In the Republic of Ireland, the Department of Children and Youth Affairs recommends implementing play-based learning in early education curricula. This research study set out to explore the following research question: What are pre-school teachers' beliefs, understandings and uses of play-based approaches to develop language and literacy skills in their classrooms? For this study, the term pre-school refers to the age category of children from 2 years and 8 months to 5 years of age. This age cohort is the age of eligibility for the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) scheme in Ireland which provides financial support for 2 years of early childhood care and education for children aged 2.5 to 5 years of age. This study aimed to explore the tools pre-school teachers used to implement play-based approaches in their classrooms; the challenges and facilitators they perceived when implementing play-based approaches, and to understand how play-based approaches were implemented specifically for language and literacy development. The study design was qualitative and nine semi-structured interviews were completed with pre-school teachers. Results from the thematic analysis highlighted the three themes: (1) Learning Through Play, (2) What Influences Play and (3) Making Sense of Play Through Reflective Practice. These three themes consist of several sub-themes which are evident throughout each theme. The results of this study showed that pre-school teachers have a positive view towards play-based approaches for children's language and literacy development. However, they were unsure about implementing play-based approaches with other curriculum models. Challenges such as settings' philosophies and parents' expectations emerged as key elements of pre-school teachers' experiences of using play-based approaches.