The Relationship Between Frequency of Participation in Play Activities and Kindergarten Readiness

Abstract

This correlational study examined the relationship between the frequency of participation in specific play activities prior to the kindergarten year and the performance of school readiness skills as measured by the Daberon-2 Screening Device for School Readiness. A researcher-adapted Kindergarten Questionnaire was used to elicit information from parents about the frequency of their child's engagement in 19 different play activities. Ten of the play activities, most notably those considered fine motor in nature, correlated significantly with subsections of the Dabron-2. Although constraints in the design of the study limit generalization to other populations, the results suggest that frequent engagement in specific types of play is associated with enhanced performance of kindergarten readiness skills.

The Play‐Learning Binary: U.S. Parents’ Perceptions on Preschool Play in a Neoliberal Age

“…Pretend play with peers also provides opportunities for first hand understanding of numerical relationships and mathematical concepts (Bredekamp and Copple, ; Jarrell, ). Long and others () found that greater frequency of play activities was correlated with school readiness. Finally, social and emotional skills such as self‐regulation, sharing, attention span, planning and social negotiations emerge through play and are widely viewed as imperative for later reading and math comprehension (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, ).…”

“…Play as a foundational building block for the emergence of important socio‐emotional and cognitive skills has been well documented (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, ; Sandberg, ; Singer and Singer, ), as has the vitality of these skills for early childhood health and well‐being (Fearn and Howard, ; Long and others, ; Mainella and others, ). This was postulated decades ago by childhood theorists Piaget and Vygotsky, who argued that play is a powerful means of self‐teaching.…”