In the context of encouraging the use of natural outdoor settings for educational experiences with young children, survey research using photographs of outdoor settings was conducted to explore in-service early childhood educators' preferences and perceptions regarding outdoor settings and the educational opportunities and resource needs they…

This article provides an overview of the Education Meets Play study that will investigate early childhood educators' use of play-based learning, now mandatory under the "National Quality Standard". By building on what can be gleaned about educators' approaches to play-based learning prior to the implementation of the "Early Years…

This article reports on a small-scale investigation of how teachers organise goal-oriented learning in Swedish preschools. The revised Swedish curriculum (National Agency for Education 2011) highlights the need for children to develop their mathematics skills through activities that integrate play and learning. This study investigates how…

Play is generally identified as a basic tool for effective learning and development in children. This study explores the ways in which amorphous or unstructured play contributes to children's overall development at the pre-primary level, helping to develop cognitive, social, and motor skills. The findings indicate that through unstructured play,…

Research Findings: This research examines preschoolers' use of mental state terms in naturally occurring peer conflicts in the classroom to determine how children use mental state terms for organizing their social interactions. Analyses focus on the types, frequencies, and social interactive functions of mental state terms. Utterances (N = 166)…

Play is a primary context for fostering young children's positive peer interactions. Through play, children develop the social, emotional, cognitive and language skills that contribute to the ability to establish effective relationships with peers. The Penn Interactive Peer Play Scale (PIPPS) was first developed by Fantuzzo to assess the quality…

We explored the use of the learning study (LS) model in developing Swedish pre-school science learning. This was done by analysing a 3-cycle LS project implemented to help a group of pre-school teachers (n?=?5) understand their science educational practice, by collaboratively and systematically challenging it. Data consisted of video recordings of…

This paper provides a brief description of the Greek-Cypriot early childhood education system and focuses on the current education reform. We focus on one of the main changes of the reform, a new status for play within the daily educational programme. The goal of this paper is two-fold; first to portray play in the former and current proposed…

Innovative teaching and learning is increasingly becoming part of medical education. We report the evaluation of a medical microbiology board game, Med Micro Fun With Facts (MMFWF), based on Trivial Pursuit™ principles. The game was developed to stimulate medical students' interest in microbiology and expose students to the subject content of an…

The extensive empirical research inspired by Piaget and Vygotsky's theories of make-believe play has been criticised for restricting data to Western, urban, middle-class children. We seek to redress this bias by researching the traditional black South African Pedi children's game Masekitlana. Our data relies on embodied memories enacted by Mapelo…

Research on mathematics found in 'everyday' interactions (e.g., Walkerdine, 1988) often relies on analysis of parent-child talk during studies of social interactions and/or literacy events more generally. In contrast, from the outset of the current study, parents were aware that mathematics was the focus of study and that each of them would…

Intervention studies evaluating pivotal response treatment (PRT) were systematically identified and analyzed. Forty-three studies were summarized in terms of: (a) participant characteristics, (b) dependent variables, (c) intervention procedures, (d) intervention outcomes, and (e) certainty of evidence. The majority of the reviewed studies (56.4 %)…

In our rapidly changing contemporary society, it has become apparent that children spend significantly less time playing outdoors than their parents did. Therefore, considerable attention must be paid by professionals to engage this challenge, especially within early educational contexts. The goal of this study was to first explore the continual…

Early peer relationships and interactions influence social acceptance and a child's ability to form social relationships later in life (Ladd 2005). Although it has been reported that some children with profound hearing loss who have experienced the oral approach since diagnosis display language skills similar to children with typical hearing…

This research attempted to describe the play policies in preschool institutions in Ankara, Turkey. The aim of this study is to determine the approaches of the preschools to the children's play. "Play Policy Questionnaire" administered to all directors and teachers of 20 public preschools and 20 private preschools. Play policy of each…