Classroom role-playing limited
Young children are missing out on imaginative games in school because of the demands of the curriculum, a study suggests. Playing pirates, princesses or mums and dads can be very good for a child’s development, says Dr Sue Rogers of the University of Plymouth.
But she found the set-up and demands of the classroom mean opportunities for such role-play are limited.
The government insists young children in school are learning through play.
Dr Rogers studied 144 four and five year olds in three areas of south-west England in a year-long study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council.
She watched children in reception classes doing role-play games and canvassed them on what they liked to do. Dr Rogers found that the classes were not always designed to meet their needs.
“‘Children of this age learn to make friends as well as to use their imagination through role play,” she said. “We know that they are capable of sustained and complex imaginative play and that capturing and engaging their interest is essential. Unfortunately, pressures on time and space, as well as the need to teach literacy, means that playing at shops, pirates and hospitals is difficult to fit into the timetable.”
She said children were often frustrated to be called away from a game with their friends to do more structured school lessons. Boys might find their games are seen as too boisterous for the classroom setting.
The children’s games tended to follow gender patterns, she said, with girls often opting for a nurturing-based game such as mum and baby, while boys were more interested in being action heroes, despite teachers’ efforts to ‘de-gender’ role play.
Her report says role play is valued highly by both children and adults and that it can make “a significant contribution” to learning and development.
“However, the intervention of certain pedagogical factors often prevents children from realising its potential.”
It suggests there is a need for more outdoor play spaces so that children could have more choice over materials, locations and playmates.
This could encourage girls to take a more active role in building activities and allow boys’ play to develop without disrupting people around them.
A spokesman for the Department for Education said: “It’s completely wrong to suggest that children are missing out due to the national curriculum. On the contrary, the foundation stage for three to five year olds is all about learning through play with enjoyment and challenge - enabling children to develop the key skills needed for all future learning.”
Margaret Morrissey, from the National Confederation of Parent Teacher Associations, said many parents were concerned about a lack of play in school.
“We would like to see less emphasis on keeping small children focused on classroom working,” she said.
“We know as parents that young children learn at their best when they are learning through play. We are putting too much emphasis as a nation on formal learning for very small children.”
Link to article (and video clip)
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Well ’spokesperson for the Dept. Ed’, I beg to differ…
I really could rant on about this as I think that many ‘learning through play’ activities are also really formal learning prettied up a bit so that teachers can tick boxes that will make policy makers happy (and I could rant on a bit about what I think is over-prescription for teachers too, quite frankly IMO I don’t necessarily see their jobs getting any less bogged down in paperwork - big ((((hugs)))) to any frustrated teachers too.)
Of course for anyone who agrees, there is always an alternative………. children don’t have to go to school! Keep them at home for a while and then re-assess, not sending them in the first place doesn’t mean you can never send them in the future and with a 9 year old due to return to school - his choice and no, I’m not 100% about it but at the same time I don’t want to forcibly home-educate because that would go even more against the grain for me - I’m sure academically he’ll do just fine. I know of parents who have delayed school entry to 7 years and their children have had few problems having started school at a later age - so it can be done!
Still, R. is happily chugging away at home and will continue to do so and I have a little Nin and bump who at this point will never go to school and I’m already looking at all the possibly alternatives within home-education.
Suffice to say - let them play, in your heart you know it makes sense!
and a 
She asked questions as if R. wasn’t sitting next to me and at one point told me that: “Children cannot be taught at home.” When I pointed out that R. had been taught at home for a good few years now, she said, “So the LEA has arranged a tutor.”
(Slings'n'things)
