Children's right to play
Professor Roger Hart talks about the importance of play for children's development. This is the same message we are hearing from many researchers and experts such as Sir Ken Robinson and Peter Gray

Play is something that is part of all cultures and cannot be considered a luxury but something that is essential to the development of children. Adults/teachers should be aware of the importance of play and create the conditions and environment necessary for children to deeply engage in play.
Peter Gray describes play as:
1. Play is self-chosen and self-directed; players are always free to quit.
2. Play is activity in which means are more valuable than ends.
3. Play in guided by mental rules.
4. Play is non-literal, imaginative, marked off in some way from reality.

Tinkering with their own ideas inside play and inquiry allows children to solve their own problems, learn through the questions and hands on experimentation. Tinkering/playing with their own ideas supports children to think divergently. "Divergent thinking is the ability to branch out from a starting point and consider a variety of possible solutions, involves fluidity of thinking, broad scanning ability and free association. It is thought to be a major cognitive process underlying creativity." (Guildford, 1968; Russ & Cougars, 2001) When children have the opportunity to play with open-ended materials, there are numerous approaches that can be taken. As teachers we need to consider offering children open-ended experiences and remove the word activities from our vocabulary. Activities are usually closed and teachers often have an outcome in mind as well as a time frame. Whereas an experience or provocation allows for children to view this as a time to play with their own ideas inside the experience or provocation being offered. Teaching and learning becomes vibrant because both teacher and children may be delighted and surprised by where the experience goes.
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