Child-centered play therapy (CCPT) is an empirically endorsed approach for children facing specific clinical concerns and life circumstances alike. The majority of research to date has accrued data about clients from secondary sources, such as adult report and observation. The purpose of this study was to explore children's perceptions of…

This article considers ways in which toys have featured in children's play throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Whilst often dismissed as trivial novelties, toys can be seen as a significant aspect of material culture, both reflecting and constructing ideas of childhood. A multimodal social semiotic perspective is used to examine a selection of toys…

In recent years, Conversational Analysis (CA) has seen an increasing interest in longitudinal studies (Deppermann & Pekarek Doehler, 2021). The recurrent experience of interactional practices leads interactants to develop routines that may sediment into entrenched patterns over time (Dreyer, 2022). Longitudinal CA thus aims to track the…

The purpose of this study was to examine the involvement of early childhood pre-service students (PSSs) in children's constructive play and highlight how this involvement supported children's play skills towards advanced play behaviours as seen by previous literature. Drawing from the conceptual framework of the Zone of Proximal Development, as…

This manuscript, as a conceptual article and communication piece, offers insights into the pedagogy of play as a philosophy of education and a wide-ranging set of methods and techniques. It intends to encourage readers to invest (further) in playful learning in language learning. To this aim, playful learning is first problematized within language…

In this artistic essay using (re)photography, we analyse two interactions in a Washington DC, classroom that features a play-based approach to child development. The pioneers of early childhood education helped frame play as a method of learning. However, the racial memory of a place continuously disturbs this pioneering conceptualisation of the…

This study investigated the impact of a 'Jewellery Club' on girls with social, communication and interaction difficulties. The project focussed on three girls aged seven who participated in an intervention using similar principles to the 'Lego Therapy' intervention. An action research approach was followed, where two phases of the intervention…

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 explores the usefulness of detective role-play as a research method to facilitate young children's critical thinking. The study examines four specifically designed detective play experiences, adopting an ethical rights-based approach to research with children. This qualitative multiple-case study is grounded in play-based pedagogy…

According to Vygotsky's cultural-historical activity theory, pretend play can be an important context for the development of children's social competence. The aim of this meta-analysis was to synthesize the current evidence about the relation between pretend play and social competence in early childhood (age 3-8 years). A systematic literature…

This paper diffracts Deleuze and quantum physics through Winnicott's work to argue for an enrichment to playing. The roots of the play-cognitive hierarchy in Freudian psychoanalysis makes visible that progression and the stages that a child must pass en route to rationality continue to feed educational assumptions that a child must leave playing…

Imagination and play are often relegated to specific times of the school day (e.g., recess) or pushed entirely into after school hours (e.g., extracurriculars), carefully separated from subject area instruction. How often has it been said that "playtime is over "or that "it's time to buckle down and get serious" when it comes…

The article analyzes the aesthetic dimension of play installations designed by university students of Early Childhood and Social Education in a Spanish interuniversity project. These installations respond to the complexity of children's spontaneous play by highlighting its pedagogical value and the importance of the aesthetic dimension. The…

The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly impacted families worldwide. The long-term impacts of the pandemic's disruptions on childhood and child development may not be known for many years. Early educators can respond to challenges stemming from the disruption in the consistency of schooling and beneficial programming for early learners by generating…

This study explored preschool teachers' beliefs about the benefits of young children's outdoor play and play in naturalized play environments. Three face-to-face in-depth, semi-structured individual interviews were administered. For data analysis, Charmaz's (2006) constructivist grounded theory was employed using two steps of coding, initial and…