Play-based learning in early childhood

If you've looked at any early childhood centre in Australia, you've heard the phrase “play-based learning”. It's the foundation of how Australian early childhood education works, written into the Early Years Learning Framework.

But what does it actually mean? And why is play, of all things, the chosen vehicle for early childhood learning?

What play-based learning is

Play-based learning is teaching that uses children's play as the primary mode of engagement. Children learn by doing, by experimenting, by making, by pretending, by building.

It is not the absence of teaching. Educators are present, observing, asking questions, scaffolding, and intentionally extending learning. They're also choosing what materials to put out, what conversations to have, and when to step back. The structure is in the educator's thinking, not in worksheets or whole-group lessons.

Why play, specifically

Children at this age learn through the body, through the senses, through testing ideas in the physical world. They're not yet wired for sitting still and listening. So formal teaching tends to wash over them, while play deeply embeds learning.

Play also lets children:

• Choose what to focus on (which means they actually focus)
• Repeat things until they master them, on their own timetable
• Make mistakes without consequences
• Practice social skills with peers
• Build the foundations of executive function (planning, switching, working memory)

The research on this is strong. Play-based programmes consistently produce equivalent or better academic outcomes than direct-instruction programmes for young children, and they produce stronger social-emotional outcomes.

What it looks like

A morning in a play-based room might include children:

• Building a town with blocks
• Mixing potions in the mud kitchen
• Reading books with an educator
• Working on a long-running ant project (see inquiry-based learning)
• Drawing, painting, doing pretend cooking in the home corner
• Sand and water play outside
• Music and movement

What you won't typically see: 25 children sitting at desks doing the same worksheet. The activities differ by age and by what each child is interested in, and educators move between groups asking questions, extending thinking, and noting what they're seeing.

Play-based learning is not unstructured

One common misconception is that play-based learning means children just do whatever they want. It doesn't.

Educators are deliberate about:

• The materials available each day
• The questions they ask
• How they document children's thinking
• How they extend a child's interest into deeper learning
• Group times for stories, music, and shared experiences
• Routine times for self-care, eating, resting

The intentional teaching happens within and around the play. The play itself is what the children experience.

Play-based learning at our centres

All four Eikoh centres are play-based, with their own variations. St Ives Chase is most explicitly Reggio-inspired, with documented inquiry projects. Normanhurst uses Emergent Curriculum, where programmes start from each child's interests. Roseville blends play with structured preschool routines as children approach school age. West Ryde covers the full birth-to-school journey across four rooms.