This research aims to examine the predictive effect of gender, culture, and shyness on reticence and solitary play behaviour. Fifty children at two U.S. nursery schools and 55 children at a Turkish nursery school were included in the study, with a total of 105 children aged 36-72 months (61 boys, 44 girls). Parent questionnaires were used to…

In recent years, a programme for young children called Drag Queen Story Hour (DQSH) has risen to simultaneous popularity and controversy. This article, written collaboratively by an education scholar and a drag queen involved in organizing DQSH, contextualizes the programme within the landscape of gender in education as well as within the world of…

We present research that explored digital coding in an Australian early years learning centre and how it impacted on a focus group of 3 and 4-year-old children's creativity. The questions that guided the design experimental method were: (1) how do young children develop and demonstrate creativity when learning through play with digital coding…

By bringing everyday phenomena into the classroom, teachers can more readily engage students in authentic scientific inquiry. When working with young children, the best phenomena are those that students can directly experience and investigate. Meaningful phenomena can be identified by watching children at play, listening to the conversations they…

Children are born to play and are born as intuitive scientists and use numeracy and literacy in their play. Playing is an essential apprenticeship for developing scientific (STEM) literacy. Observing children spontaneously playing reveals that they are experiencing STEM in action. They are observing phenomena, asking questions, solving problems,…

Objective: The purpose of this study was to gain more knowledge about the phenomenon of the inner child in relation to health and well-being as reflected in play experienced by schoolchildren. Design/method: Participants were 20 schoolchildren recruited from a primary school in a medium-size city in central Sweden. The children who agreed to…

Infant-directed speech (IDS) is a specific register that adults use to address infants, and it is characterised by prosodic exaggeration and lexical and syntactic simplification. Several authors have underlined that this simplified speech becomes more complex according to the infant's age. However, there is a lack of studies on lexical and…

It is proposed that young children may develop a felt sense of God through an attachment to nature that parallels their attachment to significant people in their lives. Children learn through their senses and young children experience a sense of awe and wonder when immersed in nature. Research supports the argument that children who are exposed to…

There is a persistent suggestion that the lack of men who choose to work with young children (0-5 years) is detrimental to children's learning and development. This study analysed whether practitioners believed that men who work with young children adopt specific approaches within a play pedagogy. Practitioner beliefs about how their gender…

The French utopian socialist Charles Fourier is a key figure in Walter Benjamin's "Arcades Project". For Benjamin, one of the most significant aspects of Fourier's utopian vision was its conceptualisation of work as a form of play. According to Fourier it would be possible to build a world around people's inherent desires. In such a…

The author argues that children's books are not, as commonly held, either didactic or entertaining and that successful juvenile literature teaches what Lewis Carroll, who wrote "Alice in Wonderland," termed "mental recreation." Pendlebury contends that learning and play, far from being opposites, can closely resemble one…

In this case study I explored the dilemmas of three early childhood care and education (ECCE) teachers in a poor community in the Cape Flats of Cape Town, South Africa during COVID-19, and how they used these dilemmas to transform their teaching. Purposive sampling was used to select the participants and data was collected through a…

The quality of early childhood programs plays a crucial role in improving outcomes for children. Play-based practices are considered a vital component in early childhood development as they offer opportunities for children to learn and grow. Despite this, the field is still trying to understand the role of teachers in facilitating play and their…

Myanmar is dealing with a protracted learning crisis in areas of the country where the COVID-19 pandemic was compounded by a coup in February 2021, which extended school closings. Save the Children created the Catch-up Clubs (CuCs), an intervention that supports children's remedial learning and addresses barriers to their successful return to…

"Many kindergarteners struggle to master the foundational behaviors that enable them to successfully engage in classroom learning" (Cameron, et al., 2012, p 1229). As a school-based occupational therapist, there has been a noticeable rise in concerns from kindergarten teachers regarding the fine motor, visual motor, self-help, and…