Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Dr Christine Stephen

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning play has the greatest value for the young child when it is really free and his own.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning [I] love my classroom because it has a lovely house and I really like making models, stuff for Mum and Dad.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning They should try to find out what the children like and try to form a lesson around that... If you get to be part of what you are learning you will understand more

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Children learn by their fingers...without their actual sensory experience of things, what other people tell them means hardly anything at all... Even some professional educators do not yet recognise how easy it is to mistake words for knowledge, and how much more vivid and usable is the understanding which children get from immediate experience of doing things, and finding out for themselves, than from being told about them.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Joe said that he had gone off design and technology since they started to make things you would not want - like a box that is too small to hold anything.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Our descriptions and explanations are useful... to supplement [childrens] own experience but they are useless as a substitute for it. We may like explaining, but it is not the most useful thing for our children.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning How do you learn to add up? –You need to get some cubes and when you are doing your number work you see what it adds up to.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Active learning... engages and challenges childrens thinking using real- life and imaginary situations.

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning

Tracking Childrens Progress

Play, work, learning [The boy] writing is learning because he is thinking in his head. Playing is not learning – we know how to play already. [At the computer] they are not learning, just playing games [On no desk day] today feels like playing! [The children are learning] because they are all facing the front and looking at the teacher You sit nicely on the carpet so that you can get a turn on the smartboard. The smartboard is activity and work.

Play, work, playfulness Play Work Playfulness an approach to education and learning, rather than a prescription for some tangible, and primarily cognitive, outcome. (Rogers & Evans, 2008)

Play and Pedagogy Educational settings constrain play, children and practitioners –playing properly –containing play –play as reward –directed play –outcomes from play

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning No good research evidence about the benefits of play Play engages, motivates, is fun, does not need a product Contrasting discourses about play –Play with purpose and cognitive challenge –intense interest in the world about them, powers of concentration on what ever occupies their attention

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Problematising Active Learning Defining active – what activities are active? Is listening to/watching another active learning? Does action support learning or give opportunities to practise skills? Learning about or learning how to? Power, choice, autonomy, responsibility, teacher as authority or facilitator Does active learning foster engagement or a positive disposition? Active learning – a developing pedagogy, evolving activity bank, classroom management technique? How does active learning relate to learning theories?

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Problem solving Finding out Counting, classifying, matching Communicating Experimenting

Playing, Doing, Thinking, Learning Piaget –changing mental structures Vygotsky –acquiring tools of society Rogoff –changing participation in the community The majority of educational theories relating to learning...are grounded in the belief that humans learn best when they are engaged and actively constructing meaning. (Yelland et al, 2008)

Conditions for learning – playing, doing, thinking Learning environments that are affording, inviting or potentiating provide the conditions for robust learning. (Carr & Claxton, 2004) –Inviting: play, action, authenticity, meaningful, satisfaction –Potentiating: open, experimental, collaborative, acquiring tools and skills –Affording: scaffolding, leading, suggesting,

Mediating Learning Learning is mediated through playing, doing, thinking Actions, objects, peers and adults mediate learning Actions – internal and external, physical, cognitive, communicative, social and emotional Objects/Resources – support &hinder, shape & scaffold Practitioners – critical mediating role of interactions, distal and proximal guided interaction, bridging meaning and mutual structuring of opportunities