Research - Learning through Play

Within my job I perform daily to a group of parents and children a selection of nursery rhymes, songs 
with actions, all designed for the children to join in, mimic and sing along. 
it is very interactive.
These songs remain the same each day in order for the kids to become more familiar with the 
movement and words so they can begin to learn a little more from each performance. 
I am eager to begin finding out a bit more about learning through play and how much of it will be 
directly applicable in my WBL research.  

In Einstein Never Used Flash Card authors Kathy Hirsh-Pasek and Roberta Michnick Golinkoff
describe the five main elements of play.

• Play must be pleasurable and enjoyable 
• Play must have no extrinsic goals; there is no prescribed learning the much occur
• Play is spontaneous and voluntary 
• Play involves active engagement on the part of the player 
• Play involves an element of make believe 

This defiantly describes the intent behind the performance session done at my work place.  

I will be finding out more about Hirsh-Pasek and Golinkoff's work if I look into this book as part 
of my literature research. 

In my initial research I have found a huge amount of research and data but one of the more simple 

ways I found to look at it was broken into three categories;

• Classic theories focus on the idea of burning of extra energy; replenishing every after hard work 
•  More modern theories explore play from the perspective of how it impacts a child's development 
• Other theories focus on "the relationship of play to diversity and social justice in daily living and 
• knowledge"

I feel within my inquiry I will be looking to focus on examining how play impacts on a child development.

Learning through play is thought by some to have development benefits in multiple areas for children 
including;

• Creativity 
• Imagination 
• Initiative 

One specific style of learning through play that caught my interest is the Montessori Method of teaching.

This teaching technique is directly reliant on the child self-directing activity and the teacher simply 

observing and guiding. 

It was developed by Maria Montessori , an Italian physician and educator, it put emphasis on

independent learning or "freedom within limits". 

The video below really put into perspective for me the theory Montessori developed,

One of her more detailed ideas is the four periods in human development, or "planes of development"  

I have created a diagram of the four stages she describes;

Below is another video I found really educational for understanding a bit more about the use of the 
Montessori method and also a helpful link to the official Montessori website,  

http://www.montessori.org.uk/what_is_montessori

I find this method of teaching incredibly interesting and will be trying to take some of these ideas into

the workplace to see if I can observe any or her hypothesis in action. 

If anyone else has had any experience with this or a similar teaching technique I would be greatly 

interested to hear some of your experiences! 

References 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_through_play

http://www.montessori.org.uk/what_is_montessori

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/146023.Einstein_Never_Used_Flashcards

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montessori_education

https://www.youtube.com

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montessori_educationhttp://www.theparentconnection.org
/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Einstein-Never-Used-Flashcards.pdf