Play Partner - What Type Are You?

You know that children learn best through play - but do you know how to play the best way to help them learn? When adults play with children they tend to fall into the role of either the entertainer, the director, or the observer. The entertainer does anything they can to keep the child's attention. They dance, they sing, they jump around, which can all be great fun, but they often forget to let the child join in with them. The director spends play time teaching and instructing and forgets to make it fun. They tend to talk at the child rather than to him or her and they dominate the interaction. The observer doesn't know how to join into the child's game and sits back and watches instead. Observing is a great start for learning about a particular child, but joining in is key to helping children learn through play.

Becoming a responsive partner to your child is the ultimate goal in learning to play to learn. A responsive partner is able to adapt activities to allow a child at any stage of development to participate and take a turn(focus is on the child versus the toy or activity, make comments rather than question); to add information during an activity to help the child learn (label, describe, exaggerate key words, expand upon current knowledge); and to allow the child to lead the interaction to where they want to go(what is your child interested in, how do they want to play with this toy or game, what book do they choose). During play the responsive partner is face to face with the child and always reinforces that they are listening by interpreting what the child says, commenting on what the child is doing and adding information. Being a responsive play partner helps your child to feel valued, to trust that you are listening, and to learn to include you in the game.

Once in the game, the opportunities to teach your child are endless - but getting in takes work. Try video taping yourself playing with your child and identify the type of partner you tend to be to your child. Use these observations to come up with strategies to move towards becoming a more responsive partner during play.

Information in this post was adapted from The Hanen Program - It Takes Two to Talk.