Describe the importance of play & leisure for children & young people.
Children learn through play. Every moment that the child is playing they are learning new skills, words and meanings. Play gives children the opportunity to explore, take risks, challenge themselves and have fun whilst learning. It is a natural way for children to learn because it uses all of their senses, they are able to take in information and sort this information out in order to solve problems. As play is constantly working a child's brain in a way to help them develop, leisure is also very important to allow the child to de-stress themselves and refresh their minds. Leisure for a child may include things such as sitting down quietly and reading a book, watching the television or sitting down to eat snack and relax.
There are 5 different stages of play. Solitary play is when toddlers play completely on their own. They can be totally oblivious to what is going on in their surroundings as they will be caught up in their own little world.
Observer is when a child looks at other children playing around them. They find what other children are doing fascinating and they start to take in what others are doing. Whilst they are watching they are constantly learning through the experiences of the other children.
Parallel play is when a child plays amongst a group of children but doesn't actually interact with the them. They may share their toys, swap colouring pens and be aware of each other, but they are not actually interacting together. Associative play is when children begin to play together. However, although they are playing together they dont have an overall game plan. For example, you may see them chasing one another around the playground but in an unorganised way. They arent really sure whats going on so if a child was to drop out of the game it would have no effect as there is no actual structure to the children's