Mothers' perspectives on learning through play in the home

Research in the field of early childhood education and care (ECEC) indicates that if educators can align their perspectives and practices with families' perspectives, children's educational outcomes will improve. Yet the literature reveals educators focus on children's independent learning of various developmental domains, while mothers increasingly focus on adult-guided learning of curricula in preparation for school. To illuminate potential ways for educators to align these divergent perspectives, this paper reports on a qualitative case study of eight mothers' perspectives on their children's learning through play in the home. It revealed emphases on children's independent learning of family practices through play, contrasting starkly with previous accounts of mothers being focused on adults guiding play to cognitive learning (e.g. literacy, numeracy). Thus another perspective divergence emerged: between mothers' perspectives in the home and ECEC settings. However, the similarity between educators' perspectives to those of mothers suggests ways forward.9 page(s

The aim of the game: Insider stakeholders' perspectives on learning through play

Most contemporary early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings in Western-heritage contexts are play-based. Play has become a central component of ECEC provision through the writings of Romantic philosophers of the 17th century and the spread of the child-centred approach in the latter half of the 20th century. Such an approach places what the child is interested in – notably represented by her/his play – in the centre of ECEC. What interests the child has been seen to represent what s/he is currently learning. Any interference with this from the adult has been seen to inhibit learning. The educator’s role in this approach has been primarily as a facilitator, providing resources for rich and diverse play opportunities that the child chose at her/his will to learn from autonomously. In recent curricular reforms across the globe, however, the educator is becoming repositioned. It is no longer sufficient that s/he facilitates learning through play only; s/he must engage with and extend play towards the learning of curriculum outcomes. In Australia, such reforms have taken the form of the National Quality Framework, which now stipulates that educators must “provide a balance between child led, child initiated and educator supported learning” rather than just child-initiated play (DEEWR, 2009, p. 15). Research suggests educators struggle to find this balance. Further, the NQF assesses ECEC centres on whether they “respond to children's ideas and play and use intentional teaching to scaffold and extend each child's learning” (ACECQA, 2012, para. 10). This active, “intentional” role appears to be at odds with educators’ traditional, facilitative approaches, influencing how learning through play is implemented. This thesis focused on this implementation by investigating the perspectives of those that enact learning through play – educators, family members, and children. Using a case study methodology, it conducted video-stimulated recall dialogues with 46 “insider” stakeholders in an ECEC centre in inner-Melbourne, Australia. Perspectives were expressed in relation to videos recorded of young children’s 4 play in the home and the ECEC centre. Using a sociocultural theorisation of perspectives, findings were analysed in relation to the institutional practices and values that were expressed in the perspectives of children, mothers and educators

The five debates : simplifying the contemporary play literature

This article reviews the literature on the play-based curriculum, which is characterised by tension and debate. It aims to present the literature in a simplified and accessible way, suggesting it can be helpful to see it as falling into five debates over: (1) how much children learn through play; (2) how play might allow power differences; (3) how the preoccupation with play may be just a Western one; (4) how play advocacy assumes all children are the same; and (5) if the stakeholders traditionally most vocal in early childhood education policy are the most appropriate decision makers. Understanding the literature may allow teachers to view play in more useful ways - and to recognise that their experiences may make a valuable contribution to the debate.7 page(s

State of play : five debates which characterise play literature

It has been argued that the contemporary literature associated with the role of play in early childhood educational (ECE) curricula is characterised by competition‖ and collision‖ (Ailwood, 2003, p. 288; Wood, 2007, p. 309). These concepts of competition and collision reference the increased debate in the ECE field about how play is used in the curriculum and to what end. Whilst progressive discourses have advocated the value and indispensability of play as a central feature of ECE curricula, essentialist and reconceptualist arguments have questioned the grounds on which it has been advocated. A significant portion of the reconceptualist and critical literature repositions hitherto assumed facts‖ about play into a space where they may be re-evaluated. The resultant landscape is one characterised by these spaces. This literature review proposes a framework for conceptualising the contemporary landscape of the play literature in terms of five crucial debates. These include debates over (1) the educative value of play time; (2) play as a site for power differentials (both student-student and teacher-student); (3) the ethnocentricity of pro-play rhetoric; (4) the universalist treatment of individuals through play advocacy; and, (5) the privileging of expert‖ stakeholder perspectives in play research. Conceptualising contemporary play literature within these five debates may be a useful framework for examining how play is understood and used in early childhood curricular discussion.19 page(s

‘I already know what I learned’ : young children's perspectives on learning through play

Around the world, if and how young children learn through their play in early childhood education and care contexts has been the subject of much debate. Yet rarely has the debate heard from the young children themselves, often due to the pervasive belief that they do not understand learning. To redress this, a qualitative case study was conducted on 28 two–five-year-olds’ perspectives about what they believed they were learning through play. Some 772 comments on learning in 683 episodes of play were analysed using cultural–historical theory, revealing how children as young as two are authorities on their own learning. Findings challenge popular ways of understanding young children's thinking and provide educators with concrete means to understand children's perspectives, learning and how educators can more effectively guide play towards learning outcomes, as expected in contemporary curriculum frameworks across the globe.12 page(s

Following in our footsteps: how adult demonstrations of literacy and numeracy can influence children’s spontaneous play and improve learning outcomes

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Formal literacy practices through play: exposure to adult literacy practices increases child-led learning and interest

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The camera is not a methodology: towards a framework for understanding young children's use of video cameras

Participatory research methods argue that young children should be enabled to contribute their perspectives on research seeking to understand their worldviews. Visual research methods, including the use of still and video cameras with young children have been viewed as particularly suited to this aim because cameras have been considered easy and fun to use for young children. However, how children learn to use cameras introduced into early childhood classrooms for research purposes is not well understood. In terms of visual research methodologies, this is a problem because participant use of cameras is associated with understanding the nature of visual data generated during the recording process itself. In this paper, we consider observational data of young children playing with video cameras introduced into their classrooms for research purposes. Drawing on the concepts of culturally mediated tool use and epistemic and ludic play, we theorise these observations to generate a new framework for understanding how children learn to use cameras through play-based activity. This framework suggests that research with children using still or video cameras may need to accommodate this learning within research designs and procedures in order to take full advantage of this medium. Pedagogical implications for using the framework to support young children's technological play are also considered

The camera is not a methodology : Towards a framework for understanding young children's use of video cameras

Participatory research methods argue that young children should be enabled to contribute their perspectives on research seeking to understand their worldviews. Visual research methods, including the use of still and video cameras with young children have been viewed as particularly suited to this aim because cameras have been considered easy and fun to use for young children. However, how children learn to use cameras introduced into early childhood classrooms for research purposes is not well understood. In terms of visual research methodologies, this is a problem because participant use of cameras is associated with understanding the nature of visual data generated during the recording process itself. In this paper, we consider observational data of young children playing with video cameras introduced into their classrooms for research purposes. Drawing on the concepts of culturally mediated tool use and epistemic and ludic play, we theorise these observations to generate a new framework for understanding how children learn to use cameras through play-based activity. This framework suggests that research with children using still or video cameras may need to accommodate this learning within research designs and procedures in order to take full advantage of this medium. Pedagogical implications for using the framework to support young children's technological play are also considered.16 page(s