Research suggests that when we treat our non-obligatory activities playfully, we are more likely to engage with them and derive meaningfulness from them. Play is of interest to the field of music education on at least two counts: the perceived relationship between play and music, and the perceived educational aspects of play related to human…

The author discusses the process of play in terms of six elements in the play cycle first introduced by Sturrock and Else in 1998 and revised by King and Newstead in 2020--precue, play cue, play return, play frame, flow, and annihilation--and their relation to Winnicott's concepts of "potential space" or the "third area," which…

The ideal period for implementing environmental education or education for sustainability is during the early childhood years. The educational context of playgroups can be a platform for both children and their parents to learn together and together engage in early childhood education for sustainability (ECEfS), however there is a paucity of…

Following the increasing impacts on the value of Western play-based pedagogy, early childhood (EC) teachers in China face developmental challenges related to understanding and implementing play-based mathematical education. The purpose of this paper is to explore Chinese EC teachers' perspectives on play-based mathematics teaching. In this…

The development of social and emotional learning in children can directly impact overall learning, emotional skills, and socialization of young children (The Urban Child Institute, 2024). Equal emphasis on social and emotional learning should mirror the importance and impact of academic learning. A philosophy of integrated social and emotional…

Playgroups are a unique form of early childhood provision involving parents and their children attending together. Parents' attendance at playgroups provides opportunities for involvement in play. However, little is known about parents' practices of co-play in playgroups and the potential for these practices to enhance children's play experiences…

Japanese teachers consider clean-up time to be the group's responsibility, and they rely on the use of music and encouragement to make clean-up time an appealing activity. The children's positive feelings also may be partially explained by the fact that teachers consider clean-up time to be an extension of play, saving toys and activities for the…

Delays in social and communication skills are associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Structured play groups (SPGs) was deemed an evidence-based practice (EBP) for children with ASD. A critical review of research published within the past 16 years and accessible in four databases was conducted with a total of 3,153 articles identified of…

In this paper, we present SCAMP -- Social Configuration Affordances for Museum Play -- an analytical framework we develop and use to highlight the relationship between designed affordances at interactive museum exhibits and different social playful behaviors they trigger and support. We do this through a selective case study analysis of Rainbow…

This study explores how children construct their belonging in culturally diverse early childhood settings in Finland and Iceland. Belonging is understood as a holistic phenomenon that is constructed through various relations. The study is a multiple-case study, influenced by ethnographic approaches, conducted with children in two preschool…

This paper considers utilising the sociocultural concept of learning activity to understand parents' learning about young children's play in the context of community playgroups and social media use. Parents' knowledge about children's play influences the provision of parental-provided play experiences for young children and can be enhanced through…

From a child-centered perspective, this article explores the practices of children's self-organized play-communities in institutional everyday life in Danish early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings, based on a phenomenological non-participant-observational study with a duration of 16 months involving two kindergartens (Bernstorff,…

Collaborations that lead to creative outputs occur within different group contexts and with diverse populations, including young children. Two cases of collaborative drawing are presented in this article to consider how young children engage in creative collaboration by negotiating meaning with others through open-ended group drawing. We…

This paper identifies the shared features of provision in exemplar school playgroups defined using the social capital concepts of bonding and bridging relationships. Relationships promote capabilities amongst people, with play a known capability for advancing children's developmental and educational outcomes. By attending to the bonding and…

A growing number of toddlers are attending childcare institutions as part of China's establishment of its infant-toddler childcare service system. However, there is limited empirical evidence available regarding the quality of these childcare services. The purpose of this study is to investigate the quality of teacher - child interactions in…