"Research Findings:" Promoting children's science knowledge by adequate measures such as guided or free play is a cardinal goal of preschool. However, there is considerable variability in preschool teachers' instructional quality in block play, which might be associated with children's domain-specific science skills but also their…

This article describes a project-based social studies activity that gave young children the autonomy to photograph what they wanted within the classroom environment while interacting with peers. Social studies learning in the early years has great potential to offer active, playful, and meaningful experiences for children and can prepare young…

This paper contributes to the expanding body of research on Playful Learning (PL) within Higher Education (HE), offering an in-depth examination of narratives concerning student participation and engagement in PL emerging as educators reflect on their experiences with PL in Danish teacher education and social education. In attempt to nuance and…

This study aimed at understanding and investigating the lived experiences of early childhood teachers' observation practices as a professional tool. Interpretative phenomenological approach was utilized to investigate participants' experiences deeply from their lived experiences. The current study's participants consisted of five early childhood…

Play, and especially free play, offers a unique opportunity for children to act with agency. Yet the regulated and routinized structure of early childhood education and care settings, impedes children's agentic action which is limited by adult-imposed rules. The present cross-cultural study aims to explore the extent to which Early Childhood…

This article is based on qualitative and quantitative data collected from teachers and pupils in Danish schools in June 2020, as schools reopened following closures in the spring due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It investigates the transformations in school life that took place in this period in response to strict official guidelines to prevent the…

During the past decade, the field of family language policy has broadened its scope and turned its attention to diverse family configurations in versatile sociolinguistic contexts. The current study contributes to this endeavor by focusing on two single-parent families who live in Finland and who strive to support Russian as a family language.…

Playing is crucial for children's growth and learning, and it is essential to understand and improve the role of educators in facilitating learning through play. This study aimed to investigate the beliefs of early childhood educators in Colombia's aeioTU program about play, which is based on the Reggio Emilia philosophy and focuses on art,…

The present study aimed to train Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs) in a parenting program called Learning through Play (LTP) to improve their Knowledge, Attitude, and Practices regarding child development after completion of training, for them to be better able to support parents during their routine practice. Quasi experimental design was used.…

The authors discuss the relationship of death and play as illuminated by computer games. Although these games, they argue, do illustrate the value of being--and staying--alive, they are not so much about life per se as they are about providing gamers with a playground at the edge of mortality. Using a range of visual, auditory, and rule-based…

This article highlights the potential of experimental and avant-garde cinema in film educational contexts. In the first part, Stefanie Schlüter evaluates her practical experience in working with 10- to 11-year-old schoolchildren. Based on reflections by Peter Kubelka, Stan Brakhage and others, she emphasizes the act of engaging with film material…

Unstructured activity periods are central components of early childhood education programs. Deficits in social communication and social interaction presented by children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) become apparent in these settings during unstructured activities, such as outdoor recess. Thirty-two preschool-age children with and without…

Autonomy -- acting volitionally with a sense of choice -- is a crucial right for children. Given parents' pivotal position in their child's autonomy development, we examined how parental autonomy support and children's need for autonomy were negotiated and manifested in the context of children's independent mobility -- children's ability to play,…

The ability of parents to read children's cues and respond sensitively underpins the effectiveness of early interventions. Allied health practitioners, however, typically spend little time focussing on parent-child interactions in early childhood intervention. A 1-day training event: 'PlayConnections' was developed to support practitioners to…

This study explored the beliefs of early childhood educators about a child's current behavior and potential adult adjustment based on a description of the child's gender and play interests. There were 451 early childhood educators from a US sample who, after reading a brief vignette describing a child's play and behavior, responded to questions…