Navigating the Play Spectrum
Free play, guided play, games, and direct instruction
Did you miss it?! Last week, we talked about guided play. Research shows it’s the best way to support early learning in young children. It’s what the play prompts in the Play By Play guide are based on!
Now, if you’re wondering why guided play is the best approach to play, you’re in the right place!
Get ready to learn:
What is Playful Learning? The five components.
What is The Play Spectrum? The four types.
Why is Guided Play the best approach? The one that really matters.
As usual, we’re giving you the need to know information in a parent-friendly way. We’ve also included practical examples and action steps so you can go on with your day not just having learned good information, but knowing how you can apply what you’ve learned.
WHAT IS PLAYFUL LEARNING?
Playful learning is “a relatively new field that embodies all the fundamental characteristics of learning experiences that best suit what we know about how brains learn”. (Wright et al., 2022)
“The five characteristics ebb and flow as children are engaged in learning through play activities. All five characteristics are not necessary all the time, but over time children should experience moments of joy and surprise, a meaningful connection, be active and absorbed, iterate and engage with others.” (Zosh et al., 2017)
PLAYFUL LEARNING IS:
JOYFUL
Simply put, emotions play a role in learning. Joy and interest are considered to be THE emotions of play!
Action Steps:
Enjoy an activity for the simple pleasure of doing it.
Participate in shared interests or leisure activities together.
Share in moments of surprise, thrill, motivation, or success after overcoming obstacles.
MEANINGFUL
We love this one! We get to help our children tap into their existing knowledge and make moments meaningful. Think about how we learn as adults. Information becomes valuable to us when we find it meaningful to us. As we build on what they already know, they develop their ability to make connections and better understand the world around them.
Action steps:
Show that you’re interested in your child by talking about what they’re doing or interested in.
Restate what your child says + Expand by adding new words and familiar concepts.
Help your child make connections between what is happening in the classroom and what is happening at home or in their community.
Read books and sing songs that contain novel words. Talk about what they mean.
ACTIVELY ENGAGING
The more “hands-on, minds-on” learning an experience we can promote, the better! Did we learn better from a lecture on anatomy or did we remember building “Bones” the skeleton and dissecting a frog? In other words, we get to create opportunities for our children to learn with their hands and think with their minds.
Action steps:
Incorporate the four elements of water, fire, earth, and air. Wash the windows, build a fort and read by a flashlight, mix dough for modeling clay, or fly a kite!
Engage in wordless picture books like this one and this one.
Get outside and direct your child’s attention to what they see, feel, hear, smell, and taste.
ITERATIVE
Every mistake leads to deeper learning. Iterative learning takes place as children try, fail, and try again. The best example I can give you for what this could look like is a puzzle. The first time a child engages in a 12 piece puzzle, they might experiment by matching random pieces together. Given some guidance, they learn to find the corners. The next time, they might understand the difference between outside pieces (straight edge) and inside pieces. Over time, as they continue to engage, they’re able to build on their skills and understanding of how a puzzle works.
Action steps:
Embrace the trial and error process: Try > Fail > Evaluate > Refine
Encourage perseverance
Model effective problem solving (ie. “think aloud”, verbalize a strategy, talk about possible solutions, etc.)
SOCIALLY INTERACTIVE
As we share enjoyable experiences and communicate with others, we build positive relationships. Most play involves others and for children, the most important people in their lives are their parents.
ACTION STEPS:
Play pretend: Set a restaurant scene one day this week. Use a table cloth and light a candle. Create a menu together and set the table. For fun, who would you like to be? A hostess, server, or chef? Take orders, cook, and fill water glasses.
Play a toy or game together, possibly one your child is already interested in — building? Princesses or superheroes? Inventions?
Flip through a book together and point out different faces and emotions. Talk about why a character might be feeling that way. Relate feelings to personal experiences.
We love talking about play and could easily go on and on, but we want to keep this topic as focused as possible. If you’d like to learn more about each of the characteristics, read this article (pp. 21-44). And if there’s a specific one you need more support with, we’d love to help. You can submit your questions here.
“Perhaps play would be more respected if we called it something like “self-motivated practice of life skills,” but that would remove the lightheartedness from it and thereby reduce its effectiveness. So, we are stuck with the paradox. We must accept play’s triviality in order to realize its profundity.”
Developmental psychologist Peter Gray; Free to Learn
What is The Play Spectrum?
Now that we have a better understanding of playful learning, let’s transition to the play spectrum.
Researchers use the words “playful learning” and “the play spectrum” as terms to include or classify free play, guided play, games, and direct instruction (Zosh et al., 2017).
Like books classified by subject in a library or food organized by type at the grocery store, playful learning is classified into 4 different types. Here’s the kicker: 3 out of 4 of those types are PLAY!
Let’s review:
Playful learning occurs when it’s a joyful experience, meaningful to the child, actively engaging, promotes learning, and is socially interactive.
All the research agrees that learning through play can happen during (1) free play, (2) guided play, and (3) games.
Learning can also happen through direct instruction, but it’s important to note that direct instruction is not play. It’s direct instruction.
If you’ve done any or all of these with your child, know that we are clapping our hands! Way to go!
01. FREE PLAY
Free play occurs when the child has full autonomy, meaning they are completely in control. They choose the toy or activity and choose how they play with it. Parents may watch their children from afar, but do not intervene unless necessary. According to the research discussed in this article, free play is essential for a child’s well being and also promotes a child’s ability to think flexibly.
Example: The child is playing with toy vehicles and is making a ramp with books. The parent does not step-in or add to what the child is doing. The child chose this activity.
02. GUIDED PLAY
Guided Play is child-led (child has autonomy) with an adult-guiding or scaffolding(offering support as they learn) to achieve learning goals within the context of play.
Example: A child chooses to play with a Potato Head toy. The child is putting on body part pieces and saying the body part names aloud. The parent joins in and intentionally adds relevant information such as the function of what each body part does. “Yes, it’s a nose! We smell with our nose.” The parent might also state something like, “I wonder what we need to see…” The parent is playing with a learning goal in mind: function of body parts.
03. GAMES
Games are exactly what it sounds like. It could be a board game or a game like hide and seek. There are set rules and limitations set on play within the context of the game.
Example: The parent sets up a board game to play with the child. They interact and follow the rules of the game while having fun. The game is leading the goal based on the structured rules.
04. DIRECT INSTRUCTION
Direction instruction is not playful learning at all. It is completely controlled by adults. Sometimes direct instruction may appear to look like play, but it’s truly not.
Example: The parent shows the child flashcards with colors on them. The parent then lays the flashcards out and asks the child to point to the named color and repeat it. The parent shows the child a video about colors. Learning colors is the goal.
Adapted from The Play Spectrum (as seen in Zosh et al., 2017)
WHY IS GUIDED PLAY THE BEST APPROACH TO PLAY?
There’s no denying the facts. Guided Play not only encompasses all the characteristics of playful learning, it also provides the balance of child to adult involvement. – Making it the optimal choice!
Action steps to practice guided play:
Start: Let your child choose an activity. Take the pressure off of yourself- no prep!
From there:
Comment naturally while your child is playing.
Comment on what’s meaningful to your child.
Use words or ideas that might be relevant to the activity and/or their environment.
Consider where you can elevate their learning. Level up their language with a new concept, word, or skill.
WHAT ABOUT FREE PLAY, GAMES, and DIRECT INSTRUCTION?
These are all valid ways to learn. It’s important to consider your child, the time you have, and your goals. Each of them have their own time and place.
If your child loves free play, absolutely encourage that. Consider using free play when you’re looking for some uninterrupted time to get a task done. Know that free play alone is not enough. Especially for children that may be displaying signs of a speech or language delay.
If your child enjoys playing games, have a family game night! And we’re not just talking board games. Playful learning for a child who is interested in letters could match upper and lowercase letters using cars. There are rules and limitations to the game, but the child is engaged and playing.
Direct instruction is not play. The research states this a lot, so it feels right to reiterate. Here us out, there is a time and place for direct instruction. But sometimes what we think is “playful” is actually direct instruction. To give you an example, printable worksheets and mats with play-doh are disguised as play. It seems like a fun and playful activity, right? The reality is, when we use worksheets, we’re often taking the goal or skill out of context. We want to encourage you to actually make the target goal or skill relevant to the life (instead of introducing a goal or skills with a worksheet).
REsources just for you!
ARE YOU READY TO PLAY WITH A GOAL IN MIND?
You’ve got options!
Get the confidence you need to be your child’s first and best teacher with our Play By Play guide.
Download a free toy guide on us!
Not ready to invest in the Play by Play guide? Check out the shop for individual toy guides.
Get a jumpstart and put in the practice with our 31 Days of Play calendar.
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RELATED POSTS:
The Best Way to Support Early Learning: Guided Play
Activities to Promote Language Development
What Finally Convinced Me: My Role Matters
The Progression of Pretend Play
Top 10 Toys for Promoting Language, Learning, and Life Skills
Sources:
Zosh, J. M., Hopkins, E.J., Jensen, H., Liu, C., Neale, D., Hirsh-Pasek, K., Solis, S.L., & Whitebread, D. (2017). Learning through play: a review of the evidence (white paper). The LEGO Foundation, DK.
Wright, C.A., Hirsh-Pasek, K., & Thomsen, B.S. (2022). Playful Learning and Joyful Parenting [White paper]. The Lego Foundation. www.learningthroughplay.com