How Children Learn Through Play

We’ve all heard of the phrase as easy as child’s play, but what this seemingly simple adage suggests is that the activity of children playing is inconsequential or not all that important. Well, as a matter of fact, not only is it important for the “cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being of children and youth”, but learning through playing is also a very effective teaching and learning method for kids, further amplifying the importance of this, at a glance, nonchalant activity.

So, how can children learn through play? Before we answer that question, we first need to define what children’s play actually is. Only then can we get into the nitty-gritty of topics such as how can children learn anything through playing or the types of play-based learning. 

Educational Entertainment

The idea that children can learn important skills or information through playing is not a new one by any stretch of the imagination. The concept of educational entertainment has been around for some 70 years, more or less. However, the idea of combining education and leisure activities is much older than that.

It can be traced as far back as the 16th and 17th centuries, or more specifically, to the Renaissance and Enlightenment movements. Jan Amos Komensky is one of the more notable philosophers that pioneered the idea that children can learn through play. In the 20th century, this idea was put to practice by none other than Walt Disney and his cartoons. From then on, it has been applied in a variety of media, such as film, television, and games, all of which have a didactic function, that is, the ability to disseminate important information or knowledge.

The rise of digital entertainment presented us with a new perspective on how much children can actually learn through play, even though its development had very little to do with this idea  (there are many other factors that influenced the development of edutainment, but that’s an entirely different matter). That being said, digital entertainment, even when it’s educational, is not without its drawbacks, as it may leave children no room to exercise their own imagination and creativity. 

But before we jump to the drawbacks, let’s cover our basics.

How Is Children’s Play Defined?

First things first. Even though we all know what play is, at least broadly, putting it into more concrete terms will help us better understand how children can learn through it. 

Children’s play is best described as an activity or a group of activities that lead to self-amusement of the player, or in this case, the child. It mostly entails the cause and effect principle, that is, the child gets some sort of emotional or psychomotor reward out of it. We can also safely assume that it can be categorized as enjoyable and largely spontaneous, especially at a younger age.

How Does It Happen?

Spontaneity is one of the key defining traits of children’s play. When the environment is safe enough, but also enabling in the way that children feel free and at ease, they tend to explore their innate impulses, i.e. they start playing. A good, very common example is toddlers dropping objects, familiarizing themselves with gravity as well as exacting a reaction from their parents. The game-like repetition of such an action is one of the earliest examples of behavioral learning.

Later on, even in more directed play activities, such as building LEGO blocks, kids may completely flip the script and exercise their creativity by building something completely foreign. Speaking of creativity, children can enact whole, elaborate worlds via pretend-play and make-believe, assuming the roles of adults or superheroes. In that manner, not only do they exercise certain cognitive functions, but when practiced with their peers, pretend-play can also help develop a certain social skillset.

Types of Play

In our previous examples, we mentioned several types of play, and even though the categories are not exclusive and do overlap, they can be sorted into the following subgroups. 

It’s worth noting that there’s no single agreed-upon classification, but for the sake of consistency, we’ll work off of the most relevant one to our topic – Piaget’s classification inferred from his theory of cognitive development.

• Practice play 

Involves the repetition of simple motor skills, such as clapping of the hands, or relatively complex bodily movements, such as jumping or running. This is how children put acquired sensorimotor skills into practice and develop them further.

• Make-believe or symbolic play

Involves the imitation of actions or the behavior of others, exercising their creativity and fantasy. They also may use certain objects to symbolize something different, e.g. pretending that a chair is a car or a complex robot.

• Games with rules

Involve structured playing, most commonly with peers, and following a certain set of rules. Tag, “duck, duck, goose”, or even sports, are some examples of games with rules.

What Is Play-Based Learning?

Now that we’ve assessed the general importance of children’s play and how children learn certain skills, behaviors, and faculties, we can explain the notion of learning through play in the more literal sense and in relation to education.

It should be apparent by now that kids are naturally inclined to play. Be it due to self-amusement, or sheer curiosity, children are strongly motivated to pursue play-like activities. Play-based learning takes advantage of this fact by incorporating said activities as a basis for learning. The defining characteristic of this approach is that the process of learning is in most cases initiated by the child, or rather the play part of it, and is then supported by the teacher who encourages the child’s inquiry, guiding their thought process by actively participating.

This approach puts the child in the role of an agent, actively taking charge and making meaningful choices. But, that doesn’t mean that the adult/teacher has no authority whatsoever; even though the play activity can be initiated by the child, the adult can still direct its course. The opposite is also possible and this dynamic largely depends on the activity in question.

Putting Learning Through Playing Into Practice

Learning through play can be incorporated in various age groups. Practicing this approach is viable from kindergarten, where it comes in rather naturally, all the way to middle school and high school, where it can be incorporated in different and more complex iterations.

For example, at a younger age, when children are playing with blocks, puzzles, or construction sets, the teacher can participate and ask questions such as “how high can you build that LEGO tower using X pieces?”, denoting basic principles of mathematics or physics while the student is learning to manipulate physical objects. 

In another instance, the teacher could arrange a dramatization of certain cartoons or programs where the children get to play out their favorite characters. This activity provides an opportunity to experience role-based social interaction as it would involve multiple peers and learn moral principles based on the choices of the characters. Furthermore, this could be extended into a language-based game, analyzing the dialogue, and explaining the meaning of new words.

Another example of an exploratory play-like activity would be showing the students microscopic images of certain surfaces and having them guess the material. To add another wrinkle to the game, the teacher could keep track of points and select a winner at the end of it. Then, the students could see the materials in question under a microscope, familiarizing themselves with the close-up pictures first-hand. This, in turn, could help students learn chemistry or biology.

Simply put, the possibilities are endless. These are only a few examples that we could think of, but we’re sure that you can do even better!

A Common Mistake

That being said, the teacher must remain vigilant that they don’t turn their teaching method into giving out something known in the education world as chocolate-covered broccoli. The analogy, in our context, means that you can’t try to make something interesting just by gamifying it if the children find it intrinsically uninteresting.

The approach of learning through play must come naturally and should be either in part directed or initiated by the student. Otherwise, avoiding this common pitfall may prove difficult. No matter how hard you try to present something that you find engaging, the children just may not like it.

The Pros of Learning Through Playing

Other than playing an important role in the children’s all-around development and providing the possibility to be used as a tool to teach content in an innovative way, play-based learning has some additional positive aspects. 

• A source of joy

We simply can’t stress this enough; the children will be having fun while learning through play. There’s no other motivator that works as well as the innate emotion of childlike happiness. 

• It’s meaningful

On the other hand, play-based activities such as games can also inherently invoke certain negative feelings through which children can learn that their choices have meaning. Even though this can be demotivating for certain kids…

• They can always try again

While learning through playing they will continuously be able to explore new possibilities or do things differently, all the while improving a certain skillset or learning new information.

• It’s interactive and engaging

Not only do the children get to socialize with their peers while partaking in an activity they all feel strongly about, but they can also receive immediate feedback, be it from the moderator, or in this case, the teacher, or their friends. This, in turn, will keep them engaged and help them develop meaningful social connections.

The Cons of Learning Through Playing

No matter whether you’re a parent looking for alternative education approaches, or a teacher looking to enliven their classroom, choosing the appropriate method needs to be done on unbiased grounds. That being the case, we need to keep certain drawbacks in mind. Although learning through playing has many upsides, here are some of the cons.

• Learning may take a back seat

Sometimes, factual subject matter has to be internalized at face value, there’s no way around it. Although such content isn’t always front-and-center at a younger age, hence this method being most applicable in ages 2-12, some information just has to be learned as such. Furthermore, certain play-like activities can come off as repetitive and the children might end up being good at the game, rather than learning the minutiae.

• Some children might need more guidance

Learning through play stimulates creativity and encourages children to think and act of their own accord, but some of them might just need tangible directions rather than having to jump through hoops.

• If thoroughly unstructured, it can be unfair

Due to the inherently social nature of most play-like activities and games, certain children might feel left out if they are not “the loudest in the room”. That’s why conscientious structuring, while leaving space for creative expression, is also important; every child has to have the opportunity to voice themselves.

Educational Methods That Incorporate Play

Learning through play as an idea can be combined with the direct instruction approach or used in a different-variant approach of its own. It’s just that liberating. But, it’s worth noting that there are some already established education methods out there that have already incorporated play-based learning in one way or the other. Such examples are the following.

The Montessori Method

This educational method was first introduced by Maria Montessori, a renowned Italian physician, and pedagogue. The method is mainly centered around “self-directed activity, hands-on learning, and collaborative play”. Montessori, for the lack of a better word, classrooms include students aged ​2 1⁄2 to 6 years old, but other mixed-age groups can be found as well. The educational approach is based on a constructivist model where the children learn about concepts through first-hand experience rather than instruction.

The Reggio Emilia Approach

The Reggio Emilia Approach is also a constructivist educational philosophy that was stirred into existence by the sociopolitical change in post-WWII Italy, or more specifically, the Reggio Emilia municipality. The protest towards the then education laws gave birth to an eclectic approach which builds on the premise that children ought to have control and direction over their learning and should learn through hands-on experiences rather than a directly instructed curriculum.

Final Words

We hope that you now have a better understanding of what learning through play can encompass. Although the direct instruction method has been largely prevalent through schools for some time now, dynamic and interactive approaches are on the rise in recent years. Consequentially, the approach of learning through playing has become relatively popular in classrooms, kindergartens, as well as with homeschoolers.

Nevertheless, whichever method or approach you prefer, we at KidsKonnect strive to give you all the necessary resources that can help you conduct your child’s or your students’ education as efficiently as possible. Time and time again, our extensive worksheet library has proven to be an invaluable resource for hundreds of thousands of teachers and homeschoolers. For similar articles, simply head over to our blog where we explore everything related to education.