Can I Go and Play Now?: Rethinking the Early Years

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Greg Bottrill:Um, yeah, they can be. I mean, I’m just thinking about children and actually my own son. Um, so we’re testing children, generally speaking. Now I recognized, you know, there’s, there was a, I don’t want to be too kind of like judge, but, um, they can find it quite hard to play in terms of imagination. Um, it can be quite limited. Pooky Knightsmith:So if children are learning through playing and your classroom is a place of play, then what happens at playtime? A FREE Discord link to the online Scribble Club community enabling you to explore the joy of scribbling even further Pooky Knightsmith:And how do we support children who might have, um, sort of special or additional needs, for example, is there any additional work that needs to be done there to enable them to play or, yeah. The adult and the child play together. So the adult kind of steps down and allows the child space and time to wonder and to question and the adult questions and one does together. So it was rather than the, that the child has to get up to the adult world. That it’s almost, it’s more of a collaborative cooperative approach because ultimately what play does because it’s in your DNA and it’s in my DNA and everyone’s in our bloodstream play.

Greg Bottrill:um, in, in a way, in a way it tastes kind of like that, um, we are, you know, we are as adults. Um, we, we kind of sort of center around the idea that we are the ego w we’re the controllers of learning and where the control is of, of, of children, but children are actually they’re full of ideas and wonder, and maybe in our own childhoods, maybe we didn’t have the opportunity to have that wonder. So the idea is, is that you have these, you have, uh, uh, in terms of behavior management, my way of doing it was to have an agreed set of rules with the children that they recognized. And that if children went outside of those parameters, that children would say, that’s not fair because we agreed this. So they’re, self-managing they self manage it because ultimately they want to play and learn. So, for example, if I know children are struggling with a certain thing, I plan what they need in terms of the scale. So when I’m looking at what they’re doing within their plate as to how I can sprinkle it over the top, but they’re not defined by that next scale, I will just see where the play we’ll we’ll we’ll we’ll take them. Greg Bottrill:Yeah, absolutely. No, absolutely. And it’s kind of like what we genuinely value within our education system. These are the big, you know, these are eternal questions that will ever, you know, That’s gone on for years. And the fact that have gone on for years is ultimately to the shame of our, our education system. The Adult World often has a preconception that learning only happens with a teacher. It doesn’t – it is richer and more immersive with other children in solidarity with one another. It’s where children can not only learn about the world but about themselves too, what they are capable of and how they can become socially mindful. The adult role is then to observe, interact and become a co-player within the setting. They let go of control and enter into play, sprinkling skills as they go….That, that really exciting ways to work with children, but the schools that have explored them already have been in as one school that I’ve been exploring them, going up into ESX all the way up into ESX. So what they do is they take plate up. And also, you know, the richness of their plays far better. But then I do a bit of not play a bit like coming to a base camp. And saying on the adventure, right? This, this next bit, we’re going to need these skills. And I talk about tight teat. So that’s like a tight teach of not play and then into open play. What it does is it gives us an idea of how other children will do it as well. So children are kind of passing their gifts to you, which you then pass on to other children that weren’t there in that particular moment. And children will latch onto it more because it’s come from the world of children, not from the world of adults, because actually children do listen to children from more than they listen to adults, but they really do. Greg Bottrill:but typical teachings from the soul is about the connection that you have with the children in front of you. I thought that’s what was parenting, but ultimately I needed to listen to him. And it’s that idea of listening to children, which then created the play pro this idea of played projects, finding out what they didn’t understand or didn’t understand, and then create the framework to put over the top of play so that children can see the breakdown of it.

Okay. If you haven’t, it’s an amazing book and an amazing film, but it’s basically a make-believe world that you visit with the children and characters come and characters go challenges, come. Yeah, and it’s beautiful. And because it’s a collective thing, what happens is when I’m in the group, that that people can join, there’s a way of then of sharing.The Dinner Party Provision approach is a way of deciding on what should be in your continuous provision and why - you can apply it to inside and outside environments. Nothing escapes Dinner Party Provision and it is a great way to immerse your team into the purpose of what they are making available and how co-play can work so brilliantly if the environment has brought the right 'gifts' to the party!

Pooky Knightsmith:Isn’t that just kind of hiding, learning in play if there’s numbers along the way. And it’s In this episode, Claire talks with Greg Bottrill: a specialist in early years education, consultant, author, and strong advocate for play in teaching. Drawing Club is a true adventure and perfect for Reception and Year 1, though it can be adapted for Nursery and even as intervention in KS2. Based around the Golden Blend of picture books, tales and animations, it involves a short period of Time Together as a whole class followed by time with children exploring their ideas and creativity that can be adapted to how you believe is best.He is also the creator of the Message Centre, Drawing Club, and Play Projects, as well as the delightful Play School TV, an exploration of the power of make-believe based on his approach to outdoor play, Adventure Island– a wonderful way to open up a world of creativity, language, story and joy: education done with children, not to them.

Pooky Knightsmith:I, my daughter’s actually, I remember her literally crying over fronted adverbials when she was about that age. Created as a precursor to Drawing Club, Story Dough! is a ten minute pop-up for adults and small groups of children to invent, wonder and bring imagination to life using a great big clod of playdough. And just like Drawing Club, you can take Story Dough! on an adventure with your children - the possibilities are endless as is the potential joy... Um, and she was crying and crying and crying, and I said, what’s the problem, liar. What’s the matter. And all I could get from her was fronted adverbials and I just, I didn’t, it just, it was a foreign language to me. I had no idea I couldn’t help her understand what the problem was or even what those words meant.Mm Hmm. And what grades that aren’t we put all the masks up, all the personas that’s but that’s what we do really brilliantly. We’re really good at that. And we make, we build all the barriers up, but with Copa, you have to be absolutely wheely, honest with yourself about your practice and even those who are further down on the adventure, they still have to be honest with themselves. He was, you know, it was, yeah, it was, it was amazing. Some alarm bells should have been going off in my brain. And then at that time we didn’t know it a bit more. Um, but ultimately my son taught me how to parent. That’s what he did. He showed me that I needed to change in what way? Well, because I kept having all these demands of him as a parent.