Work and Play Teaching Methods Used for Young Children’s
Introduction
For centuries, various educators and other psychologists have advocated ‘play’, as the ideal and most effective activity towards the development of young children. Play, is the spontaneous, joyous activity of children. But the experts also express that play has functional, utilitarian qualities related to a child’s development and learning. It is a fact that to make children concentrate on a particular thing is a difficult job and to create concentration for studies is more difficult. But as the child because of his interest chooses various play activities it gains much of his attention. The main focus of this material is on the children’s better learning through playing and working. Play is the natural and best way for children to learn. With the help of various playing activities of children one can get positive outcome. Children usually play games or show their interest in activities that are of their interest and engage themselves fully thus it has a positive impact on their process of learning and developing.
Rationale
It has been observed previously that the playing of children is a waste of time but after great research over the last two decades it has been suggested that children learn easily and quicker through play. It is because of this reason it is important to analyze the importance of developing various physical activities in primary class through which students can get engage and a better learning environment can be created. It is playing for which children live. While the children are in the activity of playing, they are actually in the process of discovering and understanding of their world. And during this act they usually make their minds work, by thinking of new ideas, focusing on the games, solving problems and expressing their feelings for the toys or whatever they are using for play.
Situational Analysis
Teaching is a reputable profession, being a teacher is not an easy job as teachers play a prime and key role in the development of students. This is one of the main reason for which I have undertaken this study, as I need to know that if play based teaching technique is adopted in primary class, will it work?
It is very important for a teacher to realize the importance of his role that he/she needs to deliver. I believe that to be an effective and successful teacher I need to know what techniques and strategies I can adopt with the help of which ill be able to deliver the requirements. What I have observed over the years that students especially at young age are not very keen on attending classes and do not pay proper attention. However if such environment is created that can engage them in a positive way and encourage them to participate actively, it can then turn out to be an effective teaching technique.
Areas to Investigate:
- Effectiveness of using Digital Games in Education
- The Design of Games Based learning
- Teaching with the help of Visual Arts in early childhood classroom
Literature
Through the research it has been realized that during the early childhood years, the children’s understanding and attitudes can be change with the help of drawings (Bae, 2004). Few researches on art education also agrees to the fact that though adult intervention is not only useful but at the same time it is very important for young children artistic development. The children are concrete learners and they use all their senses to learn (Hurwitz, 2002). It is for this reason that primary and kindergarten teachers should and must make of such tools and techniques in their teaching methods. (Korn, 2002) states that the overall quality of preschool and kindergarten art experiences largely depends on the expertise of primary teachers. Because of this reason various schools have highlighted the importance of having arts class for primary students. (Bae, 2004) have also highlighted the fact most of the primary teachers lack the expertise and confidence in delivering proper art education. The use of drawings can be considered as effective way through which primary students can share their views and ideas openly.
Due to the nebulous nature of play makes it really hard for teachers to get a proper and firm hold on the principles on teaching through play. Over the years various activities involving play has appeared in different forms in its implementation in primary classes. (Allen, 2006) argued that ‘play’, can be considered as intrinsically motivated and that the primary students are usually concerned with the various activities involved in rather then various goals, mainly because of the fact that it requires an active participation and engagement from primary students that is free from any kind of imposed rules (Cheng, 2012).
How a teacher deliver the message to students is very much dependent on the skills and abilities of the teacher. According to (Cheng 2012), stated that there are great discrepancies between the front-line teachers their intentions and various actions that they have adopted.
(Johnson 2005), found that in primary classes, with highest quality there were the interplay of play, work that was part of the curriculum as it consisted of various themes. Though with the help of play based learning it requires a lot of flexibility from teacher to have great sensitivity on young children’s behavior in order to be able to capture, sustain and extend children’s playfulness. However (Christie, 2005) argues that play has a general connotation of ‘not being serious’, as for this reason it will require to pay utmost attention in the classroom.
One of the most effective technique use by primary teachers to get engage students in class effectively is with the help of drawings, children’s have the ability to create visual images that not only convey their ideas but also gives them the freedom to express them freely. According to (Korn, 2002) believes that by engaging students in various play activities like drawings, role-plays and other games provide children with a lot of opportunities to learn properly. Doing art or other play activities in class requires children to think about their ideas, their feelings and experiences that they will encounter with the world. (Christie, 2005) states that by providing children with an opportunity to engage themselves in various play activities in class will not guarantee that literacy will be developed, however it will be teachers responsibility in guiding the literacy development of children through play. In order to be able to conduct the play activities effectively, it will be teacher’s responsibility to first observe and then to guide them properly. According to (Christie, 2005) a good rule of thumb for any primary teacher is to first observe the whole activity, how the students are reacting and then after three minutes teacher can intervene. Play results in stimulating the brain, as when the children start playing he uses his senses to observe the materials, toys etc. This creates a sense on concentration among the children and polishes their focus.
In recent times many schools and in particular many primary teachers have adopted the use of videogames or digital platform for delivering educational programs. Like books and movies, videogames can be used in many ways. According to (Gros, 2007) the overall design of learning environment in primary classes, that are built on the educational properties of games might be an appropriate way of improve learning. Over the last few years various educational games have received increased attention from primary teachers and have been characterized as powerful learning tools (Collins & Halverson, 2010). While the children are involved in playing, they engage themselves in a number of activities, which are related to their own interest, enjoyment or providing them satisfaction. Playing of children is not only crucial, because it helps in some physical activity of the children, rather than this playing is seen as a supporter of the psychological wellbeing, that is the results in development of physical skills and intellectual stimulation. Play underpins the development and learning of the young child (Stroh, Robinson & Proctor, 2008). With the help of play based learning technique, it will also enable teachers to constantly observe, teach and support students on regular basis, that will ensure that students are developing both knowledge and self regulation. The teachers have a vital role in encouragement of the intellectual and social development of the children during the time of development. The teachers are the main sources whether it is a preschool or high school, who provides the students with the tools, toys and the environment (Stroh, Robinson & Proctor, 2008). The teachers while belonging to the preschool has to be vigilant that if a child is engaged in some play, so she should observe the child playing and creating certain grounds to make them think or make decisions or make them move through their intervention in their play, by having conversations, or becoming part of the play. It is important for teacher to understand how they could make the play result in physical, emotional and social development.
Methodology
Play based learning is like developing your learning skills and is generally considered as highly implicit mainly because of the fact that the practitioner might not be able to tell how he/she will make sense of it. The nature of my research problem is related to how teaching through play will be constructed in a teacher’s cognition and how will I put my knowledge in actions.
This research project will be a qualitative case study, inspired by fieldwork methodology that comprises of observations. In this research my goal is to generate data in order to be able to have proper understanding of the practice I am studying. In order to collect focused and rich data on how to effectively engage students and make them learn quicker, ill be visiting few schools specially their primary sections and with permission to the teachers to sit in the class and observe the reactions of students on various activities.
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Project Design
To be able to do a proper research and to reach proper conclusion, have to visit few primary sections of different schools. Then various play activities will be implemented for both male and female students. Participants in this study will be students from grade 2 and grade 3. The overall program will consist of various activities like engaging students in educational video games, drawings and other play activities (role plays).
Another technique that will be used in order to conduct the research will be with the help of other primary teachers, as they will be briefed about the research scenario and will be asked if they can conduct such play activities in their class. All the activities will then be analyzed on a questionnaire of 1-10 scale. By focusing on the data obtained with the help of questionnaire, for example the level of participation of boys in a particular activity as compare to girls, I will then be able to document properly how students reacted in certain situations and what meaning they made out of it.
The primary data that will be created based on the observations of participants, how they react to different scenarios? Do they learn more quickly through traditional teaching methods or through engaging them in different play activities? And most importantly if girls are quick learners through play activities as compare to boys?
The field notes will be taken during the acts and will be analyzed after each observation and will help in guiding the direction of the study.
REFERENCES
- D. (2012). The Relation between Eariy Childhood Teachers’ Conceptualization of “Play” and Their Practice: Implication for the Process of Learning to Teach’, Vol 7, pp 65-84
- J. (2004). Learning to Teach Visual Arts in an Early Childhood Classroom: The Teacher’s Role as a Guide, Early Childhood Education Journal, Vol. 31, No. 4
- Korn-Bursztyn, C. (2002) Scenes from a studio: Working with the arts in an early childhood classroom. Early Childhood Education Journal, 30(1), 39–46.
- Thompson, C. M. (2003) Kinderculture in the art classroom: Early childhood art and the mediation of culture. Studies in Art Educa- tion, 44(2), 135–146.
- Hurwitz, S. C. (2002) To be Successful-Let them play! Cognitive Development
- Stroh, K., Robinson, T., & Proctor, A. (2008).Every child can learn: Using learning tools and play to help children with developmental delay
- Johnson J. E. (2005)‘Play, development, and early education’.
- B. (2007). Digital Games in Education: The Design of Games-Based Learning Environments’, Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 2007, 40(1), 23–38
- J. (2005). Play and Early Childhood Development, NewYork, Harper Collins
