Play is far more than just fun and games—it’s a powerful tool for learning and development in early childhood. Through play, children explore the world, develop critical skills, and build the foundation for lifelong learning.
Whether it’s building with blocks, engaging in pretend play, or simply getting messy, each type of play offers unique benefits.
Dive into this collection of articles on the importance of play and find simple play activity ideas:
- How Do Children Learn Through Play? The examples in this article explain exactly what children are learning during play activities like building puzzles, playing in the sand or building a block tower.
- The Types of Play: Understand the typical stages of play (such as solitary or social play), as well as the different types of play (such and language or pretend play).
- The Top Educational Toys: A teacher’s guide to the 10 most educational toys of all time.
- Check Out These Fun Play Activities:
- Role Play Ideas: Use these 30 ideas as inspiration for your next pretend play set-up.
- Sand Play Activities: Young children love playing with sand and it is one of the best sensory activities. Here are 30 simple sand play ideas
- Water Play Activities: Here are 15 fun water play ideas that will delight toddlers and preschoolers.
- Fun in the Bath: 18 ways to make bathtime even more fun!
- Messy Play Ideas: Engage all the senses with these 10 messy play ideas your kids will love.
- Sensory Stations: Use these 37 ideas to set up simple sensory stations in your class or home.
- Construction Play: Have you tried all these different types of construction play with your children?
- Printable Puzzles: These printable puzzles for kids are instantly downloadable and are a great addition to your puzzle collection at home or in your classroom. They are also perfect to use as a cut-and-paste activity.
- Teach children concepts through play and hands-on activities:
- Learning Colours: Colour identification is an important part of a child’s development. Here are 31 easy activities your kids will love.
- Science Concepts: Teaching science concepts in early childhood should be interactive and fun. Here are 6 ways to do it.
- Sequencing: Finding the next logical step or ‘what comes next’.
- Matching: Finding things that are identical or ‘the same’.
- Seriation: Arranging things in order – usually size – and finding what comes next.
- Sorting and Grouping: Finding which things belong together and share common characteristics.
There are more ideas below:
