How does the way pretend play is organised affect pre-school childrens cognitive development?
Pretend play has been part of our early development for a very long time and is a well established part of the early childhood curriculum. Now however, pressure to make children academically ready for school, through concentrated and direct teaching of the alphabet, number, colour and other skills, may reduce the time pre-schools can make available for pretend play. This study looked at the contribution of two forms of pretend play to pre-school children’s emotional and cognitive development. It involved fifty-one children from two mixed-age classes within one kindergarten in the Slovak Republic. The researchers found that pretend play had a range of effects. In particular, they identified links between the different ways of organising pretend play and children’s emotional and cognitive development. They conclude that it is important for children to experience an appropriate balance and that their findings give support to the continuation of play-based curricula in pre-school programme
