White paper The role of play in children’s development: a review of the evidence David Whitebread & Dave Neale, Hanne Jensen, Claire Liu & S. Lynneth Solis, Emily Hopkins & Kathy Hirsh-Pasek and Jennifer Zosh November 2017 ISBN: 978-87-999589-3-1 Table of contents Table of contents Introduction • 4 Physical play • 6 Play with objects • 10 Symbolic play • 14 Pretend play • 18 Games with rules • 24 Closing thoughts • 28 References • 34 This white paper is published in 2017 and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.09) ISBN: 978-87-999589-3-1 Suggested citation Whitebread, D., Neale, D., Jensen, H., Liu, C., Solis, S.L., Hopkins, E., Hirsh-Pasek, K. Zosh, J. M. (2017). The role of play in children’s development: a review of the evidence (research summary). The LEGO Foundation, DK. 2 Introduction Introduction There is a considerable body of research which is The general indicative evidence of a relation between indicative, relating children’s play and aspects of their children’s play, their learning and development has learning and development. This evidence includes come from the following disciplines: work in evolutionary and developmental psychology, anthropology, neuroscience and educational studies. Evolutionary psychology However, while researchers in these fields have • Bruner (1972) argued that as more and more hypothesised about how play might enhance child complex animals evolved, the length of biological outcomes, much of this evidence merely establishes immaturity increased, facilitating a related associations rather than firm, causal relationships. In increase in learning and in the amount and the fact, there is little or no conclusive evidence regarding variety of different types of play - physical play possible explanatory mechanisms. (mostly ‘rough-and-tumble’) in mammals, ‘play with objects’ in primates and ‘symbolic’ play, With this white paper, we set out to move the study including pretence, in humans. His proposed of children’s play and development forward, urging mechanisms included humans’ enhanced researchers to address the psychological processes representational abilities (language, drawing etc.) involved in playful behaviour and the mechanisms by and ‘flexibility of thought’. which they might enhance learning. We propose that • Pellegrini (2009), in a review of evolutionary work this can be best achieved by focusing on the specific on play, concluded that, in animals and humans, psychological characteristics of playful experiences, play contexts allow individuals to focus on ‘means’ set out in the related white paper by Zosh et al. (2017) rather than ‘ends’, allowing exploratory or iterative and the specific types of play children engage in. play in which they ‘exaggerate, modify, abbreviate or change the sequence of behaviours, endlessly Following a brief overview of the general, indicative repeat slight variations of behaviours, and so on’. evidence, this white paper reviews research which has been conducted in relation to the five types of play Developmental psychology proposed by Whitebread (2012), namely physical play, • Much of the research on play within developmental play with objects, symbolic/semiotic play, pretend psychology has been inspired by the theoretical play and games with rules. It concludes by examining writings of Vygotsky (1978). During play, when theoretical links between the five characteristics of it is spontaneous and child-initiated, he argued, playful experiences and the types of play reported here, children exercise control over their own activity, and by suggesting mechanisms emerging from current set themselves appropriate challenges, and so research that could form the focus of future research. create their own ‘zone of proximal development’ within which learning is most powerfully enhanced. Karpov (2005) reviewed the work of neo-Vygotskians supporting the notion that, in play, children are required to regulate their own behavior, making it a significant factor in their development of self-regulation. 4 Introduction • A number of studies reviewed demonstrated Educational studies children being able to perform tasks in play at • Diamond, Barnett, Thomas & Munro (2007) significantly higher levels than in non-playful and Hyson, Copple & Jones (2007), in their contexts (e.g. a study of 3-7-year-old children reviews of the Tools of the Mind curriculum, ‘standing sentry’ by Manuilenko, 1975). found that children attending pre-schools using • Tamis-LeMonda and Bornstein (1989) this play-based curriculum achieved higher demonstrated that infant habituation (an scores on measures of executive function, skills established measure of speed of processing underpinning self-regulatory abilities, than strongly related to cognitive development) children attending regular, instruction-based pre- predicted the amount of pretend play individuals schools. engaged in as young children. • Barker, Semenov, Michaelson, Provan, Snyder • Bornstein (2006) reviewed evidence of the & Munakata (2014) showed that the amount of universality of pretend play (although with cultural less-structured time in 6-7 year-olds’daily lives, variations) and inter-relationships between the including free play alone and with others, social complexity of this type of play and children’s outings, sightseeing and visiting museums & zoos, emotional well-being. predicted their cognitive self-regulation. • Whitebread (2010) reviewed a range of studies, • Marcon (2002), found that playful learning in pre- including an observational study of 3-5-year-olds schools in the USA was associated with better in 32 preschool settings, providing evidence that short and long-term academic, motivational and self-regulatory behaviours were most commonly well-being outcomes by the end of primary school. observed in children during collaborative, child- • Sylva, Melhuish, Sammons, Siraj-Blatchford & initiated play. Taggart (2004), in a cohort study of 3,000 children in the UK, showed that extended play-based pre- Anthropology school experience (i.e. 3 years) was advantageous • Gray (2009), in a review of anthropological studies to children from disadvantaged households in of extant hunter-gatherer societies, reported relation to their academic and social development. the unfettered, playful lives of children in these • Darling-Hammond & Snyder (1992), in a study cultural groups, the context in which humans of 50 ‘play-based kindergartens’ and 50 ‘early evolved over tens of thousands of years until the learning centres’ in Germany, found that by very recent evolutionary past (c.10-12,000 BC). Grade 4 the children from the former were more He argued that humans have evolved to learn advanced in reading, maths and social/emotional through playful behaviour, and in a further study adjustment in school. (Gray, 2012), he revealed a strong relationship between the decline of play opportunities for So, as we can see, there is a substantial body of children in the USA over the last half century and research, across a number of disciplines, arguing an alarming increase in child psychopathology. for the importance of play in human development, and, in some cases, proposing intriguing potential Neuroscience mechanisms that might explain the role of play in • Pellis & Pellis (2009) reviewed their extensive children’s cognitive, emotional and social learning. The research, spanning over 30 years, of play in simple following sections review the evidence in relation to mammals, mainly mice and rats. This consists specific types of play, and begin to set out an agenda in physical ‘rough and tumble’ and in play with for play research going forward, in order to examine objects. Their studies have provided evidence of these various hypothetical psychological processes. impact on brain development in specific areas of the pre-frontal cortex, and of poor levels of social competence in animals deprived of these play opportunities. 5 Physical play Physical play This type of play is the earliest to evolve and can be motor development and some tenuous evidence observed in most, if not all, mammals, and arguably that exercise play may also be related to cognitive some reptiles and amphibians. In human children it performance. In a more recent review Brussoni et al. includes activity play (e.g. jumping, climbing, dancing, (2015) concluded that ‘the evidence suggests overall skipping, bike riding and ball play), fine-motor practice positive effects of risky outdoor play on a variety (e.g. sewing, colouring, cutting, junk modelling and of health indicators and behaviours in children aged manipulating action toys and construction toys) and 3-12 years’. However, they pointed out that these what is usually referred to as ‘rough-and-tumble’ (play conclusions were based on ‘very low’ to ‘moderate’ fighting with friends, siblings or caregivers). quality evidence. There have been 5 significant reviews of research Amongst particular studies focusing on physical and theory in this area exploring evidence of activity play, Colwell & Lindsey (2005), in a study with causal relationships between play and aspects of 4-6-year-olds, focused on outcomes, in same-sex development, and we have found 13 empirical papers and mixed-sex play, for peer acceptance and teacher which are sufficiently rigorous to be included in this ratings of social competence. For girls, but not for review. The reviews are those by Bjorklund & Brown boys, same-sex physical activity play was associated