Early Childhood Play

The Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), highlighted that children have the needs to play. Play is essential as it aids the various aspects of children’s development. Play should be encouraged in all phases of children’s life as they learn to interact, ponder, problem-solve, mature and enjoy themselves (Anderson-McNamee & Bailey, 2010). Therefore, educators should appreciate play in the early childhood stage.

The observed child: JL is of three years old. From the observations, she was involved in various characteristics of play. Firstly, the play was spontaneous and voluntary. This refers to child-directed instead of teacher-dictated play (Rubin, Fein and Vandenberg as cited in Hughes, 2010). For instance, once Teacher S asked the

Additionally, there would be short interactions and limited negotiations. For instance, JL was seated amongst her group and while building a house out of connectors, she called out to her friend, “QE, what are you doing?” QE responded, ““I building road.” Also, JL asked QE when she wanted circular connector, “Can I have the dark pink please? Later I finish, I give you back.” Through this, children’s socio-emotional will be developed as they learn the appropriate and inappropriate actions while playing with others (Anderson-McNamee & Bailey, 2010). Also, they learn about the body language of their peers. To add on, children will learn to share and cooperate if they would like the particular material that their peers are holding (Anderson-McNamee & Bailey, 2010). Problem-solving skills will also be enhanced if children cannot achieve what they want as they try to negotiate such as trading (Anderson-McNamee & Bailey, 2010). Thus, this is developmental as Parten mentioned that it is achievable for children aged 3 to 4 even though it is more common in older preschoolers (Dyer & Moneta as cited in Rathus,

Children will symbolise one object as another. For example, JL turned the connectors into a house and knife. Apart from that, the object represents familiar or imagined situations based on children’s prior experiences. At the age of two to seven, the motivation of play was due to fantasy and includes the remaking of experiences in a way that children can deal with (Thompson, 2009). This aids children’s literacy as they use the memory to recall events, express feelings and remember by imitating are at the core (Luongo-Orlando, 2010). According to Piaget (as cited in Landreth, 2012), play closes the gap between concrete experience and abstract thought. Therefore, Piaget (as cited in Santrock, 2014) believed that this period generally appears at 18 months and continues until 4 to 5 years