Play, Imagination, and The Whole Child Discussion

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Florida International University *

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Psychology

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Feb 20, 2024

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Play and the Whole Child: Challenges & Opportunities Connections: What connections do you draw between this module and your own life or your learning? I made a few connections between the module and my own life experiences and learning. One is the importance of imagination and play. Lori Blahey in her article “ The Power of Play: 6 Benefits for Child Development”, states that play “builds imagination and creativity”, “fosters cognitive growth”, “delivers emotional and behavioral benefits”, “improves literacy”, “encourages greater independence”, and “promotes physical fitness” ( https://www.epl.ca/blogs/post/importance-of-play-for-kids/ ). I remember playing pretend and make believe as a kid and having so much fun. Whether it was with my friends or if I was by myself, I was never bored with my imagination. My imagination helped me expand my thoughts and use creative thinking to create imaginary settings, situations, and scenarios in my mind. My imagination also helped me play, interact, communicate, and connect with others. It allowed me to relate to my peers and classmates and learn to collaborate and cooperate with others. Using my imagination helped me build empathy by pretending I was in situations and considering my feelings in those situations. It helped build my social and emotional skills and helped me make new friends. It also helped me develop cognitive skills by allowing me to have sun during unstructured play, which helps the brain develop cognitive thinking skills and independence. Play helped me improve my behavior by giving me an emotional outlet to express myself. I remember as a kid being frustrated with something, and my mom stepped in, showed me how to do what I was doing better, and made it fun. That saved me from a lot of angry outbursts growing up. Play also helped me with my literacy. As a child, my mom read to me every single night. This helped foster a love of books and reading, and I love reading to this day. Lori Blahey, when mentioning play, states “Toys and games are also useful. Playing with small toys helps build the small muscles in hands. This helps with writing. ” ( https://www.epl.ca/blogs/post/importance- of-play-for-kids/ ). She also mentions how games that incorporate focus and concentration help develop observation and attention skills, which “support reading comprehension by helping children understand and apply what they're reading.” ( https://www.epl.ca/blogs/post/importance-of-play-for-kids/ ). Play not only helped me improve my literacy as well as my social and emotional skills but also helped with my physical development by helping me improve my coordination, fitness, and motor skills. Play and imagination were essential to my emotional, social, cognitive, and physical development. Challenge: What ideas, positions, or assumptions do you want to challenge or argue within this module? Honestly, there aren’t any ideas that I would like to challenge. I agree with everything in the module. I really enjoyed the article on “The Whole Child” concept by Teaching Strategies. It states, “Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders.” ( https://teachingstrategies.com/whole-child/ ). The article discusses the benefits of the whole child teaching approach, which incorporates social and emotional learning into an integrated curriculum to help teach children in a way that helps them learn the important educational subjects such as math, reading and literacy, science, social studies, and history, while improving social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development. Kai-lee Burke, the Vice Chair of the Board and former CEO of Teaching Strategies states, “A whole-child approach transitions away from a focus on narrowly-defined academic achievement to one that incorporates a broader view of the skills and knowledge that all children must develop for long-term success”.

( https://teachingstrategies.com/whole-child/ ). I agree that helping children develop their social and emotional skills is such an essential part of education. This helps children work and play with others, make new friends and create relationships with others, and learn to recognize and understand their own emotions as well as the feelings of others. The article states that helping develop these skills decreases the likelihood of repeated grades, failing grades, and years of special education while it also increases the likelihood of high-school and college graduation as well as stable and full-time employment. After reading the article, I completely agree that whole-child development is an essential part of the learning experience for young children. Concepts: What key concepts or ideas do you think are important and worth holding on to from this module? Some ideas and concepts that I think are important and worth holding on to from this module are the importance of imagination and play and the necessity of the whole child development teaching approach. I agree that incorporating play and imagination, while focusing on social and emotional development in the teaching curriculum is essential to providing children with a fun, inclusive, comprehensive, and complete learning experience and education. Children who develop their social and emotional skills at a young age and learn through play and imagination are better equipped for academic success and are more likely to have a fun and productive educational experience. Changes: What changes in attitudes, thinking, or action are suggested by this module either for you or others? I would say that this module supports the changing of attitudes, thinking, and action on the importance of play as well as emotional and social development. In prior years, education focused primarily on academic improvement and major subjects. In more recent years, educators are challenging this and advocating for a more extensive and comprehensive curriculum for children that incorporates play and activities that help children develop their social and emotional skills. Teachers support this new idea on early childhood education because of all of the proven benefits of teaching children social and emotional skills while incorporating play. I completely agree that schools and academic institutes should become aware of the benefits, understand the importance, and better incorporate social and emotional development and play and imagination into their classrooms and teaching curriculums. References: Lori Blahey August 4, & Blahey, L. (n.d.). The power of play: 6 benefits for child development . Edmonton Public Library. Retrieved January 23, 2023, from https://www.epl.ca/blogs/post/importance-of-play-for-kids/Links to an external site. Whole-child preschool. Teaching Strategies. (2021, December 22). Retrieved January 23, 2023, from https://teachingstrategies.com/whole-child/

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