Play = Learning: How Play Motivates and Enhances Children's Cognitive and Social-Emotional Growth [Hardcover]

Dorothy G. Singer (Editor), Roberta Michnick Golinkoff (Editor), Kathy Hirsh-Pasek (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 5, 2011

Why is it that the best and brightest of our children are arriving at college too burned out to profit from the smorgasbord of intellectual delights that they are offered? Why is it that some preschools and kindergartens have a majority of children struggling to master cognitive tasks that are inappropriate for their age? Why is playtime often considered to be time unproductively spent?

In Play=Learning, top experts in child development and learning contend that the answers to these questions stem from a single source: in the rush to create a generation of Einsteins, our culture has forgotten about the importance of play for children's development. Presenting a powerful argument about the pervasive and long-term effects of play, Singer, Golinkoff, and Hirsh-Pasek urge researchers and practitioners to reconsider the ways play facilitates development across domains. Over forty years of developmental research indicates that play has enormous benefits to offer children, not the least of which is physical activity in this era of obesity and hypertension. Play provides children with the opportunity to maximize their attention spans, learn to get along with peers, cultivate their creativity, work through their emotions, and gain the academic skills that are the foundation for later learning. Using a variety of methods and studying a wide range of populations, the contributors to this volume demonstrate the powerful effects of play in the intellectual, social, and emotional spheres.

Play=Learning will be an important resource for students and researchers in developmental psychology. Its research-based policy recommendations will be valuable to teachers, counselors, and school psychologists in their quest to reintroduce play and joyful learning into our school rooms and living rooms.

Editorial Reviews

From Scientific American

Play is under attack, argue the child development and learning experts behind this informative anthology. It is a victim of today’s trend to focus on a narrow set of cognitive skills, a downed bystander of the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind Act. What has been neglected in this rush to reinvent education, these authors say, is the huge body of research buttressing the relation between types of play, a wide range of learning and school preparedness. Editors Dorothy G. Singer, Roberta Michnick Golinkoff and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek lament a regression to 19th-century learning approaches, like memorization, in an era with "an emerging creative class that values conceptual knowledge and original thinking." Children must know facts, but it is ironic that teachers now emphasize rote learning at a time when information constantly changes. "The power of knowledge," they write, "comes from weaving those facts together in new and imaginative ways." The power of this volume is its descriptions of the varieties of play—make-believe, storytelling and story-acting, mathematical—and of more than 40 years of research linking play to increased attention spans, creativity, constructive peer interaction and mental health, to list only a few benefits. The authors present surprising and often dismaying reports about recent actions that ignore the literature. We learn of an unprecedented rise in expulsions from prekindergarten classes, perhaps arising from children’s frustration as they are taught skills once thought appropriate for youngsters several years older. Academic tutoring for test score gains has lasting negative consequences, according to one author, including poorer study habits and lower achievement. The anthology grew out of a 2005 conference at Yale University funded by Fisher-Price, and editors and authors of the book have consulted for Fisher-Price and other toy manufacturers over the years. So it comes as no surprise that the book spends a little time examining what is known about the educational value of toys and videos. In a chapter on media, play, infants and toddlers, Fisher-Price manager of child research Deborah S. Weber cites studies of young children whose parents sing along and clap during, and talk to them about, age-appropriate television shows and videos. Teachers found that children who watch TV supported by this adult "scaffolding" were more ready to learn than children left to watch alone. Though well written, the chapters of Play = Learning demand great concentration and challenge the educated lay reader. But it is hard to fault the authors for their thoroughness. They are serious about play and offer convincing evidence that rather than being a distraction from learning, play is the thing.

Karen A. Frenkel

Review

"Early childhood educators are well aware of the importance of play in children's lives. This volume is a wonderful collection of chapters by eminent authors, who have thought deeply about play and young children's learning. Readers will find it challenging, provocative, reassuring, and enormously satisfying."--Barbara Bowman, Erikson Institute

"In the current era of scientifically-based education and accountability, this book fills a critical gap in the knowledge base--providing an extensive research review of all the ways play enhances learning and development for all children, including those with special needs. This book should help teachers, administrators, teacher educators, and policy makers go beyond the either/or debates of the past. The evidence is clear--children need both hands-on, educationally enriching play experiences and teacher instruction."--Sue Bredekamp, Ph.D., Director of Research, Council for Professional Recognition, Washington, DC, and Former Director of Professional Development, National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC)

"This is a stunning and important book. The authors do more for play than anyone since Vygotsky. In the earliest years, play lays the groundwork for imitative learning, simulation, and contributes to socio-emotional growth. By the third and fourth years, play becomes a critical avenue by which the child experiments with virtual realities and explores future possibilities. Play is sometimes undervalued in the increasingly high-pressured world of child-rearing. This volume transforms how we think about play and is essential reading for developmental psychologists, practitioners, policymakers, and all those who wish to enhance the lives of children."--Andrew N. Meltzoff, co-author, The Scientist in the Crib: What Early Learning Tells Us About the Mind

"In this wonderful book on play, a variety of leading researchers and scholars in the play and child development area review how play helps children develop and learn. There is a special focus on play and the learning process which involves the whole child. This book provides a fresh and up-to-date look at play and areas of adaptive functioning such as literacy, mathematics, and self-regulation. This is a much needed and timely book, as our culture is de-emphasizing the importance of play. Many authors discuss implications of play research for public policy. This book tells us why we, as a society, need to provide time, space, and guidance for children to play."--Sandra W. Russ, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, Case Western Reserve University

"...a realistic appraisal of what play can contribute to early learning such as the links between play and early literacy and language competence and the importance of recess in the primary grades."--Young Children (November 2006)

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 1 edition (August 5, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195304381
• ISBN-13: 978-0195304381
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #744,204 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)