Play and playfulness have been central to progressive pedagogies since the birth of the kindergarten. Yet their position in many contemporary education discourses is often ambivalent and at times fragile. In the Global North, many critics warn of a 'play crisis' and 'play deficit'. This essay attempts to trace a cultural and intellectual history…

This article reflects on observations as a dance pedagogue, adapting Gilbert's BrainDance to a range of learning and teaching opportunities in intergenerational classroom contexts. Initially applied in an early childhood education context, BrainDance provided a point of departure into conversations and observations with teachers on how the…

Research abounds regarding the need for young children's access to authentic play experiences. Yet, while play is considered the main method of learning for young children, mainstream curricula often omit this mode and further perpetuate the artificial divide of play or learning. Guided play is a pedagogical approach in which teachers integrate a…

Play Africa, with over 40 innovative exhibits and/or programs since inception, was created as a means to address the inequalities and lack of high-quality experiences that affect the early development of children from birth to age 10 in South Africa. The results from the 2021 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) paint a dire…

STEM learning in not merely a matter of training children for current jobs--the job market is likely to change radically before a current kindergartner graduates from college, as artificial intelligence, robotics, and other technologies evolve and new technologies emerge. STEM education is an integrated, cross-disciplinary approach to teaching…

Engagement in play is vital for children to learn 21st-century skills, especially problem-solving, critical thinking, creativity, focused attention, and collaboration (Hillman et al., 2014; Singer, 2015; Yogman et al., 2018). These require developing executive functioning skills crucial for school readiness and success. Play fosters brain…

During a five-week research study, a kindergarten class of 14 five- and six-year-old children learned to sing and play soprano ukuleles. The study had a dual purpose: to teach the children foundational music skills, and to teach them to read lyrics at the emergent reader level. Csikszentmihalyi (2009) cites one of the pitfalls of traditional music…

Traditional games are commonly understood for their long establishment, passed down over generations and characterised by the simplicity of their materials. The aim of this article is to explore traditional games where materials are at the centre, focusing on games with stones. Through a new-materialist perspective, using Barad's concept of…

When given the opportunity to play with mathematical materials and ideas, children demonstrate their mathematical understanding in innovative ways. The open-ended nature of the "Pattern Blocks" activity provides agency for children to decide how to approach the tasks, ways to differentiate beyond more common pattern-block puzzle choices,…

Integral to the global nature play movement, nature play programs have flourished over the last decade, both in Australia and internationally. Internationally, there are two prominent schools of thought in this movement, Danish Nature Kindergartens, and British Forest Schools. The underpinning philosophy of Danish Nature Kindergarten programs has…

Around the world, on every continent, and in every country, children play. Though culturally contextualized, play is a global common childhood experience. There are cultural variations in children's play activities, and though play looks and sounds different across the world, there are also commonalities. Though scholars find it difficult to…

This article will provide a guide for physical educators to implementing play-based learning within their curriculum, including how play-based learning can be implemented, how to create a conducive environment that allows for play-based learning, and examples of activities that involve play-based learning.

As part of a longitudinal study focused on mathematical play, we (Melissa, Amy, and Anita) are often faced with questions about what counts as play and what mathematics (and other learning) we see in play, and whose play is most likely to be seen or dismissed. Rather than discuss our findings from classroom videos of kindergarten children engaged…

This article feeds on new materialisms, especially the work of Barad, while re-turning and exploring child/LEGO/pedagogue/(re)searcher intra-actions in kindergarten and drawing attention to both human and non-human organisms as agentic forces that produce diffractions, affects and effects when they clash. The article places a special focus on one…

Dialogic educators have designed strategies to facilitate dialogic teaching, such as establishing ground rules, employing talk moves, and structuring discussions. Though productive, such strategies rarely open dialogic space, in which shared meaning is created through an interaction that blurs the boundaries between participating voices. Dialogic…