Table of Contents
Why is the play cycle important?
As playworkers we use the Play Cycle as part of our regular practice to help us understand play better to inform our interventions and ways to support it further.
What is the teacher’s role in play-based learning?
Typically referred to as learning stories, they require teachers to observe and document children’s play experiences, capture student voice, identify the learning that is occurring as the child plays, and provide feedback to the child about their strengths, interests, developing knowledge, and key competencies.
What is meant by play cycle?
Play Cycle: The full flow of play from the first play cue to the return and the further development of play- with more cues and returns until the play is complete. Play Annihilation: The end of the play frame.
How does play contribute to children’s learning?
Young children can develop many skills through the power of play. Play helps to nurture imagination and give a child a sense of adventure. Through this, they can learn essential skills such as problem solving, working with others, sharing and much more. In turn, this helps them develop the ability to concentrate.
How do you respond to a play cue?
The answer to a play cue is a play return. The play return can come from another person or, if the child has been driven to play by something interesting around then, from the environment. This play is now held by the creation of a play frame.
Who came up with the play cycle?
Developed by two former playworkers, the late Professor Perry Else and Gordon Sturrock, the Play Cycle theory provides a theoretical description of the play process.
How can I help play-based learning?
Evidence shows that play can support learning across physical, social, emotional and intellectual areas of development. Let your child’s imagination run wild. Encourage them to play dress ups or pretend to be a favourite character. Ask them to tell you about it.
Who invented the play cycle?
These were developed by Bob Hughes for the purposes of adults who study and facilitate play.
Why is play-based learning important?
Play-based learning is important to a child’s development of social and emotional skills, such as the ability to develop positive relationships with peers. As children play together, they learn to get along with one another, cooperate, communicate effectively, problem solve and resolve conflicts.
What is meant by a play cue?
Cues: a lure or an invite to a person, to something in the environment, to another part of self. Play cues can be by a look, gesture, verbal invitation, provocation, testing out, facial or bodily display, presentation of an object or an action.
What are the main stages of the play cycle?
“The play cycle consists of the full flow of play from the child’s first play cue, the perceived return from the outside world, the child’s response to the return, and the further development of play to the point where the play is complete” (Sturrock and Else, 1998 website).