Children’s games and activities during remote education

Abstract

The article presents the importance of games and play activities for children in the first years of primary school during and after distance learning caused by COVID-19. The shift of education to online reality has been a challenging experience. Teachers had to find new ways to work with children, whereas kids had to cope with the new school reality. The aim of the article is to present the ways in which play-based activities were used by primary school teachers during remote education, based on an exploratory and descriptive study. The main research question was whether and how games and play-based activities were used during remote education in the first three grades of primary school in the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors conducted semi-structured interviews with primary school teachers and parents of students from grades 1–3. The main conclusion is that play, perceived as an important factor in early childhood education, was used by teachers in remote education to introduce a new topic, expand the scope of the material, involve children in the learning process, assess what they had learned and help to relax during classes, even if there were limitations arising from remote education and the specific needs of the youngest learners.