Play in the School Context? The Perspectives of Finnish Teachers

Abstract

Playful learning environments (PLEs)

Effect of Play Therapy on Social Development: A Randomized Controlled Trial

“…Early intervention will have more positive impact on the development of the child's brain and the ability to learn. The process of evolving children can be sped up with appropriate, timely and high quality programs that provide positive experiences for children and support for their parents [14].…”

Students and preschool teachers in a play with children: Playfulness approached through the Ego States / Studenti i odgajatelji u igri s djecom: pristup igri posredstvom teorije stanja ega

“…Within pedagogical discourse, the phenomenon of children's play is usually determined in relation to its potential for early learning and development (Hyvonen, 2011;Singer, 2013;Sutton-Smith, 1997). In particular, the outstanding possibilities of play in the learning process, through enabling research, experimentation, initiative and imagination, are emphasized, and supposed to be the 'building blocks' for children's knowledge and experience as the basis of tacit knowledge, as well as a conceptual and procedural understanding (Hyvonen, 2011;Lynch, 2015).…”

“…Within pedagogical discourse, the phenomenon of children's play is usually determined in relation to its potential for early learning and development (Hyvonen, 2011;Singer, 2013;Sutton-Smith, 1997). In particular, the outstanding possibilities of play in the learning process, through enabling research, experimentation, initiative and imagination, are emphasized, and supposed to be the 'building blocks' for children's knowledge and experience as the basis of tacit knowledge, as well as a conceptual and procedural understanding (Hyvonen, 2011;Lynch, 2015). Furthermore, benefits of children's play are perceived from the perspective of the development of a preschool curriculum and organization of educational process on play-based teaching strategies, even though free play, optionally chosen by children, still remains in the field of recreation and "just for fun" (Lynch, 2015, p. 354), which is reflected in the continuous reduction of time devoted to 'just' playing within an institutional context (see Lynch, 2015).…”

“…Preschool teachers' competence for playing, as a theoretical concept and a real phenomenon, is still in the process of determination and definition. In pedagogical discourse, concepts like playfulness, 'play-based teaching' or 'playing-learning child and teacher' are still developing (Hyvonen, 2011;Pribišev Beleslin & Šindić, 2017;Singer, 2015). Play, especially free and spontaneous, is certainly framed by early childhood, with domination of 'rhetoric of play as a progress' (Sutton-Smith, 1997).…”

“…"In a play pedagogy, teachers gently structure young children's lives by means of routines, rituals, songs, dance, rhythms, rhymes, and humor", concludes Singer (2013, p. 182). Hyvonen (2011) distinguishes several dimensions of this concept: different roles of teachers in different play and playing situations; caring for playful learning process integrated into the play, environment and curriculum; enabling children's creativity taking into account the individuality of each child, and, the individual skills in playing, as a fun and enjoyment dimension that ensures that the play takes place and is experienced as a pleasant, social, fun, genuine and meaningful activity for all players.…”