For early years practitioners, understanding the roles of fantasy and risky play in child development is crucial. Both forms of play offer significant benefits that help shape well-rounded, resilient, and imaginative children. However, these benefits may not always be fully understood or acted upon, especially when there seems to be a myriad of suggestions for other educational activities to choose from. Don’t overlook these vital play-based learning approaches; instead, think about how you can incorporate them into your curriculum on a regular basis.
What Is Risky Play?
Risky play, sometimes called adventurous play, involves activities that allow children to experience a certain degree of risk and challenge, such as climbing, balancing, and exploring new environments. While it may seem counterintuitive in the age of heightened safeguarding awareness, risky play is vital for children’s development.
Benefits Of Risky Play
There are many benefits of risky play, including:
- Building confidence – by navigating challenges and taking calculated risks, children learn to trust their abilities, boosting self-confidence and independence
- Developing physical skills – activities like climbing or balancing improve gross and fine motor skills, coordination, and strength
- Enhancing problem-solving abilities – risky play involves decision-making and problem-solving as children figure out how to overcome obstacles
- Promoting resilience – experiencing minor setbacks or falls teaches children to recover and try again, fostering resilience and perseverance
- Encouraging risk awareness and management – children learn to assess and manage risks themselves, rather than being overprotected by adults. While adults should conduct initial risk assessments, allowing children to explore risk is crucial
How To Create A Safe Environment For Risky Play
Creating a safe environment for risky play may sound paradoxical, but it simply involves ensuring certain safety measures are in place. Managed risk under supervision is key. This can be achieved through:
- Outdoor adventures, such as areas with natural elements like logs, rocks, and trees for climbing and balancing
- Obstacle courses with varying difficulty, allowing children to navigate tunnels, balance on beams, and jump over hurdles
- Loose parts play, where children create their own obstacle courses and structures using branches, ropes, tyres, and cardboard boxes
- Supervised tree climbing sessions
- Water play with different depths, containers, and flowing water, allowing safe exploration of water dynamics
- Age-appropriate tools like hammers and screwdrivers in a controlled environment
Fantasy Play
Fantasy play enhances creativity, language and social skills, and emotional understanding. Also known as imaginative or pretend play, it involves children creating and acting out scenarios, often enriched by simple props, costumes, and pretend environments.
Promoting Fantasy Play In Your Setting
The following ideas will help you create an environment that supports and encourages fantasy play:
- Provide lots of resources
Offer props, costumes, and simple toys that inspire creativity, such as:
– Costumes and dressing-up clothes
– Simple props and household items
– Puppets, soft toys, and dolls
– Rugs to act as ‘magic carpets’
– Pieces of cloth for cloaks, tablecloths, or headscarves
– Cardboard boxes and construction items like blocks and planks
– Props inspired by magical, mythical, or extinct creatures such as gnomes, fairies, or dinosaurs - Create imaginative spaces
Set up themed areas like kitchens, doctor’s offices, or grocery stores to spark pretend play scenarios. Expand to imaginative settings, such as moon bases, pirate ships, or fairy worlds. Use historical eras like Ancient Greece or medieval castles to inspire play. Visual stimulus boards featuring fantasy lands, creatures, and times can also inspire creativity. Engage children in using AI to generate imaginative visuals together. - Encourage storytelling and offer drama or role-play sessions
By reading stories to children, you introduce them to characters and encourage them to recreate or act out their favourites. Recordings like We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen can serve as excellent stimuli. - Organise specific dress-up days
Dressing up doesn’t need to be confined to World Book Day. Run themed days or encourage ‘free’ days to let children express their creativity.
For early years practitioners, recognising and promoting the value of risky and fantasy play is essential. These forms of play are not merely activities to fill time but foundational experiences that shape children’s growth, helping them become confident, creative, and resilient individuals. Go on, let out your inner creative child!
