Guided play offers a powerful approach to education, blending the freedom of child-led exploration with the focused guidance of adults. But What Is Guided Play, and how does it differ from other forms of learning? Let’s delve into the details and discover its potential to enhance children’s development.
Ms. Elena’s Head Start classroom provides a great example. During center time, children engage with carefully selected materials related to the week’s storybook theme—farm life. As the children play with animal figurines, Ms. Elena observes and subtly integrates vocabulary, ensuring they understand the words while allowing them to lead the play. This approach embodies the core principles of guided play.
The Power of Playful Learning
Play is a fundamental aspect of development, observed across species and cultures. Free play and guided play, collectively known as playful learning, serve as invaluable pedagogical tools. They allow children to learn in a joyful and conceptually rich way. Research in animal brains shows how rough-and-tumble play can promote early brain development.
Play and Brain Development
Studies on animals show play, particularly rough-and-tumble play, is crucial for early brain development. Young rats who engage in play exhibit greater adaptability later in life (Pellis, Pellis, & Himmler 2014), especially in social skills and executive functions (Burgdorf, Panksepp, & Moskal 2011). These findings offer insights into how play might support the development of social functioning and brain architecture in children.
Benefits of Play in Childhood
Research consistently demonstrates a strong connection between play and various aspects of child development, including language (Toub et al. 2016), executive functions (Tominey & McClelland 2011), math and spatial skills (Fisher et al. 2013), scientific thinking (Schulz & Bonawitz 2007), and social-emotional development (Dore, Smith, & Lillard 2015). The “science of learning” highlights that learning is most effective when children are mentally active, engaged, socially interactive, and building meaningful connections to their lives (Hirsh-Pasek et al. 2015)—all elements found in guided play.
In Ms. Elena’s classroom, Javon actively uses the word “coop,” Sara is engaged in her role as the cow, and Ms. Elena connects the word “coop” to the children’s field trip. The children socially interact to build a play scenario. These interactions foster a supportive social environment essential for healthy social and emotional development.
Defining Guided Play: Balancing Freedom and Focus
So, what is guided play in more precise terms? While maintaining the fun, flexibility, and intrinsic motivation of free play, guided play incorporates specific learning goals through gentle adult scaffolding (Weisberg et al. 2016). It provides a context for exploration specifically designed to foster learning. Child agency, where the child directs the learning, and gentle adult guidance are the crucial ingredients. Research consistently highlights guided play as a successful teaching method across various subjects (Weisberg et al. 2016).
Guided play blends child-led exploration with gentle adult guidance to achieve specific learning objectives.
Guided Play and Language Development
Guided play provides an ideal setting for language learning. Studies show vocabulary instruction in guided play enhances word learning, especially for preschoolers from disadvantaged backgrounds (Toub et al. 2016; Han et al. 2010). One study compared guided play to teacher-directed learning in vocabulary acquisition (Toub et al. 2016). Children who learned words through guided play after shared book reading showed better retention than those who used picture card word-recall activities.
Enhancing Math and Spatial Skills through Guided Play
Guided play is also effective in developing spatial skills, which are important in themselves and are linked to later success in mathematics (Verdine et al., forthcoming). A study comparing guided play, free play, and direct instruction revealed that preschoolers learned more about geometry and shapes through guided play (Fisher et al. 2013). In the guided play scenario, adults followed the children’s lead and scaffolded the interaction.
Imagine Ms. Elena’s classroom with a center filled with different shaped tiles. As the children explore, she joins in when needed, asking questions and guiding them to discover the properties of the shapes.
Ms. Elena incorporates the definition of a square into the children’s play without taking over. This demonstrates how guided play allows teachers to use children’s joy and engagement to reinforce crucial skills.
Why Guided Play Works: Evidence from Brain Science
Guided play represents an enhanced discovery approach to learning, increasing children’s knowledge through opportunities for immediate and meaningful adult feedback (Alfieri et al. 2011). Guided play is an active, engaged, meaningful, and socially interactive learning context (Hirsh-Pasek et al. 2015).
Consider children playing with a shape sorter. The teacher can provide gentle guidance. By incorporating feedback and experimenting, children generate hypotheses and discover causal relationships, much like little scientists (Schulz & Bonawitz 2007; Gopnik 2012). This light scaffolding prevents frustration and allows for extended periods of playful experimentation.
Adult-scaffolded play experiences help children develop proactive control, neural mechanisms in the brain’s prefrontal cortex that use clues from the environment to anticipate what might happen next (Weisberg et al. 2014). This fosters a mise en place, a readiness to anticipate events and explore an activity, preparing children’s minds to embrace learning experiences (Weisberg et al. 2014). By preparing the play environment, teachers like Ms. Elena allow children to work towards learning goals in their own playful way.
In Ms. Elena’s classroom, a castle playset encourages children to organically use vocabulary related to knights and dragons. Ms. Elena can highlight words and help children make connections to them.
The Future of Guided Play
Play is essential and plays a significant role in human development. Research shows guided play supports young children’s development and primes neural mechanisms (Weisberg et al. 2014). It also helps children understand how the world works (Gopnik 2012). Further research into the biological foundations of play is vital, especially for interventions for vulnerable populations.
Play is a metaphor for active, engaged, meaningful, and socially interactive learning. It prepares children to be social, caring, thinking, and creative citizens (Golinkoff & Hirsh-Pasek 2016). Many researchers and teachers now agree that playful learning methods are the most positive means to aid young children’s development (Lillard et al. 2013, 28).
References
Alfieri, L., P.J. Brooks, N.J. Aldrich, & H.R. Tenenbaum. 2011. “Does Discovery-Based Instruction Enhance Learning?” Journal of Educational Psychology 103 (1): 1–18.
Burgdorf, J., J. Panksepp, & J.R. Moskal. 2011. “Frequency-Modulated 50 kHz Ultrasonic Vocalizations: A Tool for Uncovering the Molecular Substrates of Positive Affect.” Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews 35 (9): 1831–36.
Dore, R.A., E.D. Smith, & A.S. Lillard. 2015. “How Is Theory of Mind Useful? Perhaps to Enable Social Pretend Play.” Frontiers in Psychology 6. http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01559/full.
Fisher, K.R., K. Hirsh-Pasek, N. Newcombe, & R.M. Golinkoff. 2013. “Taking Shape: Supporting Preschoolers’ Acquisition of Geometric Knowledge Through Guided Play.” Child Development 84 (6): 1872–78.
Fisher, K.R., K. Hirsh-Pasek, R.M. Golinkoff, D.G. Singer, & L. Berk. 2010. “Playing Around in School: Implications for Learning and Educational Policy.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Development of Play, eds. P. Nathan & A. Pellegrini. New York: Oxford University Press.
Golinkoff, R.M., & K. Hirsh-Pasek. 2016. Becoming Brilliant: What Science Tells Us About Raising Successful Children. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Gopnik, A. 2012. “Scientific Thinking in Young Children: Theoretical Advances, Empirical Research, and Policy Implications.” Science 337 (6102): 1623–27.
Han, M., N. Moore, C. Vukelich, & M. Buell. 2010. “Does Play Make a Difference? How Play Intervention Affects the Vocabulary Learning of At-Risk Preschoolers.” American Journal of Play 3 (1): 82–105.
Hirsh-Pasek, K., J.M. Zosh, R.M. Golinkoff, J.H. Gray, M.B. Robb, & J. Kaufman. 2015. “Putting Education in ‘Educational’ Apps: Lessons From the Science of Learning.” Psychological Science in the Public Interest 16 (1): 3–34.
Lillard, A.S., M.D. Lerner, E.J. Hopkins, R.A. Dore, E.D. Smith, & C.M. Palmquist. 2013. “The Impact of Pretend Play on Children’s Development: A Review of the Evidence.” Psychological Bulletin 139 (1): 1–34.
Pellegrini, A.D. 2009. “Research and Policy on Children’s Play.” Child Development Perspectives 3 (2): 131–36.
Pellis, S.M., V.C. Pellis, & B.T. Himmler. 2014. “How Play Makes for a More Adaptable Brain: A Comparative and Neural Perspective.” American Journal of Play 7 (1): 73–98. http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1043959.pdf.
Schulz, L.E., & E.B. Bonawitz. 2007. “Serious Fun: Preschoolers Engage in More Exploratory Play When Evidence Is Confounded.” Developmental Psychology 43 (4): 1045–50.
Sutton-Smith, B. 2001. The Ambiguity of Play. Rev. ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Tominey, S.L., & M.M. McClelland. 2011. “Red Light, Purple Light: Findings From a Randomized Trial Using Circle Time Games to Improve Behavioral Self-Regulation in Preschool.” Early Education and Development 22 (3): 489–519.
Toub, T.S., B. Hassinger-Das, H. Ilgaz, D.S. Weisberg, K.T. Nesbitt, M.F. Collins, K. Hirsh-Pasek, R.M. Golinkoff, D.K. Dickinson, & A. Nicolopoulou. “The Language of Play: Developing Preschool Vocabulary Through Play Following Shared Book-Reading.” Manuscript submitted for publication, 2016.
Verdine, B.N., R.M. Golinkoff, K. Hirsh-Pasek, & N.S. Newcombe. Forthcoming. “Spatial Thinking: Fundamental to School Readiness.” Society for Research in Child Development Monograph series.
Weisberg, D.S., J.M. Zosh, K. Hirsh-Pasek, & R.M. Golinkoff. 2013. “Talking It Up: Play, Language Development, and the Role of Adult Support.” American Journal of Play 6 (1): 39–54.
Weisberg, D.S., K. Hirsh-Pasek, R.M. Golinkoff, A.K. Kittredge, & D. Klahr. 2016. “Guided Play: Principles and Practices.” Current Directions in Psychological Science 25 (3): 177–82.
Weisberg, D.S., K. Hirsh-Pasek, R.M. Golinkoff, & B.D. McCandliss. 2014. “Mise En Place: Setting the Stage for Thought and Action.” Trends in Cognitive Sciences 18 (6): 276–78.
