.

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LEGO Unicef Pub: Learning through play - Strengthening learning through play in early childhood education programmes

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LEGO Unicef Pub: Learning through play - Strengthening learning through play in early childhood education programmes

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Play as an essential strategy for learning

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Practical suggestions about how to set up fun baby doll washing role play. Great to develop personal, social and emotional skills, independence, communication and water play!

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Set up this fun baby doll washing activity for toddlers and preschoolers to enjoy. Great role play activity for developing personal, social and emotional skills as well as being a fun water play activity for outside!

When I was teaching Reception (Kindergarten) this baby doll washing activity was always an absolute favourite with the children when we set it up in our outdoor play area. My own children now love it too and it has become a regular staple during the summer months in particular.

We used our Tuff Spot (builder's mixing tray) sensory table as the baby doll washing station, although any type of wide, shallow sensory tray or water table would work. You could, of course, use an old baby bath or washing up bowl too; those would be perfect for a smaller scale version of the activity!

Into the tray we put a variety of waterproof baby dolls, some warm soapy water, bubbly wash in a pump bottle, a small jug for scooping water, baby flannels and some toothbrushes.

On the floor nearby we had some muslins, baby hooded towels, blankets, cotton balls, natural Kamilosan chamomile lotion, cloth nappies (diapers) and some newborn size baby clothes. Side-note: it's SO much cheaper to buy some newborn or tiny baby sized real baby clothes than the ridiculously overpriced dolls clothes they sell. Having left over baby clothes and equipment in the attic is even easier! If you're doing this for your classroom or daycare, try asking the parents if they have items to donate.

They loved washing the baby dolls and brushing their teeth. As always, the favourite part for them is the application of lots of soap and lotions, with Miss 3 going through a repetitive cycle of lather, rinse, dry, lotion and repeat!

Teeth brushing was a good opportunity for talking about dental care and hygiene and would make a good class activity after discussions in circle time too, as well as overall good care and hygiene of our bodies.

We also talked about the importance of keeping the babies warm and drying them carefully, before dressing them. There were many lovely moments of PSED (personal, Social and Emotional Development) observed, with lots of gentleness as well as shushing, rocking, cuddling and singing to the dolls.

They really enjoyed putting the cream and nappies on and I couldn't get over the cuteness of those tiny gNappies/ gDiapers as they fit almost perfectly!

Apart from all of the caring and role-playing fun, this is also such a lovely activity for hot days, keeping cool and having a bit of a splash while they play!
What they are learning as they play:
PSE: caring for others, role-playing, understanding about habits, showing understanding of hygiene and self-care practices, dressing

Physical: fine motor skills, doing up buttons/ poppers/ zips, fastening nappies/ diapers

Creative: telling stories and acting out roles/ characters during play

See all our WATER PLAY activities.

See all our ROLE PLAY activities.

Follow our SUMMER FUN pinterest board for loads more ideas from around the web.
Follow Anna @ The Imagination Tree's board Summer Fun Activities! on Pinterest.

[This post contains Amazon affiliate links. Thank you for your support.]

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Baby Doll Washing and Caring Activity - The Imagination Tree

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Set up this fun baby doll washing activity for toddlers and preschoolers to enjoy. Great role play activity for developing personal, social and emotional skills as well as being a fun water play activity for outside!

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The power of play – Part 5: Adult roles in child’s play By Kylie Rymanowicz

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The power of play – Part 5: Adult roles in child’s play By Kylie Rymanowicz

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If we support a child’s experiences by being present and engaged, but not taking over, we allow them to build up themselves, engage in learning and exploration and we can provide opportunities to help stretch and grow their experiences.

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The power of play - Part 5: Adult roles in child's play

How can you best support your child's play experiences?

Support your child's play without taking over.

Maria Montessori said that, "Play is children's work." So, where do you fit into their work? Are you the boss, leader, coach, coworker? While play may be the work of children, the work does not get done single-handedly. Quality play experiences are created and nurtured when adults are involved in the process.

Leading versus supporting

It's important to make a note that supporting and leading or controlling are two different roles that adults can play when it comes to their child's play, and only one of them is beneficial for the child. When adults control, lead or take over a child's play, they are violating the basic principles of play being self-chosen and self-directed by the child. When children lose the freedom to explore openly, the experience loses its meaning.

Instead, if we support a child's experiences by being present and engaged, but not taking over, we allow them to build up themselves, engage in learning and exploration and we can provide opportunities to help stretch and grow their experiences.

Aistear: the Early Childhood Curriculum Framework's " Learning and developing through play " identifies the following three stages of adult support of play.

1. Planning for play

Adults have ultimate control over a child's environment. By making sure you have a fun and appropriate environment for your child to play in, you can help them grow. You can help plan your child's play by:

Paying attention to environment and structure. When you structure an environment (either indoors or outdoors) based on a child's strengths, abilities and needs, you can enhance their normal play and help them be successful and independent.

Building and extending. Challenge a child's current knowledge or understanding through opportunities or materials that extend upon their current experiences or understanding.

Providing choices. Giving children the freedom to make their own choices is not only empowering, but helps them to lead their own learning experiences based on their interests and abilities.

2. Supporting play

In order to help a child learn and know, you need to learn to know your child, which you can do by supporting their play. You can support children's play by:

Talking about play. Adults can extend and support a child's play simply by engaging with children during play. Adults can talk to children about their play. By being involved, children learn that adults are invested in them and respect their play decisions.

Validating their efforts. Participating in play with your child is fun for them and shows them you value what they are doing. Your presence and proximity to children can communicate a lot to them.

Adding to children's play. In actively participating in play, when invited, adults can extend upon a child's current knowledge and help them make new connections. This can be done by modeling positive behaviors or interactions.

Preventing problems. By being actively involved in the process of play, adults are in a good position to intervene if a situation arises when a child might need help, whether it is an interpersonal conflict, a problem or a safety concern. It's important to remember children need opportunities to practice problem solving and conflict resolution independently as well. Make sure to give children ample opportunities to practice these skills on their own and only intervene if necessary.

Building children up. Sometimes children may need help engaging in activities or joining an activity, and when adults are regularly a part of their play, they can be a good bridge to help children feel comfortable initiating and participating in play.

3. Reviewing play

Reviewing a child's play can help collect information about the child and help you to extend upon their current activities and learning. You can review your child's play by:

Checking in. By observing, talking and listening to your child, you can learn about the purpose, effectiveness and enjoyment of a child's play experiences. This information can help you think about ways to keep their play engaging and meaningful in the future.

Observing the space. Having a space that is well suited for a child's play is important. By thinking about how the space impacted your child's play, you can think of ways to make it even better.

Thinking critically. You can really get to know a child by observing and interacting with them during play. Through those experiences, you can think critically about a child's interests, interactions, relationships and preferences to check up on their progress and help inspire future successes.

Making plans. By taking all of the information gathered by planning and participating in play, you can make plans for the future to fix any issues, build upon a child's need and enhance the overall play experience for your child.

By being actively involved in your child's play, you can help them learn and grow. You create opportunities to build a supportive and trusting relationship with your child and help build them up in the process. You have the power to help your child unlock the power of play!

Don't miss the other articles in The Power of Play series, " Stages of play," " Born to play," " Types of play" and " Characteristics of play."

For more articles on child development, academic success, parenting and life skill development, please visit the Michigan State University Extension website.

Other articles in this series

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The power of play - Part 5: Adult roles in child's play

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How can you best support your child's play experiences?

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A fantastic resource produced by the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families, for early years managers and teams.

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Early years staff wellbeing: a resource for managers and teams

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Early years staff love their work, but it can be emotionally demanding & stressful. Our latest early years resource shows that staff wellbeing needs to lie at the heart of nursery settings.

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9 ideas for creative storytelling with children by Sue Cowley

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9 ideas for creative storytelling with children by Sue Cowley

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Storytelling ideas for learning, listening, and taking the spotlight

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1. The Tiger Who Came to Tea

The storytelling idea: You'll read aloud Judith Kerr's The Tiger Who Came to Tea, about a tiger that interrupts Sophie's afternoon tea, and afterward have a talk about behavior toward others.
What you need:

A copy of The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr

A carpet or common sitting space

How you do it:

Read the story to your children.

Afterward, ask the children to discuss the following thoughts.

Which words would they use to describe the tiger? Why?

What impact does the tiger's behaviour have on Sophie and her family?

What do the children think of how Sophie's father reacts to the tiger? Were they surprised that the father didn't get angry?

Why do the children think the tiger doesn't visit Sophie again? Was the tiger real?
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2. The Very Hungry Caterpillar
What you need:

A copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

A carpet or common sitting space

How you do it:

Read the story to your children, and explain that they are going to help dramatize the events of the story through movement.

Ask them to curl up like a caterpillar in an egg on a leaf.

Next, they should "pop" out of the egg - How can they look hungry in the way they move?

Now get them to chomp through various foods, and then show that they are still hungry.

At any point, you may want to pause to help your children think through how they can express these actions and feelings.

At the end of the story, get the children to become butterflies and "fly" around the room in the way a butterfly would.
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The storytelling idea: You'll read aloud Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar, about a very hungry caterpillar, and respond to the story through movement.
What you need:

A copy of Not Now Bernard by David McKee

A carpet or common sitting space

How you do it:

Read the story to your children.

Afterward, ask the children to discuss the following thoughts.

Why do Bernard's mother and father always say "Not now, Bernard" to him?

Do their own parents ever say "Not now" to them? Why might they say this?

Discuss what happens as a result of Bernard's parents not listening to him.

What do the children think the characters in the story could have done differently?
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3. Not Now Bernard
What you need:

A copy of We're Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen

An open space, with room for movement

(Optional) A parent audience

How you do it:

Read the story to your children and talk about the events of the story - Which noises or movements would go well with certain moments in the story?

Many moments in the story use onomatopoeia like "splish splosh," and children can think about how they might turn these noises into movements.

(Optional) Help your children practice their accompanying performance, and invite a parent audience for a performance of the story.
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The storytelling idea: You'll read aloud David McKee's Not Now Bernard, about a boy named Bernard who is eaten by a monster (which goes unnoticed by his parents), and afterward have a talk about how we relate to our parents.
What you need:

Willing parents or grandparents

A short list of interesting historical trends and events

How you do it:

Ask among your families to find any parents or grandparents who are willing to come and talk to your children about the past, and arrange for a visit.

Help the children prepare a list of questions for your guest, encouraging them to think about how life may have been different in the past.

The theme of the talk might tie in with a commemoration of a historic event.

Encourage your visitors to bring in items from their childhood or past, for instance a ration book from World War II or an old-fashioned rotary phone.
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4. We're Going On a Bear Hunt
What you'll need:

Two staff members

A carpet or common sitting space

How you do it:

Explain to the children that you are going to model some situations where behavior might be wrong, to see what that might look like.

Get staff to role play a series of behaviors modeling bad conduct, for instance snatching a toy from another child, or refusing to let one child play as part of a group.

Encourage the children to talk about what is going on. Why is this behavior not okay?

Ask the children to reflect on how they would feel in each situation.

Finally, ask the children what they could do differently in these situations to achieve a better outcome?
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The storytelling idea: You'll read aloud Michael Rosen's We're Going On a Bear Hunt, a playful, song-like tale about a group of children encountering a bear, and will help the children develop a pantomimed performance to accompany the story. Optionally, you can help prepare your children to present their performance in front of a parent audience.
What you need:

An open space

Large cardboard boxes

Sheets

Planks

Crates

Other open-ended craft materials of your choosing

How you do it:

Clear your open space, then supply it with your collection of craft materials

When the children arrive, explain that it is up to them what they make of the various materials on offer.

Talk together about different scenes or topics they might want to develop. This could be based on their interests - For instance, superhero role play or exploring the idea of space by creating a rocket ship.

Support their play and understanding by playing alongside them and encouraging shared thinking.
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5. Talking About the Past
What you need:

A CD player, Bluetooth speaker or laptop

Edvard Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" (Downloadable and streamable online)

Open space

Art supplies

How you do it:

Explain to the children that you are going to play them a piece of music that creates a very specific mood. Ask them to close their eyes so that they can concentrate on the music.

As they listen, encourage them to think about what the music makes them feel, and whether it makes them imagine any specific settings, characters or stories.

When the song is over, ask the children to respond using various art forms - They might dramatise the music, create a piece of art in response, or you might get the whole group moving around the room to show them how the music makes them feel.
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The storytelling idea: Children's elder family members will be invited into your child care center for a history-focused story session, as they recount their memories of childhood and events in the past.
What you need:
Carpet or common sitting space for discussion
How you do it:

Talk about 'good listening behavior' during carpet time.

How can we tell if someone is listening to us? What can we do to show someone else that we are listening to them?

Why do we need to keep our hands and feet to ourselves when we are on the carpet?

What should we do if we want to ask something during a whole class discussion?

Why is it important not to talk when someone else is speaking?

6. Modelling Behaviors

The storytelling idea: Staff model behaviors through a series of scenes that explore acceptable and unacceptable behavior.

7. Deconstructed Role Play

The storytelling idea: Children will be challenged to develop their own role play scenes and stories using open-ended recycled materials as props.

8. Musical Imagination

The storytelling idea: Children respond imaginatively to a piece of music, exploring what sort of a mood it projects, and how it makes them feel.

9. Thinking About Listening

The storytelling idea: Take time to talk about listening with the children, and discuss why it's important.

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9 Ideas for Creative Storytelling with Children | Famly

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The storytelling idea: You'll read aloud Judith Kerr's The Tiger Who Came to Tea, about a tiger that interrupts Sophie's afternoon tea, and afterward have a talk about behavior toward others. What you need: A copy of The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr A carpet or common sitting space How you do it: Read the story to your children.

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Practical strategies for promoting physical activity

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Practical strategies for promoting physical activity

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The purpose of this briefing is to provide managers of early years settings with evidence-based recommendations and practical strategies to consider when planning, developing and delivering activities to promote physical activity in the early years, ie, children aged 0-5.

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Why playing with dolls boosts child development a Review by Molly Bolding for TES Magazine

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Why playing with dolls boosts child development a Review by Molly Bolding for TES Magazine

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Research suggests that when children talk and interact imaginatively with their toys, they’re actually developing crucial social and emotional skills. So, why isn’t such play taken more seriously in early years teaching? Sarah Gerson, a researcher at Cardiff University, thinks we now have good evidence to suggest playing with dolls has some seriously positive effects for childhood development and learning.

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In his short essay The Philosophy of Toys, Charles Baudelaire penned one of the earliest attempts to understand children's relationships with dolls. Published in 1853, he asks: what is it exactly that children are doing with their toys and what are they getting from it? He writes: "All children talk to their toys; the toys become actors in the great drama of life." Yet, he is puzzled by the compulsion to both decorate dolls and destroy them.

Ultimately, he failed to find any answers - but have we done any better in the intervening 160 or so years? The short answer is yes. Sarah Gerson, a researcher at Cardiff University, thinks we now have good evidence to suggest playing with dolls has some seriously positive effects for childhood development and learning.

Gerson has spent more than 10 years looking at the relationship between children and play, and in particular at how imaginative play with dolls helps children to develop an understanding of the world around them. Doll play, she explains, is a key facet of learning to be social: in a series of experiments from October last year, her team demonstrated that the part of the brain that handles "social processing ... thinking about other people's thoughts, understanding other people's emotions, things like empathy" was just as active when playing with dolls as it was when playing with other children.

"When children are playing alone with dolls," Gerson explains, "they can recreate [their] social worlds, so they practise these social interactions that they do when they're actually interacting with another person, and that seems unique" compared with other kinds of play.

Hierarchy of play

Brain scans suggest that dolls are crucial to the socioemotional learning that is so pivotal to the early years of schooling and on into adult life. This is backed by evidence from different types of studies. For example, it can also be seen in research looking at children's "internal state language", or ISL. This is where children begin to recognise their emotions, intentions and compulsions, and articulate those states for themselves and for others. Gerson says that dolls can play a vital role in the development of this language.

"You can imagine if [the child] is playing with two dolls and they say something about one doll being mad at the other, or one is jealous that the other doll has a toy or something, that's all about what's happening in the heads - or the imaginary heads - of those dolls, and that's what we think children are practising," she explains.

But is this role of dolls in childhood development always recognised in schools and early years settings to the degree it should be? Salim Hashmi works at King's College London and has recently completed his PhD on the relationship between children, toys of different kinds and the neuroscience of social development.

He suggests that "play in general, in any of its different ways of being, has, for a long time, been considered important for really quite a lot of aspects of children's development. Dolls, in particular, have been thought of as quite beneficial because they're humanlike".

However, he feels there is a hierarchy of play in people's minds that understates the importance of play with dolls. He is keen to advocate that dolls have an important place in play time, offering children valuable insight into relationships and emotions on a par with the more constructive learning based around Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths), such as Lego, puzzles or problem solving. These other types of play gain prominence, he argues, as they are more explicitly related to academic ends in the minds of adults.

What this can lead to, says Gerson, is an attempt by adults to structure doll play to make up for what they feel it lacks. This, she says, is the wrong approach.

For children to get the most out of dolls, she explains, it's important that teachers and caregivers allow children to play with dolls without any strings attached. It's about giving children opportunities to play with dolls "without necessarily telling them what to do with them", she says.

Benefits for boys

Also important, she stresses, is that every person working with children recognises that dolls are equally beneficial for boys and girls. Research has demonstrated that while most children won't be able to articulate a strong sense of their gender identity until they are 3 to 5 years old, many will experience a gendering of their social experience from their caregivers. This often includes girls being directed towards dolls and boys towards Lego and cars.

Hashmi points out that denying boys the chance to play with dolls, or not actively presenting them with opportunities, could have a long-term impact on their development of ISL and, as such, on their levels of empathy, emotional regulation and social dialogue.

That's not to say that young boys "won't develop these skills in other ways", says Hashmi, but it may limit the opportunities they have to do so.

And a final consideration, when it comes to dolls, is an audit of how diverse your current dolls in school are, in type and appearance.

Because dolls are humanlike, there should be a focus on variety in physical representation: size, age, ability, race, gender and so on. Children can play only with the toys they are given, so if caregivers provide nothing but white female dolls, this may influence how much a boy or a child of colour wants to play with them or how they play with them.

In addition, a recent study in Israel, which Gerson plans to explore further in her next piece of research, suggests that the physical appearance of dolls can elicit preferential treatment from children who share that appearance, while introducing a doll from a different social "group" can encourage positive attitudes towards people of that group.

Press play

Another focus for variety should be the media through which dolls are accessed. While some adults may see devices and screens as a distraction from "proper" play or learning, Hashmi's key message is to support children to play with whatever dolls they like, including via screens, because children explore imaginative play in a host of ways, be it with a Barbie, a toy with a face drawn on or a video-game avatar.

"Children can be playing in different ways, they can be acting in a 'play', taking on roles, being the dolls, they could just be completely managing it ... the children who are storytelling may be doing a hybrid of all of it," he explains.

Moreover, Hashmi's recent work suggests that this benefit can be seen regardless of whether the doll is a physical doll or a character on a screen. Having recently completed a PhD exploring play with video games versus Playmobil, Hashmi emphasised that the virtual worlds of video games can serve very similar purposes to the imagined worlds of dolls that children create.

Ultimately, in whatever form they take, Gerson wants to see dolls taken more seriously within the education system. She hopes that further study of children and dolls will yield more interesting results to make an even more convincing case.

"People have studied pretend play, imaginary play, construction play, but doll play hasn't really been studied that extensively, so it's a really rich area for looking at what children are doing with it and what they could learn from it."
Molly Bolding is a freelance journalist This article originally appeared in the 17 September 2021 issue under the headline "Tes focus on...Playing with dolls"

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Why playing with dolls is more important than you think

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In his short essay The Philosophy of Toys, Charles Baudelaire penned one of the earliest attempts to understand children's relationships with dolls. Published in 1853, he asks: what is it exactly that children are doing with their toys and what are they getting from it?

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Why Boys Really Need Boy Dolls by Karlyn Crowley PhD (Psychology today)

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Why Boys Really Need Boy Dolls by Karlyn Crowley PhD (Psychology today)

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Studies indicate that gender roles get solidified all too early. Boys and families don’t have to abide by archaic gender roles that limit. Boys can learn skills of nurturing, empathy, and caretaking through doll play.

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First things first: The new American Girl boy doll, Logan Everett, is cuuuuute. He has a great head of hair and cool clothes and looks like a neighborhood kid you'd hang out with. What's not to love? My 6-year-old took one gander at Logan and jumped up and down clamoring for him. When you woke up this morning, Logan was on every major news outlet with American Girl backing him all the way.

As a gender studies scholar, I have a vested interest in not just adding to the free market, but adding something just-that doesn't sell as well, strangely. American Girl won't have to do a thing to make money on Logan. The less they say about him, the more he'll sell. They're normalizing the boy doll on a mass scale. Why complain? Because I can: American Girl is missing the chance to change masculinity, especially for young boys.

I know, I know, why would I expect a multinational conglomerate to feel social obligation? Odd, but I do. American Girl originally set out to change doll culture by providing girls with dolls that taught history with compelling role models in contrast to the image obsession of Barbie (Mattel now owns American Girl). I've even had students in gender studies classes argue that American Girl historical dolls are feminist. One student did "close readings" of American Girl Magazine to talk about its girl power equity messages. I think they couldn't give up their childhood obsession with American Girl and needed to make it right, but I get it.

American Girl, when it first came on the market, felt different from other doll offerings-real girls facing real challenges in history. They were more racially and ethnically diverse with Addy Walker, Josefina Montoya, Kaya'aton'my, and Rebecca Rubin, among others (though they had and have work to do on race). American Girl included accessories for dolls with disabilities like a wheelchair and hearing aid. When you're a little kid and want a doll to look and be like you, that is no small thing. The price point by contrast-not so small. My own daughter begged for and got Addy Walker, who was born in slavery. We talk openly about racism and slavery in our house; once she got Addy, we had different conversations about race through Addy. Addy's presence made a difference. So when Logan showed up in my newsfeed today, I wanted more.

The reason American Girl is launching Logan: consumer demand. That's the easy way out. Isn't there a better reason? That's externally driven rather than making a company statement: boys deserve a doll to play with.

American Girl notes about Logan in USA Today, "A boy character has been a top request from our fans for decades,'' says American Girl spokeswoman Stephanie Spanos. "We're hopeful Logan will appeal to both girls and boys ... For boys, we know Logan can speak directly to them and give them something unique and special to call their own.''

Boys and families don't have to abide by archaic gender roles that limit. Boys can learn skills of nurturing, empathy, and caretaking through doll play. Boys can play with dolls and not be called sissy, gay, and much worse. Instead, American Girl said nothing. They released a video of Logan playing with other American Girl girl dolls; they tell us that girls will want him, too. I would argue that Logan is actually pitched to girls and not boys at all. In other words, American Girl is playing it safe.

Studies indicate that gender roles get solidified all too early. In " Boys & Toys: Helping Healthy Boys Succeed," I write about psychologist Judy Chen's important work. Chen's studies show that by age 5, boys are already performing their masculinity for external approval. Logan, as an 18-inch American Girl doll, is aimed at kids 6 and above-the recommended minimum age on the toy box says 8 years old. By the age of 8, boys who are playing with dolls have long since passed a normative "socially acceptable" age to do so. Heteronormative and hyper-masculine gender norms would say that boy doll playing should a) not have started in the first place and b) certainly be over by the age of 8. Parents have expressed concern to me on both counts-that their sons want to play with dolls and then want to play with them past a particular age. I talk them down from the ledge.

This is the homophobic stigma boys who play with dolls face. Yes, these are parents worried about gender role conformity, which they see as connected to sexual orientation-there is not necessarily a connection but myths persist. Many parents still think that playing with dolls will make their son gay, as if you can "make" someone gay and as if that were a bad thing. At a minimum, boys playing with dolls are considered a social oddity and discouraged; at the maximum, they are taunted, teased, even abused. A male friend of mine who played with a doll in his childhood said his dad buried the doll in the backyard so he would quit playing with it. The father thought it was-you guessed it-sissy and would make his son gay. Well, his son is gay and gender non-conforming. In spite of his dad's doll burial, he dug up his doll in the backyard and kept playing. It's a funny story now, but it was a traumatic story then. Dolls may seem unimportant, but they can play a major role in identity and family formation.

There have been several past attempts to put a male doll on the market. Now I'm talking about dolls beyond character ones like Buddy Lee used to sell Lee jeans. There were a handful of male Cabbage Patch Kids. And some adults remember their "My Buddy" who had great overalls. Only the commercial remains.

The boy doll I adore is one we helped launch at the Center I direct, the Cassandra Voss Center. So, yes I'm biased. His name is Wonder Crew Will, just out now at Target; there are four multiracial boy dolls in this line. The thing Wonder Crew CEO Laurel Wider gets right about Will is the mission of the company: Wider sets out explicitly to show how boys learn social-emotional skills through doll play, skills that make them whole boys who grow up to be whole men. As Wider notes in her Kickstarter video, "Wonder Crew crewmates gives boys the mainstream green light to express kindness, empathy and other characteristics that aren't usually encouraged by their toys." Wider continues, "Real strength and fun isn't about toughness and weapons. It's about friendship and creativity."

The buzz phrase "toxic masculinity" has been in the news a lot and for good reason. Encouraging boys to break from hyper-masculine roles and urging them to alter, change, or not adhere to those roles at all is liberating not only for them but everyone around. As Rebecca Cohen states in The Good Men Project, "rigid ideas about what constitutes masculinity also have a significant negative impact on grown men."

Be bolder, American Girl-tell us what boys gain through playing with a boy doll or any doll. Parents still feel the need to declare, "It's OK my son plays with dolls." When that stops being true, then we'll know we've gotten somewhere.

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First things first: The new American Girl boy doll, Logan Everett, is cuuuuute. He has a great head of hair and cool clothes and looks like a neighborhood kid you'd hang out with. What's not to love? My 6-year-old took one gander at Logan and jumped up and down clamoring for him.

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Developing life skills through play (Part of the Cambridge Papers March 2019)

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Developing life skills through play (Part of the Cambridge Papers March 2019)

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Guiding, participating, challenging, scaffolding - understanding the varied role of the adult in play

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[Research and analysis] Teaching and play in the early years: a balancing act

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[Research and analysis] Teaching and play in the early years: a balancing act

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This research is still relevant. Early years good practice survey exploring perceptions of teaching and play. Brimming with real life practice examples to illustrate the key findings.

Page 11 highlights the key role of the adult, including;
- communicating and modelling language
- Showing, explaining, demonstrating, exploring ideas, facilitating, encouraging, questioning, recalling and providing a narrative for what they (children) are doing
- Setting challenges
- Providing equipment
- Attention tot he environment
- Routines that establish expectations

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Early years good practice survey exploring perceptions of teaching and play.

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Details

Her Majesty's Chief Inspector commissioned this good practice survey to gather evidence to address the recurring myth that teaching and play are separate, disconnected endeavours in the early years.

Her Majesty's Inspectors visited a sample of the most successful early years providers to observe the interplay between teaching and play and evaluate the difference chosen approaches were making to the learning and development of disadvantaged children, especially funded two-year-olds.

All providers, which included maintained schools, pre-schools, children's centres and childminders, were selected because they were successful in achieving good or better outcomes for children in some of the most deprived areas of the country.

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Teaching and play in the early years: a balancing act?

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Early years good practice survey exploring perceptions of teaching and play.

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New Title: Teacher Education & Play Pedagogy

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New Title: Teacher Education & Play Pedagogy

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Play holds a crucial role in early childhood education in relation to its importance as a context and a teaching practice for the support of children’s learning and development. Drawing on theories such as improvisation, narrative form and play-responsive teaching, this book explores the potential for teacher involvement in play and how to prepare them for this professionally, as well as developing their own play skills.
20% off with discount code FLA22.

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Latest EECERA book now available: Teacher Education and Play Pedagogy - EECERA

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Written in association with the European Early Childhood Education Research Association (EECERA), this is the latest title in the Towards an Ethical

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Child’s Play: Examining the Association Between Time Spent Playing Adventurously and Child Mental Health

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Child’s Play: Examining the Association Between Time Spent Playing Adventurously and Child Mental Health

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This research identifies significant associations between adventurous play and internalising problems; children who spend more time playing adventurously had fewer internalising problems. Study 2 showed that these associations were stronger for children from lower income families than for children from higher income families. The results align with theoretical hypotheses about adventurous play.

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Introduction

Recent research estimates that, outside of school, children in Britain spend just over three hours a day playing [ 1]. Play is intrinsically rewarding for children, provides a way for them to interact with the world, express themselves, and make sense of the world around them. Despite this, there has been growing concern that children's play, particularly their outdoor, independent, adventurous play has been declining over recent decades. For example, Clements [ 2] found that whilst 70% of mothers surveyed in the United States reported that they played outdoors daily as children, only 31% of their children were reported to do so. Moreover, findings from the UK suggest that whilst parents reported spending approximately 40% of their time playing as children in natural spaces, only 10% of their children's play was reported to happen in these spaces [ 3]. Furthermore, there is robust evidence of increasing restrictions over the past 50 years on children's independent mobility, defined as the age at which children are allowed out alone and how far they allowed to travel [ 1, 4]. Alongside these declines in outdoor play and independence, rates of emotional disorders in UK children aged 5-16 years increased by 49% between 1994 and 2017 [ 5] and recent data show further increases, with an estimated one in six UK children having a probable mental health problem in July 2020 [ 6]. It has been proposed that reductions in children's outdoor, risky play, may have negative consequences for children's mental health, and may be contributing in part to the increase in children's mental health problems [ 7, 8, 9]. To date though, no empirical research has directly examined this association [ 10].

Adventurous play, or risky play, is defined as child-led play where children experience subjective feelings of excitement, thrill and fear; often in the context of age-appropriate risk-taking. Several theoretical articles have hypothesised links between adventurous play and children's mental health, particularly internalising problems such as anxiety and phobias. For example, Sandseter and Kennair [ 9] propose that children have a natural drive to engage in risky play, which evolved because it has anti-phobic effects, naturally exposing children to stimuli that may otherwise be feared such as heights and water. In keeping with this, Gray [ 7] theorises that the decline in play over the last generation is associated with increasing rates of mental health problems in children. A recent conceptual model drew on the extensive literature related to the development of anxiety in children to argue that sufficient adventurous play experiences during childhood may help to prevent anxiety in children [ 8]. Specifically, Dodd and Lester describe the role of intolerance of uncertainty [ 11], coping [ 12, 13], anxiety sensitivity [ 14] and avoidance [ 15, 16] in child anxiety and propose that adventurous play provides a motivating, positive context for exposures to, and subsequent healthy learning about, uncertainty, coping and physiological arousal. They argue that through these learning experiences children's ability to cope adaptively in the face of uncertainty and arousal increases and their risk for problematic anxiety decreases.

Despite this theoretical work, research examining the association between adventurous play and children's anxiety, or mental health more broadly defined, is scarce. Qualitative evaluations of school-based interventions to increase levels of adventurous play report positive outcomes of adventurous play, including increases in resilience [ 17] and improvements in children's happiness at school [ 18]. There is also evidence that play, in general, is good for children's wellbeing and mental health; children admitted to hospital show lower levels of anxiety and fewer negative emotions when they take part in a play intervention [ 19] and, when given time for free play, hospitalised children show reductions in stress [ 20]. Outdoor play and being in nature, which facilitate adventurous play, also have a positive effect on children's wellbeing [ 21, 22, 23], but the direct link between adventurous play and children's anxiety has yet to be examined.

Although the theoretical links between play and internalising symptoms have been described in previous work, to our knowledge adventurous play has not been explicitly linked to externalising problems such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and Conduct Disorder within psychological theory. There are some findings that would be consistent with adventurous play offering benefits for externalising problems. For example, schools taking part in an intervention to prioritise risk and challenge in the playground reported less bullying and conflicts on the playground post-intervention [ 18]. Further, children with ADHD who played regularly in green play settings were reported to have milder symptoms than children who played in built outdoor or indoor play settings [ 24]. It is not clear though that adventurous play has a specific role in these positive effects and, again, there is a lack of research directly evaluating the link.

In this paper we present two studies which examine the association between parent-report of children's time spent playing and child mental health. Study 1 and Study 2 use the same measures of play and mental health; Study 1 uses an opportunity sample of parents living in Northern Ireland and Study 2 examines the extent to which the findings hold using a large nationally representative sample of parents living in Great Britain. To capture mental health broadly, in both studies we evaluate long term symptoms of internalizing and externalizing problems as well as shorter term positive and negative affect, which were assessed during the first weeks of the Covid-19 lockdown. Internalising problems include symptoms of anxiety and depression whereas externalising problems refer to difficulties with behaviour and attention. Positive and negative affect refer to more transient mood states. Time spent playing adventurously, time spent playing unadventurously and time spent playing outdoors are estimated using the Children's Play Scale (CPS; 25) in both studies.

Our primary hypothesis follows relevant conceptual models: that children who spend more time playing adventurously will have fewer internalizing symptoms. In addition, we hypothesise that children who typically spend more time playing adventurously will have less negative affect and more positive affect during the Covid-19 lockdown, which we conceptualise as indicating better coping under uncertainty. To evaluate the specificity of these associations, we also examine associations between adventurous play and externalizing symptoms, as well as associations between mental health and both time spent playing unadventurously and time spent playing outdoors.

Study 1

Method

Participants

Survey respondents were 427 parents/caregivers (93% female) with a child aged 5 to 11 years. Participants were self-selecting, recruited via social media and newsletters sent from a range of organizations. Their children (45% female) were aged 5 to 11 years (M = 8.02, SD = 1.98). All participants were living in Northern Ireland and the majority identified as White British or White Irish, consistent with the population of Northern Ireland, where > 98% are white. There was diversity in other demographic factors, see Table S1 in Supplementary Material for full demographic characteristics. To be included, participants had to correctly answer two questions that were designed to screen out bots and participants not paying attention (see Section 2 of Supplementary Material for details).

Measures

The full survey was designed to mirror the British Children's Play Survey (BCPS; 1), which did not include participants in Northern Ireland. The focus in the present paper is on associations between children's play and mental health. For completeness we analysed the data addressing the same research questions as the published BCPS paper and present these results in Supplementary Material Section 4.

Children's Play Scale (CPS)

The CPS [ 25] includes questions about play in seven places. Full details are provided in Supplementary Materials Section3. Briefly, respondents report the frequency and length of time their child plays in each place in Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter. These responses are then used to give an estimate of total time spent playing in each place within a year. The adventurous play supplement asked parents to rate how adventurously their child plays at each place. This was rated on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (very low levels of adventure) to 5 (maximum levels of adventure). For this study we extracted three variables: total time spent playing outdoors, time spent playing adventurously and time spent playing unadventurously. To calculate time spent playing adventurously, we calculated the total time spent playing using only places where parents rated that their child played with at least a mild level of adventure (2 on the Likert scale). To calculate time spent playing unadventurously, we calculated the total time spent playing using only places where parents rated that their child played with very low level of adventure (1 on the Likert scale). We conducted sensitivity analyses with the cut off at 2 for unadventurous and 3 for adventurous and the pattern of results and conclusions remained the same. The test re-test and cross-informant reliability of the CPS and adventurous play supplement have been evaluated in Dodd, Nesbit [ 25].

SDQ

The SDQ is a 25-item screening questionnaire that asks about positive and negative attributes. Items can be combined to create five subscales: emotional symptoms, conduct problems, hyperactivity/inattention, peer relationship problems and prosocial behaviour. An internalising problems score can be calculated by summing emotional problems and peer relationship problems, and an externalising score can be calculated by summing conduct problems and hyperactivity/inattention. The SDQ is widely used and has strong psychometrics (see www.sdqinfo.org [ 26]).

PANAS

The 10-item Positive and Negative Affect Schedule for Children-P [ 27] asks parents to read each of 10 items which describe an emotion and select to what extent their child has felt this way during the past few weeks. Five items are positive emotions, five are negative. Responses are summed to give scores for positive affect and negative affect. The scale has good psychometric properties [ 27].

Kessler-6 (K6)

The Kessler-6 [ 28] is a 6-item scale, designed to capture distress, based on symptoms of anxiety and depression, in adults. The original scale asks respondents to consider the previous 4-week period and to rate, using a five-point Likert scale, how often they felt each of the six emotions listed. To gain a measure of longer-term parent mental health, which we use as a control variable, we asked respondents to describe how often they had felt each emotion over the past year. The K6 has good psychometric properties [ 29].

Procedure

Participants were recruited via social media and newsletters sent from a range of organizations. Interested parents were invited to take part in the study via advertisements that directed them to an information sheet and consent form. After consent the survey opened in SurveyMonkey. Recruitment began on 3rd April 2020, when the first responses to the survey were received. The survey was closed on 26th April 2020. The UK-wide lockdown due to Covid-19 began on March 26th meaning the survey was always completed within one month of the start of the lockdown. Respondents completed the survey on one occasion and were clearly instructed to answer the CPS and SDQ questions thinking about life before it was affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. For the PANAS they were asked to respond with the previous few weeks in mind. Participants were given a £10 voucher.

Missing Data, Distributions and Outlier Checks

There was some missing data, in particular on three of the time questions on the CPS. Missing data were imputed using the mice package in R [ 30] and pooled results are reported. Where variables were skewed they were transformed and outliers were Winsorized. See supplementary materials Sect. 2 for full details.

Data Analysis Plan

Given that analyses included three variables extracted from the CPS we examined correlations between these measures. Time spent playing adventurously was positively associated with time spent playing outside ( r = 0.59, p < 0.001) and negatively associated with unadventurous play ( r =  − 0.63, p < 0.001). Time spent playing outside and unadventurous play were not significantly correlated ( r = 0.07, p  = 0.168).

To examine our hypotheses, Pearson r correlations, pooled from the multiply imputed datasets, were used to evaluate associations between the three play variables and four child mental health variables (SDQ internalising, SDQ externalising, PANAS positive affect, PANAS negative affect). A Bonferroni-corrected alpha of 0.0125 (0.05/4) was used to correct for multiple comparisons. We then examined whether these correlations remained significant after controlling for parent mental health and child sex, child age, child disability or mental health problem, child birth-order, parent employment status, parent marital status, parent age and parent level of education. Again, a Bonferroni corrected alpha level of 0.0125 was used.

Results

All correlations can be seen in Table 1. These results show that time spent playing adventurously was significantly associated with both children's internalising scores on the SDQ and positive affect as measured using the PANAS, with children who spent more time playing adventurously having fewer internalising symptoms and more positive affect. No significant correlations were found between adventurous play and either externalising symptoms or negative affect. In contrast, hours spent playing unadventurously was not related to positive affect and was positively related to internalising scores on the SDQ. Children who spent more time playing unadventurously had more internalising symptoms. For hours spent playing outdoors, no significant correlations with internalising or externalising scales nor for PANAS positive or negative affect scales were found.

Table 1 Mean and standard deviation for each child mental health measure and Pooled Pearson correlation coefficients (r) and 95% confidence intervals for relationships between play variables and children's mental health

All three significant correlations were robust to controlling for demographic variables. The full results of these regressions can be seen in the results file here: https://beta.ukdataservice.ac.uk/datacatalogue/doi/?id=8793#!#0. Although it was not our primary focus, in addition to the play variables, the following demographic factors were significant predictors of child mental health. For both regressions predicting internalising problems (one with adventurous play as a predictor and one with unadventurous play as a predictor), the demographic variables that were significant predictors were child disability status, marital status and parent mental health ( p < 0.05). Children had fewer internalising symptoms when they were not described as having a learning disability, mental health problem or physical disability, when their parents were married or living as married and when the reporting parent had lower levels of distress as reported on the K6. For the model predicting positive affect, the demographic variables that were significant predictors were child sex, child age, child disability status and parent mental health ( p  < 0.05). Children had more positive affect if they were female, younger, did not have a disability, and if their parent reported lower distress on the K6.

Brief Discussion

It was hypothesised that children who spend more time playing adventurously would have fewer internalizing symptoms and that children who typically spent more time playing adventurously would have less negative affect and more positive affect during the first weeks of the Covid-19 lockdown. Results support these hypotheses with the exception that there was no evidence of an association between adventurous play and negative affect.

The results provide some indication of specificity because no significant association was found between adventurous play and externalising problems. Furthermore, there was a positive association between time spent playing unadventurously and internalising problems, and no significant correlation between mental health and time spent playing outdoors, which further suggests specificity.

A limitation of this research is that the sample, although relatively diverse, was not recruited to be representative of the general population. Given the small effect sizes and confidence intervals close to zero, replication of these findings is important.

Study 2

The aim of Study 2 was to further evaluate the hypotheses outlined within Study 1 via analysis of data from the British Children's Play Survey.

Methods

Participants

Participants were 1919 respondents who took part in the British Children's Play Survey, administered by YouGov, a UK public opinion research company. The sample were recruited to be approximately nationally representative and then weighted back to the national profile of all adults aged 18 + including those without internet access. All participants (54% female) were parents or caregivers of children (49% female) aged 5 to 11 years. Full details of the sample are provided in Dodd et al. [ 1].

Measures

The measures were identical to those detailed in Study 1, including the CPS, SDQ, PANAS and K-6.

Procedure

Participants were invited to take part via email and directed to an online survey which they completed once. Recruitment started on 4th April 2020 and data were collected 4th-15th April 2020. The UK-wide lockdown due to Covid-19 began on 26th March 2020 so all data were collected within 3 weeks of the start of lockdown. As in Study 1, respondents were given very clear instructions to answer the questions thinking about life before it changed as a result of the pandemic, with the exception of the PANAS, where they were asked to respond with the previous week in mind.

Missing Data, Distributions and Outlier Checks

There were some missing data, in particular for a single item on the PANAS. Missing data was imputed using the mice package in R [ 30] and pooled results are reported. Where variables were skewed they were transformed and outliers were Winsorized. See Supplementary Materials Section 3 for details.

Data Analysis Plan

Following Study 1, pooled Pearson correlations were used to evaluate associations between the play variables and four child mental health variables. A Bonferroni corrected alpha of 0.0125 (0.05/4) was used. Additionally, in keeping with Study 1, we also examined whether the results held after controlling for parent mental health and demographic variables. Linear regressions were conducted to examine whether associations remained significant after including child age, child sex, child disability, parent disability, employment status, birth order, parent age, parent education and parent mental health as predictors.

Results

The correlations are shown in Table 2. These results show that effect sizes of all associations were small. Nevertheless, hours spent playing adventurously was significantly associated with both children's internalising scores on the SDQ and positive affect as measured using the PANAS, with children who spent more time playing adventurously having fewer internalising symptoms and more positive affect. In contrast, hours spent playing unadventurously was not related to positive affect nor to SDQ scores. Children who spent more time playing unadventurously had less negative affect. For total time spent playing outdoors, significant correlations were found with both SDQ internalising scores and PANAS positive affect scores. No significant correlations were found between any of the time spent playing variables and externalising scores. All of the significant associations were robust to controlling for demographic variables in a linear regression (see results file available: https://beta.ukdataservice.ac.uk/datacatalogue/doi/?id=8793#!#0).

Table 2 Mean and standard deviation for each child mental health measure and Pooled Pearson correlation coefficients (r) and 95% confidence intervals for relationships between play variables and children's mental health

Although it was not our primary focus, in addition to the play variables, the following demographic factors were significant predictors of child mental health. For the regressions predicting SDQ internalizing scores, child disability, parent disability, birth order, parent age and parent mental health were all significant predictors ( p < 0.05); children had fewer internalizing symptoms if they did not have a learning disability, physical disability or diagnosed mental health problem, were not first born, had parents who were older and parents who were experiencing less distress as measured using the K6. For regressions predicting positive affect, child age, parent education and parent mental health were significant predictors ( p < 0.05), with children having more positive affect when they were younger, female, and when their reporting parent had lower distress as reported on the K6. For regressions predicting negative affect, child sex, child disability, parent disability, parent employment status, parent age, parent education and parent mental health were all significant predictors ( p  < 0.05). Children had less negative affect when they were male, did not have a disability, did not have a parent with a disability, when their parents were not working, older, highly educated and experiencing less distress as measured on the K6.

The results quite closely replicate the findings from Study 1 with the exception that the correlation between adventurous play and internalising problems was notably smaller. Given that the Study 1 sample were from Northern Ireland, where human capital per head and household income are lower than across Scotland, Wales and England [ 31, 32], we speculated that the difference in results might be explained by demographic differences between the samples. The BCPS dataset included a binary variable labelled 'Social Grade'. This is a classification based on the occupation of the lead income earner in the household and is closely associated with household income [ 33]. In the absence of household income data we chose to use this variable to explore whether results would differ between children growing up in higher income and lower income households.

Household income and play were entered as predictors in linear regression models along with their interaction. Separate regressions were conducted for each of the mental health measures and each play variable. A Bonferroni corrected alpha of 0.0125 was used given the four mental health measures. Full models are available in the results file available here: https://bit.ly/3lqxXdx. Significant interactions were found for five models. Two of these models were for SDQ internalising score; one with a significant interaction between adventurous play and household income ( b =  − 0.01 [− 0.02, 0.00], p = 0.002) and the second with a significant interaction between outdoor play and household income ( b =  − 0.01 [− 0.02, 0.00], p = 0.004). In one model for positive affect, a significant interaction between adventurous play and household income was found ( b = 0.04 [0.01, 0.06], p = 0.003). Finally, for negative affect as measured using the PANAS, two further models included a significant interaction with interactions between adventurous play and household income ( b = 0.00 [− 0.01, 0.00], p = 0.012) and between unadventurous play and household income ( b = 0.00 [0.00, 0.01], p  = 0.012).

To explore each of these interactions we divided the sample into lower and higher household income groups using the social grade variable and calculated correlations. The results show that, for low household income, there were statistically significant negative associations between SDQ internalising score and time spent playing both outdoors ( r =  − 0.14* [− 0.21, − 0.07]) and adventurously ( r =  − 0.15* [− 0.22, − 0.08]) but neither of these correlations were significant for high household income (outdoors: r =  − 0.01 [− 0.07, 0.05]; adventurously: (0.01 [− 0.05, 0.07]). The relationship between positive affect and time spent playing adventurously was stronger for low household income ( r = 0.25* [0.19, 0.32]) than for high household income ( r = 0.11* [0.05, 0.17]), although significant for both groups. In contrast, for high household income, negative affect was negatively associated with time spent playing unadventurously ( r =  − 0.14* [− 0.20, − 0.08]), and positively associated with time spent playing adventurously (0.09* [0.03, 0.16]), whereas these relationships were smaller and not statistically significant for low household income (unadventurously: r =  − 0.02 [− 0.09, 0.05]; adventurously: r  =  − 0.03 [− 0.10, 0.04]).

Linear regressions controlling for demographic variables showed that the interactions between play and household income remained significant for the models predicting internalising problems and positive affect (see results file available here: https://beta.ukdataservice.ac.uk/datacatalogue/doi/?id=8793#!#0), but did not remain significant in either model predicting negative affect.

Brief Discussion

The results supported our primary hypotheses that children who spent more time playing adventurously would have fewer internalising problems as well as more positive affect during the Covid-19 lockdown. We also hypothesised that adventurous play would be associated with less negative affect but, consistent with Study 1, this was not supported. A significant negative association was found, however, between unadventurous play and negative affect; children who typically spent more time playing unadventurously had less negative affect during the Covid-19 lockdown. For all associations, the effect sizes were small.

Complementing Study 1, we found interactions between play and household income indicating that adventurous play may be more closely related to internalising problems and positive affect for children from low-income families. Surprisingly, we also found an interaction between adventurous play and family income for negative affect, whereby children from a higher income family who spent more time playing adventurously had more negative affect, whereas no significant association was found for children from lower income families. This latter interaction did not hold after controlling for demographic characteristics and should therefore be interpreted with caution.

Overall, the pattern of results is largely consistent with Study 1 and the findings were robust after controlling for a broad range of socio-demographic factors. The results provide some indication of specificity because no significant association was found between adventurous play and externalising problems. Notably, similar patterns for outdoor play and adventurous play were found in Study 2, making it difficult to determine whether adventurous play specifically is driving these findings.

Discussion

It has been proposed that to prevent anxiety and broader mental health problems, children need opportunities to play adventurously and take risks in their play. We therefore evaluated, across two studies, the hypothesis that more adventurous play is associated with fewer internalising problems. In both studies, there was support for this hypothesis. In Study 2, the correlation was stronger for children growing up in households with lower income. Although the effect sizes were notably small, the association between adventurous play and internalising problems was robust, holding after a wide range of demographic factors were accounted for, and when an alternative cutoff was used to define adventurous play. The small effect size is arguably to be expected given the broad range of factors that affect children's mental health; any individual factor such as play experience would be expected to account for only a small proportion of variance. The variation in effect size due to household income may be due to corresponding differences in exposure to adventure via more structured activities. For example, activities such as scouts, martial arts or adventure camps all provide children with exposure to the feelings of uncertainty, arousal and coping that are proposed to underpin associations between adventurous play and anxiety. These opportunities may be less abundant for children from families with lower household income and therefore, adventurous play may have be more important for these children. The CPS measures unstructured play so it does not capture these additional activities, but this explanation would be in keeping with previous research focused on the benefits of adventure experiences (e.g. [ 34]).

We also hypothesised that children who typically spend more time playing adventurously may have coped better with the uncertainty of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown and may therefore have experienced more positive affect and less negative affect during this period. The results partially supported this hypothesis; across both studies a clear positive association between adventurous play and positive affect was found. Children who typically played more adventurously were happier during the first Covid-19 lockdown than those who did not. Again, although effect sizes were small they were robust across studies and held after controlling for a range of other demographic factors. In contrast, no direct associations between adventurous play and negative affect were found. Although there was some indication that children from higher income families may have experienced more negative affect during lockdown if they usually played more adventurously, this did not hold after controlling for other demographic factors. The effects for positive affect are of relevance to mental health given that low positive affect is a core feature of depression. Children with higher positive affect have lower symptoms of depression over time [ 35]. This finding therefore provides some initial support for the idea that adventurous play may help children to cope, or at least maintain positive affect, during difficult periods, even if it does not prevent negative affect.

An additional aim was to explore the specificity of any associations found between adventurous play and internalising problems. Theoretical models propose that whilst play offers broad benefits for children's development, happiness and wellbeing, it is adventurous play specifically that provides learning opportunities which buffer against anxiety. Our findings broadly support this; no associations with externalising problems were found and unadventurous play was either not associated with internalising symptoms or was positively associated such that more unadventurous play was associated with more internalising symptoms. Notably, there is significant overlap between our adventurous play and outdoor play measures, as indicated by the high correlation, but results were less consistent across the two studies for outdoor play than for adventurous play.

From a theoretical perspective, the results provide some initial support for the predictions of a number of models [ 8, 9] but the data are cross-sectional and we cannot rule out the the direction of effect is that children with higher internalising problems play less adventurously. We also cannot conclude that adventurous play experience definitely helped children to cope during lockdown, without having a baseline, or pre-pandemic, measure of positive affect or a control group not exposed to the pandemic. Nevertheless, this research provides an important first step in evaluating theoretical claims and provides a foundation for future longitudinal and experimental work. For example, where it may be possible to manipulate adventurous play (i.e. through school-based interventions) and directly assess the impact on children's mental health.

The research has a number of strengths including the use of two independent samples, one of which was large and nationally representative. There are some significant limitations. The primary limitation is the reliance on parent report of play and mental health. We are confident that the results are not due to shared method variance due to the specificity of the associations, but parent report offers only one perspective on both the child's play and the child's mental health. It is also important to acknowledge that parents were asked to report retrospectively about their child's play and mental health due to the national lockdown as a result of Covid-19. It is not possible to evaluate the accuracy of this retrospective report but the measures were completed very soon after the start of the lockdown (a maximum of one month later) which means we can be reasonably confident that parents would have been able to report with reasonable accuracy [ 36]. Furthermore, due to the large sample, we relied on questionnaire measures but it may be beneficial for future work with more focused samples to use diary-based measures of play perhaps combined with technology to allow tracking of activity levels or geographical location. Finally, adventurous play is likely to offer a range of benefits to children, including an increased sense of autonomy, improved risk perception and greater physical activity, but these outcomes were not assessed given our focus on children's mental health. Future research would benefit from taking a holistic view of children's development and well-being to better capture the effects of this type of play.

To conclude, the results indicate that providing children with opportunities to play adventurously may have a small but positive effect on their mental health, particularly for children from low income families. Importantly, small effects can have substantial real world consequences due to their ability to accumulate over time and at scale [ 37]. This has been argued to be particularly important when the outcomes are consequential (e.g., mental health). For example, whilst universal free school breakfasts are related to a small increase of 0.09 standard deviations in math achievement, over a year duration the benefits of free school breakfast may equate to around 1.6 months of schooling per child [ 38]. Given that children enjoy playing in an adventurous way, interventions to support children's access to and engagement in adventurous play are likely to be an appealing way to support children's mental health.

Summary

A number of theories indicate a role for adventurous or risky play in anxiety prevention. In this paper for the first time, the association between children's time spent playing adventurously and their mental health is examined. More adventurous play was associated with lower internalising symptoms and more positive affect. The results suggest that giving children more opportunity to play in an adventurous way when they are in and out of school may offer benefits in terms of children's mood and longer term mental health. To support children's mental health, they need opportunity to play outdoors and adventurously, planning policy must consider children's needs to ensure that every child, particularly those growing up in lower income families, has free access to safe space for adventurous outdoor play close to home. Longitudinal and experimental work is required to tease apart direction of effect in future research.

Data Availability

The surveys, data, analysis script and results files that support the findings of this paper are openly available via the UK Data Service: https://beta.ukdataservice.ac.uk/datacatalogue/doi/?id=8793#!#0.

Funding

This research was funded by a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship, Grant Number MR/S017909/1.

Author information

Affiliations

1. Children and Young People's Mental Health Research Collaboration (ChyMe), College of Medicine and Health, University of Exeter, 2.05b South Cloisters, St Luke's Campus, Heavitree Road, Exeter, EX1 2LU, UK

Helen F. Dodd, Rachel J. Nesbit & Lily FitzGibbon

2. School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences (PCLS), University of Reading, Reading, UK

Helen F. Dodd & Lily FitzGibbon

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Correspondence to Helen F. Dodd.

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Play England, Play Wales, PlayBoardNI, HAGS and Association of Play Industries are named as partners on this funding. Outdoor Play and Learning (OPAL) and Learning through Landscapes are named as collaborators on this funding. No funding has been provided by any of these organisations for the research or to the research team.

Research Involving Human Participants

The methods and procedures described in this study were approved by the University of Reading School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences Ethics Committee (2020-003-HD). All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the University of Reading School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences Ethics Committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants (parents) included in both Study 1 and Study 2.

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Dodd, H.F., Nesbit, R.J. & FitzGibbon, L. Child's Play: Examining the Association Between Time Spent Playing and Child Mental Health. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-022-01363-2
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Keywords

Play

Child mental health

Anxiety

Internalising problems

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Child's Play: Examining the Association Between Time Spent Playing and Child Mental Health - Child Psychiatry & Human Development

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It is theorised that adventurous play offers learning opportunities that help to prevent mental health problems in children. In this study, data from two samples is used to examine associations between the time that children aged 5-11 years spent playing adventurously and their mental health.

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Active Norfolk: Practical ideas to keep the under 5's active

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Active Norfolk: Practical ideas to keep the under 5's active

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With children aged 0-5 being among those impacted most by lockdowns, it’s crucial to keep them active. This is not only to help their growth and muscle development, but to assist early brain development.

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Active Younger Kids (Babies and toddlers)

We know how hard it can be to keep up with the little'uns, particularly on cold or rainy days!

With younger kids aged 0-5 being among those impacted most by lockdowns, it's crucial to ensure we keep them active. This is not only to help their growth and muscle development, but to assist early brain development.

Check out our ideas for ways to keep our under 5's physically active below. If your kids are aged over 5, check out our activities tailored to slightly older children here.

How can I keep my younger kids active?

Many parents wonder how to keep their kids active as they grow, and just how active they should be.

Being active doesn't necessarily mean leaping around or dancing. It can mean anything that gets them moving,

To keep younger kids aged 0-5 active at home, make sure they have plenty of enriching activities and exercises. These should be done for at least 180 minutes each day. This could be colouring, reading a story together, or working out some basic puzzle activities to keep their brains active.

Activities to try indoors

If it's cold and wet outside, why not find something fun to do indoors? The resources listed will not only get the kids moving, but will get them thinking too, providing opportunities to learn!

Whether you're joining in or working from home, these games should be safe for kids to do by themselves with your supervision. There are also designated activities for kids to do whilst parents are working from home here.

There's a selection of activities to get you started - some can be done online whilst others with some basic equipment.

10 Minute Shake Ups: Keep up with Dory, or freeze things with Elsa! Choose from activities themed around your kids' favourite Disney characters to keep them entertained and active.

Cbeebies Join In: Cbeebies have worked hard to bring you a full suite of resources for pre-school aged children. From creative activities such as colouring and storytelling, to physical activities and games, there's enough to keep them going all day.

Tiny Happy People: This BBC resource is aimed at 3-4 year olds. Whilst there are fun games and dances to try, there are also sleepy time games, and ways of encouraging your child to talk imaginatively so they can wind down after a day of fun.

Activities to try outdoors

There are plenty of things you can do outdoors with the kids.

Try going for a walk together, and making a game out of it. You could tell a story about your walk and encourage kids to use their imagination. As well as this, you could use it as a chance to practise counting and see how many dog walkers you spot.

Here are some other ideas to get you started:

Whitlingham Spring Activities: The team at Whitlingham Adventure have been hard at work creating a spring bumper resource pack. There are also several suggestions which you could try with the kids.

The Early Years (0-4) | ParticipACTION: From those not yet mobile, up to pre-schoolers, there are resources to help you guide your child through their early years. This includes useful tips on how much they should be moving, to healthy sleep levels.

On The Move Outdoors: A series of accessible walks around Norfolk. Designed to make the routes accessible for all, they're perfect for knowing if there's a toilet nearby, or knowing if there's a clear route for those with pushchairs.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

More resources for younger kids

Below are some factsheets on how active younger kids should be at each age. There are also some tailored suggestions on how to keep them moving.
Thanks to the members of the Greater Manchester School Readiness Physical Development Task and Finish group with leadership from Stockport Council for their contributions.

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Younger Kids - Getting Active At Home - Active Norfolk

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We know how hard it can be to keep up with the little'uns, particularly on cold or rainy days! With younger kids aged 0-5 being among those impacted most by lockdowns, it's crucial to ensure we keep them active. This is not only to help their growth and muscle development, but to assist early brain development.

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Nurturing in the early years: A Famly blog by Aaron Bradbury

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Nurturing in the early years: A Famly blog by Aaron Bradbury

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Children develop empathy when they start to understand that they are separate people, whose feelings and perspectives are different from others. They learn about empathy by observing and modelling what adults in their lives do.

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Empathy is at the heart of what it means to be human.

It lays the foundations for us to be able to act ethically, to show love, and to have good relationships. With particular focus, it means very young children being given the opportunity to thrive.

Empathy begins with being able to take another person’s perspective, or to “walk in another’s shoes”.

Have you ever wondered what is happening in our young children’s minds when it comes to empathy? We will never truly know this, but there are many ways in which we, as early years professionals, can make sense of the nurturing aspects of empathy we observe within our everyday practices.

You may be reading this and thinking, “I have seen empathy displayed by children in my work setting.” This is exciting to know, and you wouldn’t be wrong, but at the same time, children may not show much empathy either. This is also normal and can be linked to a child’s developmental stage.

For example, you may have seen children hugging each other if one child is upset, and another child goes over to comfort them. This is empathy. Or, on the other hand, we may see a child look at another child and laugh at them. Some children may not have developed a sense of empathy yet and this, of course, is ok.

The first child in the examples given above (who gives a hug) shows that the child has an emotional response to another person’s distress and this is where the roots of empathy begin.

Knowing how to handle those big feelings, and being able to translate them into behaviour that can help another child, is complex and takes time, as well as lots of practice.

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What does empathy mean to a child?

Empathy can help a child understand:

That they are a distinct person,

That their feelings and perspectives are different from other people’s, as well as starting to recognise these feelings,

That their feelings matter to you and others in the setting.

By connecting these feelings, they can start to regulate their own emotional responses.

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Children will also begin to be able to put themselves “into someone else’s shoes” and start to imagine how they might feel were they another person. From this, they will also think about the next action they could take, to help another child feel better. In this way, empathy can be seen as an ability that builds on emotional self-awareness.

But remember, children will not be able to do all the above in one go. Very young children are just starting to navigate their own feelings and beginning to find themselves, in terms of regulating their own emotions.

Empathy needs to be seen as a work in progress throughout a child’s life because it does not just appear automatically. While we may be born hard-wired with the capacity for empathy, its development requires experience and ongoing nurturing.

“Building an understanding of what others are feeling, how their own actions can impact on others, and why someone might be experiencing feelings at a particular time is a valuable life skill for children to possess.”

Goodstart.org.au

The big ideas

Laying the Foundations for Empathy

Displays of empathy in children are learnt behaviour from those around them, which supports the nurturing, loving emotions of the child.

Similarly, we must understand that empathy might not be prevalent in the child’s life. Psychological and physical trauma can have profound effects on development and well-being throughout children’s lives. And, exposure to chronic adversity (like abuse, neglect, and trauma) impairs social and emotional processing.

Kowing this, we can reflect on how we lay the foundations for empathy with our care.

Empathy is an emotion and a cognitive experience. Babies are born with the ‘components’ of the emotions of empathy that develop over time.

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Babies start to reflect the emotional state and expressions of those around them. This is linked to mirror neurons, and even babies who are just a few days old often show early signs of responsiveness to other babies and infants. We don’t teach babies how to do this, so we know they are born hardwired to map certain experiences of others within their brains, and then react to this with their bodies.

Babies have early emotional experiences with their caregivers which supports the development of empathy. As a caregiver or professional, it is important to nurture and care for babies and infants, as they start to make crucial associations between positive human interactions and feeling calm and safe.

Children who feel secure and loved develop sensitivities towards others and their emotional needs. This is called ‘attachment’ and is the connection between a caregiver and baby or child.

Different brain systems enhance nurturing by supporting parent-infant attachment, as well as emotional wellbeing, learning, and giving attention.

It can be easy to think of your primary function as a practitioner, as being the child’s secondary caregiver, but have you taken the steps to think about the child holistically?

Have you reflected on the interactions and the relationship you have gained with the child’s main caregiver? Have you been involved in a discussion around the ethos of nurturing care and what this means to the child, the setting, and the main caregiver?

“Secure attachment can form with any caregiver (parent or professional) who provides security, safety, affection, and comfort.”

Aaron Bradbury

How children start to feel and think

Children’s emotional state develops as they mature and get older. The cognitive components for empathy start to emerge and allow children to build on the emotional templates that they begin to form during the first years of life.

By the age of three, children become more aware that others have separate feelings and experiences to themselves. They may not necessarily know what to do with those feelings, or how to respond, but the awareness is forming nonetheless.

These skills and behaviours unfold very differently for each child and depend on their own experiences. Our role as early years professionals is to provide a nurturing environment, where children feel safe and secure, and provide empathy within the context of the ethos and approach of the setting.

Transitions for children, such as the morning drop-off, and the handover at the end of the day, are opportunities to work with the children and families to create a nurturing environment for empathy, and plant the seeds to help children grow and develop.

However, empathy is not something we can sit children down and teach them. Instead, we need to provide opportunities for rich, loving environments which support an ethos of play, care and love.

And, we as early years professionals can also model empathy within our everyday practices. Remember that children are always listening and watching. Our everyday interactions are being observed- just like you observe children, they are continually observing us too.

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Opportunities for reflection

We need to be reflecting on the reasoning behind our own actions in our role, and continually look at nurturing empathy within our settings as a whole ethos, including staff, children, and parents and carers.

To begin to do this, we might ask ourselves:

How are we nurturing ourselves to be able to nurture the children in our care effectively?

Are we seeking the voice of the child and truly advocating for uniqueness in all that we do?

Where would you start in developing a nurturing empathetic approach in your setting?

Then, you can reflect on how to develop those nurturing, empathetic approaches in your Early Years practice by considering the following points:

Make sure that you are familiar with the concepts of child development in regards to  brain development and parent and carer relationships and start to link these to your everyday practice.

Familiarise yourself with contemporary concepts, such as Aaron Bradbury’s work on the science around nurturing, relationships, and Tamsin Grimmer’s work on developing a loving pedagogy .

Explore the meaning of the unique child and the voice of the child and how this is reflected at your setting.

Value your expertise, but also value how the practice you offer has been developed through research-informed practice.

Think about the environment in your setting- to what extent does the setting adopt a nurturing, positive approach to child development? Does your ethos support a positive approach to learning?

You know your children well, so develop an ethos within your setting that promotes every child being successful in life and becoming a resilient and emotionally intelligent human being.

Further reading:

Bernhardt, B. C. & Singer, T. (2012) The neural basis of empathy. Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 35, 1–23.

Bradbury, A. (2022) Nurturing in the Early Years – What the science tells us? Early Education Journal. Volume 96. Pp7-9. ISSN 0960-281X

Bussey, M.C., Wise, J.B. (2007) Trauma transformed: An empowerment response New York: Columbia University Press.

Goodstart (2018). Why teaching children empathy is more important than ever. [Online]

Grimmer, T. (2021) Developing a Loving Pedagogy in the Early Years: How Love Fits with Professional Practice. London. Routledge

Official Danish Government Reopening Advice

Guidance from the Danish Health Ministry, translated in full to English.

UK Nursery Covid-19 Response Group Recommendations

The full recommendations from a working group of over 70 nursery chains in the UK.

Please note: here at Famly we love sharing creative activities for you to try with the children at your setting, but you know them best. Take the time to consider adaptions you might need to make so these activities are accessible and developmentally appropriate for the children you work with. Just as you ordinarily would, conduct risk assessments for your children and your setting before undertaking new activities, and ensure you and your staff are following your own health and safety guidelines.

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Aaron Bradbury - Nurturing for empathy | Famly

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Aaron Bradbury on nurturing as a foundation for empathy in the Early Years

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A toolkit by Theresa Casey and Juliet Robinson, recently revised. Section 3 is particularly relevant, where the toolkit focuses on the role of the adult in facilitating loose parts play.

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Adventurous Play: A Prevention For Anxiety - ACAMH with Professor Helen Dodd

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Podcast: Adventurous Play - A Prevention for Anxiety with Professor Helen Dodd

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Podcast: Adventurous Play - A Prevention for Anxiety with Professor Helen Dodd

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In this podcast Helen discusses her recently published data that shows a link between adventurous and outdoor play and children’s mental health, as well as explains why she suggests that adventurous play itself can mitigate the risk of anxiety and explores her hypothesis that adventurous play targets some of the specific cognitive behavioural factors associated with child anxiety.

Helen further comments on her research into parental attitudes, including what interventions and campaigns can help change parental attitudes to adventurous play for overinvolved or anxious parents, as well as discusses how avoidant children and inhibited children can be supported to become more adventurous.

Furthermore, Helen shares her message to educators, CAMH professionals, policymakers, and other stakeholders when it comes to facilitating children to play in ways that may better support their mental health.

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For this podcast, in celebration of Playday (celebrated each year across the UK on the first Wednesday in August), we are joined by , Professor of Child Psychology in the College of Medicine and Health at the University of Exeter. The focus of this podcast is on child mental health and the importance of adventurous play.

As Playday encourages families, communities, and organizations to consider how they can build better opportunities for all children to play, Helen sets the scene by giving a brief overview of why play is so critical for children and young people.

Helen talks to us about how the pandemic has affected children's play, before turning to her research on adventurous play and why she sees adventurous play as an antidote to anxiety.

Helen also discusses her recently published data that shows a link between adventurous and outdoor play and children's mental health, as well as explains why she suggests that adventurous play itself can mitigate the risk of anxiety and explores her hypothesis that adventurous play targets some of the specific cognitive behavioural factors associated with child anxiety.

Helen further comments on her research into parental attitudes, including what interventions and campaigns can help change parental attitudes to adventurous play for overinvolved or anxious parents, as well as discusses how avoidant children and inhibited children can be supported to become more adventurous.

Furthermore, Helen shares her message to educators, CAMH professionals, policymakers, and other stakeholders when it comes to facilitating children to play in ways that may better support their mental health.

Subscribe to ACAMH mental health podcasts on your preferred streaming platform. Just search for ACAMH on; Podcastaddict, JioSaavn, Listen notes, Radio Public, and Radio.com (not available in the EU). Plus we are on Apple Podcasts visit the link or click on the icon, or scan the QR code.

I am a Professor of Child Psychology at the University of Exeter working within the Children and Young People's Mental Health Researh Collaboration (ChYMe). My research examines the development of anxiety disorders in children and the way that risk factors work together to affect children's risk for anxiety. I am particularly how children respond to uncertainty and ambiguity and the role of child temperament and the family environment in children's anxiety risk. I am currently funded by a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship which funds a programme of work examining how adventurous play might offer learning opportunities that could help to prevent anxiety in children.

Transcript

[00:00:32.092] Jo Carlowe: Hello. Welcome to the In Conversation podcast series for the Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health, or ACAMH, for short. I'm Jo Carlowe, a freelance journalist, with a specialism in psychology. As part of ACAMH's celebration of Playday, the National Day for Play on August the 3rd, I'm interviewing Helen Dodd, professor of Child Psychology in the College of Medicine and Health at the University of Exeter.

Helen is going to talk about child mental health and the importance of adventurous play. If you're a fan of our In Conversation series, please subscribe on your preferred streaming platform. Let us know how we did with a rating or review, and do share with friends and colleagues. Helen, thanks for joining me. Can you start with a brief introduction about yourself and what you do?

[00:01:14.830] Professor Helen Dodd: Firstly, thank you so much for inviting me and for your support for Playday. It's fantastic to hear people thinking about mental health and play together. Yeah, so I'm a professor of child psychology at the University of Exeter. I also hold a UKRI Future Leader Scholarship, which funds the research that I'll be talking about today. So, my background is in child mental health and until a few years ago, I hadn't really thought that much about children's play. My research was all about understanding risk factors for anxiety, understanding why children become anxious, and thinking about what we can do to try and prevent children from developing problems with their anxiety. And then a few years ago I became interested in play, and particularly in adventurous play or risky play, and thinking about how that type of play might allow children to learn about some of the things that we try and kind of target in prevention work for anxiety. So that's led me to doing this research now.

[00:02:05.500] Jo Carlowe: Playday encourages families, communities, and organizations to consider how they can build better opportunities for all children to play. Can you give a brief overview of why play is so critical for children and young people?

[00:02:19.660] Professor Helen Dodd: Play is what children do. It feels good to play. And I think it's important when we talk about play, we always talk about children. But actually, it still feels good for us as adults, doesn't it? If you think about when you do something, that no one's telling you to do it. It's not for work. It's not something that you have to do, you're just doing it for fun, and particularly, if you're doing it with friends or with family, it feels good.

And so, first and foremost, play is important because it feels good, because it's fun, because it brings joy to children's lives. And if nothing else, is that not a good reason to be supporting play? Of course, alongside that, play offers lots of benefits and opportunities for children. So when we allow children space to play, and they have opportunities to have what we call free play, which is where they're choosing what they do- they're choosing when they start, when they stop, and as adults, we kind of take a bit of a step back.

When children do that, they have a really nice opportunity to have control over their lives, which actually children don't have a lot of time when they have total control over their lives. And it offers an opportunity for them to express themselves, to explore their environments, to explore different feelings and emotions. It offers them an opportunity to connect with people around them by playing with them, by playing in a group, or one to one with friends and peers, and to develop that understanding of social relationships, but in this joyful, positive context.

And, of course, sometimes play goes wrong and children fall out. But then they have this opportunity to negotiate and to work out those problems. And so, so much learning actually is happening when children play. But for them, it doesn't feel like learning. And it's not the same as adults kind of setting up an activity for them to do in order for them to learn. They're just playing because it feels good and it's fun. And a really nice side effect of that is that they get this opportunity for autonomy, for control, for developing these social skills, for expressing themselves. And so, it's just a really nice way of supporting children's well-being.

[00:04:15.610] Jo Carlowe: I'm wondering how the pandemic has affected children's play?

[00:04:18.902] Professor Helen Dodd: Yeah. It's a really good question. And one of the positives, I think, with the pandemic is that people are talking about children's play more than potentially ever before. During lockdown, children's play was affected significantly in terms of their social play. So obviously, when children weren't able to be in school, or weren't able to leave the house and see their friends, then they missed out on huge opportunities for play with their friends.

And for lots of children during lockdown, they had- particularly that first lockdown- they had much more opportunity for play because they weren't in school. So, if they were lucky enough to have siblings at home that they could play with, then they might have been playing more than ever. It's important to remember that they still weren't playing with their friends. They weren't playing with children their own age. And those relationships are different. Some of that learning that happens that we talked about already in social play with friends doesn't necessarily happen when you play with siblings because the dynamic is different. So, if you've got an older sibling, that older sibling might let you get your own way. They might not fall out with you in the same way. Or a parent might intervene and say, you two work it out.

Whereas, with friends, you have to kind get those things right, or they'll just decide they don't want to play with you anymore. It's really important to keep in mind that during the lockdowns children missed out on that social play. But they might have had, otherwise, more play opportunities. But, of course, whenever we talk about the pandemic, we need to keep in mind that children's opportunities and experiences have been very different. So we need to be really careful, I think, about generalizing that all children were playing outdoors and having this wonderful time. Because, of course, that wasn't the case for all children. It massively varied, depending on how much space people have, particularly access to outdoor space. And so, for some children, their play would have been really restricted during lockdowns. Hopefully now that children are back in school and back able to see their friends again, they're having more opportunity to play and kind of reconnect.

[00:06:13.830] Jo Carlowe: Let's talk about outdoor space, because your research focuses on adventurous play, such as climbing trees or riding a bike fast downhill, and you see it as an antidote to anxiety. Why adventurous play?

[00:06:26.910] Professor Helen Dodd: As I said, my background has been in understanding anxiety in children and studying risk factors for anxiety. So, when I thought about this in the context of adventurous play, what I felt and argued in a theoretical paper that I wrote, together with Kathryn Lester, was that lots of these factors that we know are related to anxiety I think could be targeted by the particular experience that children have when they play adventurously.

So, for example, when children have an opportunity to play adventurously, what I mean by that is sort of at the edges of their comfort zone- so that exciting kind of thrilling play. And, of course, that differs from one child's to the next, in terms of what that actually looks like. But I think most of us can relate to that feeling of doing something that feels a little bit scary, but also feels quite good.

So, when children play at the edges of their comfort zone and they experience uncertainty, they experience arousal in their body- so maybe butterflies in their tummy or sweaty palms. And so, learning happens whilst they're having those experiences. So, they're learning about what it feels like to feel uncertain, how it feels to have to evaluate risk and make a decision about whether you can or can't do something. How much uncertainty is too much uncertainty? How do you gather information in that situation? And they're learning about what happens to their bodies when they feel scared, when they feel nervous. But they're learning about those in this positive context. So hopefully, when it goes well, what we're proposing is that children learn that sometimes their heart races, and sometimes they get butterflies in their tummy. Sometimes they feel uncertain. But actually, those things in and of themselves aren't something to be scared of. Because then good things can happen, because it can feel good because they're having these positive play experiences at the same time. And that helps them then to develop a more positive approach to coping. So, they learn how to cope in a way that's adaptive. So, when I feel these things, I know that I can cope. I know that I can deal with them in this way.

Really, overall, what we want is for children to have exposure to these slightly anxiety-provoking situations, but in a positive context, so that all this learning can take place. And then when they are exposed to something which is genuinely a bit more scary and isn't in playful context, then they're approaching that with, well, I know that these things happen in my body. I know these feelings. They're familiar to me. I know what it feels like to feel uncertain. I know that I can cope. I know that if I give things a go when I feel scared, sometimes it feels good, and bad feelings go away and positive feelings come. So, it's particularly about adventurous play, because it needs to have this slight exposure to fear and anxiety. And that's where it links, really. So, prevention of anxiety and learning those skills, which we think would help to prevent anxiety if children have the opportunity to have that kind of play.

[00:09:14.280] Jo Carlowe: And that was the hypothesis in a conceptual paper. But since then, you've recently published data showing a link between adventurous and outdoor play and children's mental health. What have you found?

[00:09:25.140] Professor Helen Dodd: That's right. Yeah. So, a month or so ago, we published first kind of quantitative data showing a link between children's adventurous play and their mental health. This paper includes data from two studies. So, one is a national study of children's play in Britain- the British Children's Play Survey. And the other study was a survey conducted in Northern Ireland. And the findings are nicely consistent across those two samples.

And what we found was that when children spend more time playing adventurously or more time playing outdoors, then they had lower levels of internalizing problems- so anxiety and depression symptoms. And we didn't actually intend to do this, but COVID meant that we did. We conducted the survey just as we were going into lockdown in 2020. That meant that we could also ask parents how children were coping during that initial part of the pandemic.

We asked parents to tell us about children's mood- so their positive mood and their negative mood. And we also found that children who in the year prior to the pandemic had had more opportunities to play adventurously, also had more positive mood, more positive affect during the initial phase of lockdown. That offered some support to our hypothesis that having these adventurous experiences allows children to cope better in anxiety-provoking situations.

[00:10:43.635] Jo Carlowe: It's very interesting. But I have to ask the question that it's a sort of chicken and egg situation. Because I would imagine that children who are less anxious are more likely to embrace adventurous play than their more cautious peers. What leads you to suggest it's adventurous play itself that can mitigate the risk of anxiety, as opposed to adventurous players being by default less predisposed to anxiety?

[00:11:07.822] Professor Helen Dodd: Yeah. It's such an important question. So, in the theory paper, then we're arguing that adventurous play can offer these learning opportunities that should prevent anxiety. In the data that we just talked about, as cross-sectional data, you're absolutely right, that it could be the other way around. So, children who are less anxious play more adventurously. Obviously, what we would expect actually is that that's a bidirectional relationship.

I totally agree that children who are less anxious might be more likely to play adventurously. But equally, I think that there are good reasons for thinking that opportunities for adventurous play could prevent anxiety. So, some things to kind of keep in mind, in terms of how we've interpreted that data, is that, first of all, the way we defined adventurous play in that data was from having a mild level of adventure.

So we're not talking about quite extreme adventurous activities. It was any play where there was at least a mild level of adventure- so a little bit of excitement. I don't imagine that at that level there would be huge differences between children who were more anxious and less anxious. It's more the kind of extreme things that where you would see differences I think. The other thing is in that data, we saw that the relationship between adventurous play and children's internalizing difficulties was stronger in children from low-income families.

And there isn't any reason for thinking the relationship in the other direction would be stronger in children from low-income families. But it does make sense that adventurous play, if it's protective, might be more important for children living in low-income families. So, I think there are some hints that there could be that direction of adventurous play preventing anxiety. But I think some of the effect, as you describe, is likely the other way as well. We're actually already starting some work at the moment where we're trying to change children's play, so that we can really target that question. The best way of finding out is saying, well, if we change children's play opportunities, what happens to their mental health? Watch this space for the outcomes from that data.

[00:13:07.500] Jo Carlowe: I want to look at what you think what the mechanisms are at play. So, you hypothesize that adventurous play targets some of the specific cognitive behavioural factors associated with child anxiety. But what can you tell us?

[00:13:20.640] Professor Helen Dodd: In the theoretical paper, we talk about four main mechanisms that are related to what we would do in cognitive behavioural therapy. So a major one is about avoidance versus approach behaviours. So, a key factor that underpins anxiety [INAUDIBLE] is avoidance. So, if we avoid things that we feel fearful of, then we never learn not to be fearful of them.

And so, one of the things that we think happens when children play adventurously is it offers an opportunity for prevention of avoidance of fear and a motivation to engage, because it's in a playful, fun, child-led context, which feels quite different to taking a child in therapy and getting them to face a fear that they're really scared of. That's a big factor is for the child to learn about the benefits of approaching something even when you feel a little bit scared.

Another factor is reduction of intolerance of uncertainty. So as I talked about before, when children are exposed to a level of uncertainty, then they will learn about uncertainty. And what we think is that when children have that exposure to uncertainty, then they will learn that it's not actually anything to be scared of in and of itself. So, we imagine that adventurous play can help to reduce that intolerance of uncertainty, or prevent an intolerance and uncertainty from developing.

We also talk about coping mechanisms, prevention of maladaptive coping mechanisms, and the promotion of adaptive coping mechanisms. And with anything, children need opportunity to learn about coping. And so adventurous play offers an opportunity to learn about coping. But, again, in this positive context, where children can try things out and see what works and see what helps and what doesn't, so hoping adventurous play can offer opportunities to learn this adaptive coping style.

And then the other factor is around physiological arousal- so having that exposure to physiological arousal, and the interpretations of that. If you imagine a childhood where you haven't ever had these opportunities, you've never felt what it feels like to be scared and for the things that happen to your body. And then suddenly something happens where you do feel a bit scared when these things happen, that could be quite overwhelming. Like, what's happening to my body? How do I interpret that? Is something wrong with my heart? Why is it racing like that? If you've experienced those feelings whilst riding your bike, then you understand what's happening with your body, and you don't make misinterpretations of that physiological arousal. So those are the four mechanisms that we focus on in the theory paper regarding why adventurous play might be able to target some of the cognitive behavioural factors involved in anxiety.

[00:15:56.500] Jo Carlowe: Opportunity for adventurous play, I assume, is influenced by parents. And I'm thinking that overinvolved or anxious parents are likely to dissuade their children from adventurous play. You've looked at parental attitudes, I believe. What interventions and campaigns can help change parental attitudes?

[00:16:14.897] Professor Helen Dodd: The research has been done by some members of my team. Brooke Oliver and Rachel Nesbit has looked at parent attitudes, and we've interviewed parents about adventurous play. And also, looking at parent mental health and how that's related to children's play opportunities. And you're right, that when parents are more anxious, then their child is less likely to play adventurously. And parents, themselves, when we talk to them, will identify that often their anxiety gets in the way.

An important finding from that work has been that almost all parents we've spoken to have been able to recognize that this type of play is good for children, and they want to offer it to their children. So, I don't think that the sort of intervention work or public health messaging needs to be about the benefits. I think parents know that it's good. I think it's more about how we make it happen by addressing some of the barriers and the things that are getting in the way.

Partly, I think that's about risk perceptions. The risk actually of a child being injured during play is substantially lower than is the risk of them being injured during sports. And yet, when children play sports, we tend to not be worried about them getting hurt. There's some work to do around understanding that and appreciating that the risk of children actually being injured when they're playing is quite low.

And understanding, too, that children judge risk well if we give them space to do so. I think often as adults we don't trust children to make those judgments. And actually, then we step in, and we remove opportunity for them to learn in order to improve their judgments. But children don't want to hurt themselves. They have a survival instinct the same as the rest of us. And there is research showing that if we give children just the space and we trust them, then they don't actually take risks that would hurt themselves. They tend to do that more when we stop them. And then they get defiant, and then they do something that's more risky. There's some work around risk perceptions.

And also, supporting parents with their own mental health. And parent mental health is a huge factor in children's mental health, thinking about how can we support parents with their mental health, which would have huge benefits for parents. But also, these knock-on effects on children, and an opportunity to play more adventurous there's only one of those in terms of the benefits that that would offer children. The other thing that I think is really important to keep in mind is that parents don't exist in a vacuum. So parents are part of a wider system around children. And the work that we've done with parents tells us that many other factors in that system are important. And so just trying to work with parents or put the blame on parents isn't going to work. It doesn't make sense, because parents will give their children more chance to play adventurously if there are good facilities for doing so, if there's a sense of community, if other parents are doing the same thing, if there's good support for it.

If they feel like they're being judged by other parents, then that will affect what they do. If their local park is somewhere they don't feel is safe to go to, then they won't use it. We really need to keep in mind that it's not just about parents, it's about the entire infrastructure that exists around parents, and community safety, road safety, facilities, policy are all important in feeding into what parents then actually do.

[00:19:29.950] Jo Carlowe: You mentioned earlier avoidant children, inhibited children, which is mentioned in your research. How can these children be supported to become more adventurous?

[00:19:39.322] Professor Helen Dodd: Yeah. It's a very good question. It's something I think about a lot. Because before I started doing this work, a lot of my research was with children who were inhibited and at risk for anxiety. And so, I think with those children- often, I talk about children just being given space and time to play, and they will just get on with it. And most of them will just play adventurously by themselves. And I wonder with more inhibited children, it may be that it needs to be a bit more structured, that they need some modelling. They need to see other children doing it, or a parent doing it with them, and to be able to see that it's fun. And that even though it feels a little bit scary, actually, that's part of the fun.

And that there are these positive things to come from it, too. So I think some of it is modelling. Some it's kind of scaffolding and encouragement, and realizing that the adventure level depends on the child. So whilst what one child might be thinking of as adventurous, another child might think of as terrifying. But that child might think, you know what? If I'm just going to walk along this wall and balance, that might be adventurous for that child.

So, this isn't about trying to get all children doing crazy, exciting, thrilling, risky things. Like, not all children want to do that, or would find that fun. It is about that place where it is still fun. So, it's exciting, but not terrifying. And so, thinking about, well, what does that mean for this particular child? And it may be that they'll do a little bit, and then they might want to push a little bit more with those experiences. But it doesn't matter whether they do or not. What's important is that they're given the support to be able to have those, "ooh, this is exciting" experiences.

[00:21:15.090] Jo Carlowe: Does that apply across all ages, the need for adventurous play?

[00:21:19.630] Professor Helen Dodd: I think the more children have these experiences as they make their way through childhood, then the more embedded these hopefully positive outcomes will be. So, it's not ideal to take a 13-year-old who's never been given any opportunity for adventurous play, and then say let's do it now. But that would be better than not doing it at all. We start to give children space to explore right from when they start trying out walking.

And then we have to immediately start judging the rest. Like, do we let them try and take a few steps? Are they going to fall down? We do let them take a few steps, because we understand that walking is necessary and it's part of their learning. So, I think it's applying that same approach, that sometimes we need to let them do some things that might feel a little bit scary for us as parents or caregivers, and doing that kind of throughout their childhood.

But I do think that this idea of adventure experiences being positive applies across the lifespan. And there's quite a lot of research, actually, with adults in terms of the positive effects on mental health for adventure experiences. So going kayaking or rock climbing or- there's something positive that comes from pushing ourselves a bit, and having those kind of exciting, thrilling experiences.

[00:22:33.180] Jo Carlowe: Helen, you mentioned that you were involved with some interventions earlier, and you were involved with some schemes in schools in Birmingham to change play. What can you tell us about these projects?

[00:22:43.020] Professor Helen Dodd: In order to really tap into whether adventurous play can improve children's mental health, ideally, what we need to do is to try and change play. So, some of the work that we're doing we're doing in collaboration with an organization called OPAL, which is Outdoor Play and Learning. And we're working, as you said with two schools in Birmingham, where OPAL are delivering their program, their intervention, which is around children's play at playtime.

And a big part of that program is about what they call risk reframing- rethinking risk. And thinking about rather than reduction of all risk, it's about taking a risk-benefit approach, where you think, OK, well, if there's a risk, is there a benefit for the child? And it's OK to have some risk if there's some benefit. It makes no sense to put children at risk if it's not offering a benefit. But a child walking along a balance beam, for example, there's a risk that they might fall off, but there's a benefit they learn to balance.

So they're taking that approach, and really encouraging schools to think about their play times, think about how they can be more creative with their play times. They introduce lots of what we call loose parts to the playground. So that might be things like tires or crates or chalk, sand. Recycled things can be reused, like old sheets for building dens. So, lots of things that children can use to be adventurous and creative with.

And it's not about making all children be adventurous. It's about providing opportunity for children to express themselves in their play, and adults taking that step back a bit and letting children lead their play, and not jumping in and saying, no, don't do that. Get down from that. Giving them space to explore those sort of adventure experiences, whilst also, of course, making sure that they're not pushing that too far. And we don't want lots of children getting injured. But, for example, school playgrounds where they might have trees, then they might put rope swings in the trees, or they might let the children climb the trees, for example, which most schools typically wouldn't allow. So, they're going to be delivering this intervention into schools. And we're doing quite intensive work before they start, which is now complete. And in a year's time, we're going to go back and have a look at how play has changed. And also, have a look at how it's affected children's mental health, and also children's well-being and enjoyment of school as well, which I think are important factors to keep in mind here, too.

[00:25:06.150] Jo Carlowe: Yeah. That's going to be so interesting. You've talked about some of the barriers to adventurous play. And I'm wondering what your message is to educators, CAMH professionals, policymakers, and other stakeholders when it comes to facilitating children to play in ways that may better support their mental health?

[00:25:25.607] Professor Helen Dodd: I think the first thing is that people need to think about play. So often, play is forgotten, though it's in our early year's curriculum, for example, until children are five. And it's not in the national curriculum once children are past five. The physical activity guidelines refer to play for under-fives. But once children get to five, then there's no mention of play in physical activity guidelines. Until recently, people working in mental health didn't really talk about play very much.

So, I think one of the things is just realizing that play has a value, and we need to think about it in our policies. So, whether that's kind of local authority planning policies, in terms of development of playgrounds; active travel so that children can access playgrounds, et cetera. Or whether that's education policy, or whether it's thinking about when you're working with a family in CAMHS, for example, thinking about that broader context. So, what is this child's play experience? Are they having opportunity to play? Does this parent know how to play with this child? And really, think about using play as a way of supporting relationships, giving children control, giving children opportunity to express themselves. And then beyond that, I think it's about- I think across professions, we need to think about how we give children the space and time for play, and that freedom and opportunity to lead their own play.

One of the things that's motivated this whole program of research is that over the past few decades, we've seen a decline in the amount of time children spend outdoors, the amount of freedom they get, the age they're allowed out by themselves. And they're quite dramatic changes to childhood. And so, we need to be conscious of those, and thinking about how can we balance that? And we don't want those trends to continue, so that children are becoming 13, 14 before they're going out by themselves, or allowed to go out and play with their friends. At the moment, it's about age 11. Parents' generation- they went out when they were about nine to play by themselves. So how do we prevent that kind of [INAUDIBLE] freedoms from kind of getting worse? And how do we ideally compensate for some of that by providing children with the time and space to play?

[00:27:32.700] Jo Carlowe: Helen, what else is in the pipeline for you, either in terms of follow-up research or other projects that you'd like to mention?

[00:27:39.585] Professor Helen Dodd: At the moment, as I said, we're working with these two schools in Birmingham. Depending on the outcome of those, we're hoping to develop that further and do a small randomized controlled trial to see whether that would be feasible to do it as a kind of big trial. I'm working with some clinical psychology colleagues on a program for parents- so particularly parents who are anxious, thinking about how we can support their anxiety, particularly thinking about in order to allow their children to play. So that will initially be a pilot program.

We want to do a follow-up national survey, so that we can see how COVID has affected trends in children's play. And so that would be really interesting to follow up as well. And continuing to do our work in schools, and also thinking about how the work in schools might be used to reach parents as well. So rather than directly trying to make changes via parents, but thinking about if we change things in schools, does that kind of model for parents that this type of play is OK, and have influences outside of school?

[00:28:39.173] Jo Carlowe: Finally, Helen, what is your takeaway message for those listening to our conversation?

[00:28:43.870] Professor Helen Dodd: I think it's that play is a really fun, joyful opportunity for children. It's central to childhood. And we need to make sure that children have time and space in their lives to do it- so that's physical space and psychological space. If you're in a position where you're influencing how children spend their time, whether that's as a parent or as a professional, then think about play. And try and make sure that children have opportunity to have that freedom and opportunity to play, particularly with other children.

[00:29:12.085] Jo Carlowe: Brilliant. Thank you so much. For more details on Professor Helen Dodd, please visit the ACAMH website, www.acamh.org. And Twitter @acamh. ACAMH is spelled A-C-A-M-H. And don't forget to follow us on your preferred streaming platform. Let us know if you enjoyed the podcast with a rating or review, and do share with friends and colleagues.

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Adventurous Play: A Prevention For Anxiety - ACAMH

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For this podcast, in celebration of Playday (celebrated each year across the UK on the first Wednesday in August), we are joined by , Professor of Child Psychology in the College of Medicine and Health at the University of Exeter . The focus of this podcast is on child mental health and the importance of adventurous play.