The Importance Of Play Essay

Today I am going to talk about the importance of play as a vehicle for young children’s learning and development in the early years of primary school.
Here I am going to talk about what is play and why it is important for young children. According to Burdette & Whitaker (2005), play is an activity in which children engage to amuse, occupy themselves and optimize their brain development. Play is essential for children’s development because it contributes to the cognitive, physical, social and emotional wellbeing. During play, children work in groups, share with each other, negotiate and resolve their conflicts. There are different types of play. In pretend play, a child often pretends to be a mother when playing in kitchen corner and a builder when building blocks in construction corner. In creative play, children enjoy being creative by painting, dancing, playing with recycled objects and working with

It creates a zone of proximal development in the child (Berk, 1999, p. 227). According to Vygotsky, conflict and problem solving are essential features of child development (Van Hoorn et al., 2007, p. 36). In zone of proximal development, children perform beyond their usual level of functioning when engaged in cognitive and social collaborations. Vygotsky believed that play was essential to development and it is a major source of it. There is a clear link between play and children’s learning and development. Vygotsky (1978) described the levels of learning at social level (interpersonal) and individual level (intrapersonal). He clarified that children develop the understanding of rules. In dramatic play, rules are implicit, forms the foundation of games and rules become more explicit. For example, fireman wears safety hat all the times. Children learn rules about social behaviour from their experiences in family and cultural backgrounds. Before play, they develop the capacity to negotiate the