Play As a Learning Opportunity Essay

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document

Total Length: 589 words ( 2 double-spaced pages)

Total Sources: 1

Page 1 of 2

Role of Play In Learning Experiences for Young Children

Although many educators believe the play is a frivolous activity that young people should engage in only after they have completed more serious pursuits, empirical observations of children at play confirm that these experiences can also provide valuable learning opportunities. Despite a universally accepted definition for play, some of its defining characteristics include the following:

Play is active: This means that watching television or other sedentary, non-participatory activities are not regarded as play, but using a video game platform such as a Wii to play virtual golf or tennis on a television can be regarded as play.

The activity is voluntary: Children choose to participative in the activity voluntarily rather than being compelled by their peers or adult authority figures. This means that being forced to participate in an obligatory soccer game at school may not represent play to many children, while a "pick-up game" of baseball in a vacant lot comprised of willing and enthusiastic players can most certainly be considered as play.

The activity produces pleasure: Just as play is difficult to precisely define, so too is pleasure but this defining characteristic of play means that young people enjoy the activity for its own sake, even if it is as simple as bouncing a ball or as complicated as building a Lego-brick metropolis complete with avenues and landscaping.

Stuck Writing Your "Play As a Learning Opportunity" Essay?

View All Our Example Play As a Learning Opportunity Essay

Have A Custom Example Essay Written



Reality is suspended to some extent: Although this defining characteristic also exists along an individualized continuum, children at play suspend reality to some extent during the duration of their activities, thereby lending them a "playful mindset" that allows them to be submariners, astronauts or race car drivers just by sitting in a cardboard box. While children obviously intuitively understand that the cardboard box is not really a nuclear-powered submarine, space ship or Formula race car, they also know that they are having fun pretending they are in a non-threatening way (at least to themselves instead of space aliens), making this an especially salient element of play.

Other researchers have also weighed in on what types of activities constitute authentic play, with another useful defining characteristic being the lack of a need for a purposeful or meaningful outcome from the activity, with the activity itself representing the important outcome for the child. For instance, young children making mud pies do not expect to be able to open a real bakery with their products nor do they expect them to outlast the next rainstorm. They do however expect to have fun pretending these and countless other things while they are playing in the mud, so this characteristic should be included in the definition….....

Show More ⇣

     Open the full completed essay and source list


OR

     Order a one-of-a-kind custom essay on this topic


sample essay writing service

Cite This Resource:

Latest APA Format (6th edition)

Copy Reference
"Play As A Learning Opportunity" (2015, November 03) Retrieved June 4, 2026, from
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/play-learning-opportunity-2157185

Latest MLA Format (8th edition)

Copy Reference
"Play As A Learning Opportunity" 03 November 2015. Web.4 June. 2026. <
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/play-learning-opportunity-2157185>

Latest Chicago Format (16th edition)

Copy Reference
"Play As A Learning Opportunity", 03 November 2015, Accessed.4 June. 2026,
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/play-learning-opportunity-2157185
   

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document
order custom essay example