Combining Learning with Play and Play with Learning
Date: 06/12/2023
Combining Learning with Play and Play with Learning
Introduction:
Some people suggest that parents should seize every opportunity to train their children to read and recognise words. For example, when children are watching cartoons to learn English or are playing, they can be trained to say the Chinese and English names of the toys first. However, children should be allowed to play freely in a safe environment. Parents should pay attention to these four key points of play:
1) Play is voluntary, children lead.
2) Has to play freely.
3) Can play anytime and anywhere.
4) Play makes children grow up happily.
Play is good for children’s growth in many ways. For example, they allow children to explore freely, establish positive feelings, and improve interpersonal relationships. If parents add extra training exercises in play, children’s growth may be hindered. If parents want to increase children motivation to learn, they can set “special learning times” with them and use play as a part of learning. Examples are as follows:
1. Word-eating Monster
Learning objective: Learn English letters
Materials:
Ø Make a monster with a large open mouth out of toilet paper tubes or paper bags
Ø Make 26 uppercase and lowercase English letters out of coloured card paper.
How to play:
² Parents can first take out one uppercase English letter, and the child can choose the corresponding lowercase English letter to feed to the monster
Advanced Level:
² Parents can take out an English letter, then the child can feed the English letter of the previous or next letter to the monster
2. Building Block Tower
Objective: Learn numbers
Materials:
Ø Building blocks
Ø Write the numbers 1-30 (depending on the child’s ability) on coloured cards
How to play:
² Parents can stack up building blocks of two different colours and get the child to choose cards with the corresponding number and colour. For example, stack three red building blocks, then put five yellow building blocks on top of it; the child will then choose a red card with the number 3 on it and a yellow card with the number 5 on it. 3.
3. Sunbathing Together
Objective: Learn English vocabulary
Materials:
Ø 26 clothes pegs that have the 26 English letters written on them from a to z, respectively
Ø Write English words on the coloured cards, leaving 1-3 English letters blank in the middle of each word.
How to play:
² Children can draw a coloured card, choose the clothes pegs with the right English letters on them, and clamp them in the blank spaces on the coloured cards.
Message to parents:
Although some parents may think that it is very time consuming to prepare the materials, it is better to teach by example than to teach by giving instructions. If parents are willing to put in the time and effort to teach their children and progress with them, they will cultivate their children’s interest in learning and improve their parent-child relationship.
In short, play can be added to learning, but it is not necessary for children to learn things when they play games.
Written by SHUM Wing Yan (Registered Play Therapist-Supervisor of the Association for Play Therapy of U.S.A., Registered Social Worker, Certified Social Work Supervisor)
