Accessing the Inaccessible: Redefining Play as a Spectrum

Abstract

Defining play has plagued researchers and philosophers for years. From describing play as an inaccessible concept due to its complexity, to providing checklists of features, the field has struggled with how to conceptualize and operationalize “play.” This theoretical piece reviews the literature about both play and learning and suggests that by viewing play as a spectrum – that ranges from free play (no guidance or support) to guided play and games (including purposeful adult support while maintaining playful elements), we better capture the true essence of play and explain its relationship to learning. Insights from the Science of Learning allow us to better understand why play supports learning across social and academic domains. By changing the lens through which we conceptualize play, we account for previous findings in a cohesive way while also proposing new avenues of exploration for the field to study the role of learning through play across age and context.

Play Captains on Play Streets: A Community-University Playful Learning and Teen Leadership Collaboration

“…Playful learning is guided by a core set of principles -that we should try to make learning joyful, meaningful, socially interactive, actively engaging, and iterative (Zosh et al, 2018). Playful learning is a pedagogical perspective that children can learn through all kinds of play, but that learning is most likely when play is infused with learning goals.…”

“…Play is difficult to define, and recently has been argued that it lies on a spectrum from free play with little adult support to direct playful instruction that is driven by adults. In the middle of this spectrum sit games with rules and guided play, in which adults gently facilitate play, but children retain the agency to drive the play activity (Zosh et al, 2018).…”

“…Evidence is growing that children learn and develop skills from multiple types of play, from children refining social skills and self-regulation during team activities (Blatchford & Baines, 2010;Foley, 2017) to building executive functions through games like Simon Says that require children to focus their attention, behave flexibly, and utilize their working memory (Diamond, 2016;Röthlisberger, Neuenschwander, Cimeli, Michel, & Roebers, 2012). Prior playful learning projects have aimed to harness the power of adult participation and child agency (Zosh et al, 2018). During guided play, for instance, if young children have the agency to discover information for themselves while adults keep them on track, children learn early math content better than when told the answer or when playing alone (Fisher et al, 2013).…”

Modified Legos is Effective in Stimulating Development on Pre-School Children

“…Adanya tujuan pembelajaran tertentu dari sebuah permainan dapat dilakukan dengan bermain bebas maupun permainan terstruktur yang dirancang oleh orang dewasa (Zosh et al, 2017). Dalam hal ini, modifikasi permainan lego yang dirancang oleh tim peneliti bertujuan untuk melatih empat aspek perkembangan anak, yaitu motorik kasar, motorik halus, sosialisasi dan bahasa.…”

Improvement of Planning Skills in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder After an Educational Intervention: A Study From a Mixed Methods Approach

“…Playing is a child's natural way of expression and provides opportunities for his/ her development and learning. This makes games an essential tool for children's teaching-learning process and for the systematic observation and analysis of their progress (Fasulo et al, 2017;Otsuka and Jay, 2017;Zosh et al, 2018). However, despite its importance, there are few works that carry out a valid and reliable child intervention and evaluation based on games (Salcuni et al, 2017;Hillman, 2018).…”