Designing an environment for play

When you design an environment for children to play in, you need to allow space for the different types of play to take place. The main types of play include social, emotional, physical, creative and cognitive.

Designing for different types of play

Social play

When children are placed in-group care they will learn about how to get along with others. This does not mean that all the children need be friends, rather that they need to respect one another's space.

This requires them to experience activities that will help them socialise. To you, socialising may mean going out on a Saturday night and seeing your friends.

With children, the meaning is a little different. Socialising refers to children's first experiences with groups of people and how they develop their own style of dealing with various situations.

When providing for social development, remember to consider both the indoor and outdoor environment.

a play area containing children's sized furniture, dress up clothes, blocks and other toys.

There are many ways you can facilitate social play:

By providing the opportunity for pretend play (which is often referred to as dramatic play). Set up an area such as a mini home, office, hospital, or other environment. This allows the children to re-enact social exchanges that they have seen.
By providing dolls and other equipment to further enhance the area you have provided. Try to bring as much reality to the area as possible.
By using characters and other real life equipment in alternative areas. For example, cars in the block corner.
Using puppets and felt pieces are another way you can promote social development. Children can act out situations they have experienced or seen using this equipment. Puppets and other materials like felt pieces can also be used by you to demonstrate various ways of socialising, building relationships and sending a message.
Other forms of presenting examples of socialisation are using storybooks, self designed stories, tapes, CD ROMs, videos, and pictures.
Through group activities - such as singing, dancing, games.
Another way of demonstrating effective social skills is to be a role model, remember children are always watching and mimicking your behaviour.
Nothing beats personal experience. Being on hand to guide children through their social experiences with the other children is a great way to ensure success.

Emotional play

Emotional play is closely related to social play and can be provided for in the same way. However it is good to keep emotional development in mind, as it is best facilitated by your responses.

Self-esteem is the main focus in this area, as well as learning coping strategies to deal with the various feelings people have.

Physical play

Physical play is about providing opportunities for the children to exercise, develop their fine motor and gross motor skills and expel energy.

When designing the environment for children to play in you, and other caregivers you work with, will need to consider both indoors and outdoors, individual and group play, personal health needs and fine and gross motor needs.

There are many experiences you can offer to promote physical play. Areas you need to consider for including physical play are:

areas for climbing
areas for running
areas for wheel toys
areas for movement to music
areas for block play
areas for manipulative play.

By ensuring that you are catering for all these areas you will be able to ensure that the children in your care gain the best opportunity to develop their physical skills.

Creative play

This is the area where the individual child is given the opportunity to express themselves. This self-expression can come in many forms. Here are just a few ways:

painting
sculpting
acting
story telling
dancing
singing.

When providing areas for creative play to take place you need to consider every possible way a person can express themselves, then promote the freedom for it to happen.

Cognitive play

Cognitive play allows children to develop problem solving skills. You should always design areas for cognitive play, and include outdoor as well as indoor areas.

Some cognitive areas that you could use are:

puzzle area
interest table
writing centre
games table.

Environment layout

When planning an environment you need to decide how the different play areas that you've just looked at should be presented.

Quiet play areas are important, as they will provide the children with the chance to relax and carry out the experiences they choose as well as spend time on their own.

You will also need to provide an opportunity for boisterous play - an active area. Do you think these two types of play spaces should be situated side by side?

Have a think about the following scenario.

Brian is busy building a tower of blocks. It has been a huge production, and Brian has been assisted in his efforts by Andre and Michelle. They have made lots of noise and have spread their play out into the book corner, which is situated right next to the block area. They are having loads of fun!

Natasha is in the book corner and is browsing through the photo albums. She has asked the building crew many times to be quiet, but they have not heard her over their own excitement. In frustration Natasha puts the photo album back on the shelf and goes outside, kicking the blocks in the book corner on her way out.

That scenario could have been avoided if the quiet book corner had been placed away from the active block area. The active area is most likely used for your physical areas of play, however remember, they all mix together.

Overlapping areas

Something that you may be asking yourself is: ‘Do any of these play areas cross over?’

The answer is yes they do! All of the play areas intertwine and support one another in the promotion of the development of the whole child. Different areas of development are encouraged at once.

For example, by allowing for both individual and group opportunities at all times, you are providing opportunities for social development across all of the play areas.

Another example is, by providing a challenge you will extend the individual as well as promoting cognitive development and emotional development.

You can see from these examples that there are many ways to creatively encourage a child's development, and you need to keep these in mind as you design environments for the children in your care.

Active and quiet areas

Think about how you feel over the day. Are there times when you're full of energy and wanting to be involved in an exciting activity? Are there other times when you just want to relax and rest and have some quiet time? Children are just the same. They need an environment in which they can feel comfortable whatever their mood.

There needs to be places for children to participate in group work, as well as on an individual basis. There needs to be areas that are alive with the hustle and bustle of activity, and there should also be areas where children can go to relax.