Category Archives: Early Years
The power of play: How Early Years IB education sets solid learning foundations
Play is powerful, but it’s not just about having fun. Play is essential to development and growth, and contributes hugely to a child’s social, emotional, cognitive and physical well-being and development.
In the last three decades, scientific research has shown us that the most crucial time of a person’s life in terms of development is from birth up to age eight. During these vital years, children should be provided with opportunities to learn about the world and explore their environment through play-based learning.
In the International Baccalaureate, play-based learning is integral to the Primary Years Program (PYP) curriculum framework. The curriculum is centered around the idea that children are partners in the learning process. They’re not just passive bystanders, rather they’re integral to and a huge part of their own learning and progress.
But what is play-based learning, and why is it so important that educators incorporate this into the early years curriculum? Let’s take a look.
What do we mean by play-based learning?
Play is intuitive to children and all parents know that being able to play is important to their children’s development. Rarely, however, is play associated with learning – or at least it wasn’t until recent years.
The relationship between play and learning is complex; play-based learning is not just putting toys in a room and leaving children to it. Rather, it promotes the natural inquisitiveness of children and requires experienced educators who facilitate play depending on individual children’s interests, development, and emerging skills.
Playing is how children experience new things in a safe way and in a safe environment: they can cook food, visit the supermarket or drive a car. As a result, they get to explore the world hands-on and develop the skills they need as they age.
There are five main characteristics of play in play-based learning. The play should be:
- Joyful – in other words, children should find the activities fun.
- Meaningful – the play develops a particular skill or set of skills e.g., gross-motor skills, fine motor skills, critical thinking, social interaction, etc.
- Actively engaged – children willfully join in with play and explore new ideas and concepts.
- Socially interactive – children have opportunities to play with peers or adults.
- Iterative – children are encouraged to try things, think creatively, and adapt their play.
What are the benefits of play and creative thinking?
As well as being fun, play-based learning has numerous benefits for children. These include:
Increased self-confidence
Firstly, children develop self-confidence in a huge range of scenarios. Since free play is a key component of play-based learning, children are encouraged to try new things but never forced. So not only do they gain confidence but there is also a reduction in anxiety too.
Reduced stress and anxiety
Play provides joy as well as one-on-one interaction either with a peer or an adult, which can reduce stress. In a world that is constantly changing and evolving, the role of play is significant in children’s lives and can help reduce anxiety when changes occur.
Expand comfort zones
When new and unfamiliar activities are presented to children, they learn to expand their comfort zones. With gentle encouragement or modelling from an educator, a child is encouraged to explore a new way of play. For some children, this might involve taking part in activities like messy play that they are apprehensive about, for example.
Play and inquiry-based learning are also excellent ways of sparking creative thinking in children. When you increase the opportunities for children to think creatively, you encourage divergent thinking. Children are, then, much more open to exploring creative solutions and generating new ideas.
Develop real-world skills
Another benefit of play is that it helps children to build social relationships and practice social skills needed to navigate the world. When they’re in their home environment, they are used to interacting with a parent and perhaps siblings. Play-based learning in an educational setting allows children to navigate working with others that they don’t know as well, which is an essential skill for a developing child.
Finally, research shows there to be strong links between play in the early years and communication skills later. When children are provided with opportunities to engage in pretend play or play that involves negotiating with peers, they have a significant opportunity to enhance and cultivate their social skills.
How play is expressed in the IB
In the International Baccalaureate, play is integral to the Primary Years Program (PYP) curriculum framework. As will the IB in its entirety, the PYP curriculum is centered around the idea that children are partners in the learning process. They’re not just passive bystanders, rather they’re integral to and a huge part of their own learning and progress.
In the PYP, you’ll see teachers providing opportunities for open-ended play with resources and materials that children can use independently. Teachers are the facilitators who encourage play and step in to ask questions that encourage them to develop their thinking, understanding, and strategies.
Children are encouraged to become problem solvers and have ample opportunities to question, wonder, experiment, and play, both alone and collaboratively. Through play-based learning, children can learn, innovate, and inquire each day.
The PYP provides different types of play experiences. These include:
- Free play (entirely child-led)
- Guided play (child-led with adult scaffolding)
- Games (designed by adults and scaffolded, play with set rules/constraints)
- Direct (adult designed and controlled, set constraints)
Overall, the IB method of learning in the early years is highly focused on play-based learning and inquiry-based learning. Teachers facilitate the children’s learning by providing opportunities for different activities and encouraging different play experiences. In short, it is a holistic learning experience that promotes children’s emotional, cognitive, physical, and social development.
How do IB educators foster a playful environment?
When IB educators work with children, they carefully plan their day’s and week’s activities to provide a huge variety of different playful learning experiences. With open-ended materials and unstructured activities, children are engaged in sustained, complex, and rich play each day.
IB educators work hard to create the perfect playful environment for the children. Inclusion is a huge part of the curriculum, and all children are encouraged to join in all activities cooperatively with each other.
There is an emphasis on positive discipline, which teaches children to build a sense of community in the learning environment through the adoption and praise of good behaviour. Educators model positive behaviour and interactions and don’t resort to harmful, punitive discipline methods.
Finally, the learning environment itself is a huge part of fostering a playful environment. At CIS, for example, our IB educators ensure the learning environment offers a variety of spaces where children can flow and take comfort in. There are open spaces, an early years gym, a secure rooftop playground, and a greenhouse that is used for outdoor learning. All learning spaces are open-ended and encourage play-based learning.
Final thoughts on the power of play
Children are naturally inquisitive and by harnessing learning through play, they can develop a solid learning foundation for their future. Ultimately, play is a huge power tool for developing confident, inquisitive lifelong learners.
Here at Copenhagen International School, we foster a child-centred environment where children have time to be curious, ask questions, explore, and experiment. While doing so, they learn valuable social skills and develop their sense of self in a secure environment.
Want to find out more about play-based learning at CIS? Book a tour to speak to one of our friendly members of staff.
