Why Play Sense
What is Play Sense?
Play Sense is a unique concept in early childcare and education. Between the ages of 2- and 4-years old, a child is at an exciting stage in human development, but they need three elements to be in place to learn and develop optimally – an engaging, nurturing teacher, a safe home environment and a rich, play-based curriculum that develops foundational ‘soft skills.’
We match like-minded families with qualified ECD teachers in micro-playschools and online playschools where our exciting, evidence-based curriculum ignites each child’s ability to learn and express their individuality. This is something that traditional playschools are less equipped to achieve because they often use a skills-based curriculum to teach large groups of toddlers in an unfamiliar environment.
We believe that our proven model is the gold standard in Early Childhood Education for the world we live in.
Re-imagining early childhood education
Research has proven that guided imaginary play is the best way children age 2 to 4 learn language, social skills, and self-regulation. Play and especially imaginary play is the only way to develop these foundations for learning.
Play Sense pre school curriculum is developed by Occupational Therapists and parenting experts (and mothers) to teach toddlers important skills like listening, taking turns, focus, collaboration, and creativity – in an age appropriate way. With these skills in place, children can go on to have a meaningful learning journey and lifelong success.
To develop resilient, emotionally engaged children who are attuned to their own and other’s emotions, and able to self-regulate their own behaviour.
To encourage a strong sense of identity and belonging and develop empathy and care for others and the environment.
To nurture the foundation for the learning journey, namely creativity, inspiration, intrinsic motivation, and active exploration to learn. We call these ‘Super Senses.’
To develop executive function in little ones, this is the motivation to accomplish goal orientated tasks using the skills of problem solving, decision making, flexibility and judgement.
To support the developmental goals of 2-to-4 year olds such as gross motor, fine motor, language and cognitive skills.
What are core capacities or super skills?
Emotional regulation
Self-regulation and the ability to manage one’s own emotions and behaviour in response to a trigger, is a primary skill that is one of the greatest predictors of academic success and resilience in life. Because self-regulation develops on a trajectory from birth, by the time a child is 2 years old their minds are ready to learn how to regulate their emotions and behaviour.
Toddlers learn emotional self-regulation when they are cared for in an empathetic manner by a nurturing adult who co-regulates with the child. Emotional regulation is best achieved in small group settings or one-one-one with a parent or caregiver. By giving little ones the right environment and language to express themselves and their emotions, they learn to manage their impulses and control their behaviour, a foundation for learning, socialisation and success.
Social Skills
People are social creatures and almost all facets of life require us to connect with others and work together – either in person or online. Being socially attuned is critical to happiness and success in life.
The toddler years are a pivotal point in the development of socialisation. Once your toddler feels connected, safe, valued and has a sense of belonging and can regulate their emotions they begin to appreciate the emotional state of another. This forms the basis for care, empathy and respect for others, the environment, society, and the world around us.
Play Sense connects little ones to others and their world in a way that produces children who think beyond themselves.
‘Super Sensory’ capacities
If you consider the key capacities for academic achievement, we can’t ignore those magic elements – the intangibles – that set one child apart from the next.
We call these capacities ‘Super Senses’ and they include:
- Creativity
- Imagination
- Love for learning
- Resourcefulness
- Engagement in tasks
- The will to do
- A sense of self-worth and motivation
Executive function
An education program would not be complete without focussing on developing executive function – the ability to plan, reason, apply judgement and achieve a goal. Executive function is like the CEO of the brain – it is in charge of making sure things get done – from the idea, to the planning stages of a task to the final deadline.
The critical elements of executive function are:
- Attention
- Judgement
- Deductive reasoning
- Critical thinking
- Inhibition
- Working memory
- Flexibility
- Problem solving
Developmental milestones
The more obvious measures of a toddler’s abilities are skills that are traditionally part of a playschool curriculum:
- Gross motor skills
- Fine motor skills
- Language
- Cognitive skills such as numeracy, visual perception, memory, etc.
- Daily activities such as potty training, snack preparation and tidying up
