Play isn't just for early childhood

Play is at the heart of the Tools classroom. We know how effective a ‘tool’ play is in helping young children develop the foundational skills they need to learn more effectively in their preschool and kindergarten classrooms – and also to prepare them for future learning. 

By engaging children in activities like Play Planning, that give them opportunities to use oral and written language to plan before acting, Tools teachers guide young children toward mature play. That mature play is the activity with the most developmental potential for building self-regulation skills and more, creating meaningful contexts to build vocabulary, background knowledge, reasoning, cognitive flexibility and the social skills they will use in and outside of school. In other words, purposeful play is a wonderful way to learn. And not just for preschool and kindergarten children.

We aren’t surprised to see that a recent LEGO Education survey of elementary and middle school teachers and students confirmed that the benefits of play aren’t just for our youngest learners. In addition to increasing engagement and making students more excited to come to school, nearly all of the thousand students surveyed (98%) said that play helped them to learn better in school. And their teachers agreed, with 81% of them noticing that their students are more engaged during lessons that involve play.

So, let’s give our older students and their teachers permission to get in on the fun and take a playful approach to learning. We all deserve to benefit from play!

Read more about how purposeful play can help students learn here.