Why is play important in helping children aged 3 – 5 learn?
It is how children learn about the world…their minds are at the stage where they have to explore and do things rather than hear about them…through play they explore concepts, relationships, pretend things (things they arent allowed to do like cooking, feeding babies, being a firefighter etc). Because its fun and stimulating the children are more likely to want to repeat the learning. Also, if they enjoy it their self-esteem will go up and they will have whats called ‘mastery learning’ which is when they feel good about themselves and that they can achieve. There are many theorists who see play as advantagous—Montessori, Froebel, Sheridan etc. Look up on www.nurseryworld.co.uk on the archives and type in ‘play’ and it will show you loads of articles which you can reference.
