As a young teacher, Jane Katch was mentored by Vivian Paley. Katch watched how Paley turned puzzling issues into exciting explorations. Later in her own class, Katch became intrigued by the violent imaginative games that a group of boys were playing. Following Paley's example, Katch immersed herself in trying to examine the play rather than to…

This study aims to examine how five-year-old children demonstrate their learning through mathematical games in preschool settings in Palestine. It also explored the perspectives of children and teachers of different stages of play. The sample consisted of 90 children and 6 teachers. Children were guided to a wide range of mathematical games.…

In this study, the play preferences of 80 five-year-old children, 40 girls and 40 boys, from four schools in Turkey and the characteristics that shape their preferred plays were examined. The research was designed by descriptive method, which is one of the qualitative research patterns, and the data were collected using draw-and-tell technique.…

The opposition between learning as a process of self-cultivation ("Bildung") and learning as a form of vocational training for the workplace ("Ausbildung") is becoming ever more deeply entrenched in the twenty-first-century university. In language education in particular, the distinction between these two competing aims…

Technology volition is the will to develop knowledge of, and use, the physical world to design products, processes and systems. The aim of this study was to contribute new knowledge of children's technology volition when they identify, build and improve technical constructions, and how teachers support this learning. Analysis focused on moments…

This paper details a multimodal practice of response and transmediation, called a Thought Chronicle, which I employ in my undergraduate work with preservice teachers. I position this intervention in relation to the theoretical discourses of multimodality, social semiotics, and psychoanalytic ideas of dreaming and play.

Worldwide, domestic violence forces many mothers with their children into refuges for abused women. Some children experience multiple residential relocations and continual schooling disruption. Limited research exists exploring these children's school experiences. This article examines their strategies at school. Data were collected in qualitative…

The purpose of the study was to examine Japanese and Korean kindergarteners' perspectives by asking them to photograph play and explain why their photos represent play (photo elicitation interviews). The participants consisted of 50 kindergarteners on Japan's main island and 50 kindergarteners in South Korea. Japanese and Korean kindergartners…

Outdoor preschools are critical for children's play and development. Integrating observational and interview methods, this study examined four-to-five-year-old children's cognitive play experiences in an outdoor preschool with natural, mixed and manufactured zones. The observational results indicated that the natural and mixed zones offered a…

Creative Contradictions in Education is a provocative collection of essays by international experts who tackle difficult questions about creativity in education from a cross-disciplinary perspective. The contributors to this volume examine and provide fresh insights into the tensions and contradictions that researchers and educators face when…

In an online graduate-level early childhood education course, the authors sought to playfully disrupt and transform educators' conceptions of children's "dark play," as provoked by contemporary popular culture. Embracing the imaginative potential of darkness and liminality, the course participants problematized and expanded their…

The transition from kindergarten to Grade 1 is marked by a sudden decrease in children's play time (Brostrom, 2005; Hartmann & Rollett, 1994). This study sought to examine 69 Montreal-area Grade 1 children's beliefs about out of school play, as well as their parents' (N = 56) perceptions of their play. Findings indicate that parents value play…

This study investigated the humorous activity of two infants, 18 and 21 months old, in their infant group childcare setting. This was a qualitative study that followed two infants for four months. Through participant and non-participant observations, journal writing and interviews, data were collected on children's involvement in humorous…

Reveals ways to help students learn that writing can be similar to play, in that they can use their imaginations to create new settings and even new worlds. Suggests using toys, imaginary trips, and including friends in stories as inspiration for writing. (SKC)

Early research on imaginary companions suggests that children who create them do so to compensate for poor social relationships. Consequently, the peer acceptance of children with imaginary companions was compared to that of their peers. Sociometrics were conducted on 88 preschool-aged children; 11 had invisible companions, 16 had personified…