Learning Through Play-Suzi Gould

I attended a GoogleMeet about Learning Through Play run by Suzi Gould. She had us remember a Learning Through Play experience that we cherished when we were a child. She talked about the joy of play that children have and how this is a powerful mode of learning. Through listening to Suzi it confirmed for us the value of play and why we are doing it at St Francis of Assisi School. I particularly liked how she said teacher's superpower was observing. This has been a challenge at the start as we wanted to intervene and fix the children's problems in Learning Through Play but we have learnt that is not always the best learning opportunity for the child. I was interested in her 7 principles that she taught the older children in game-like learning:1 Everyone participate 2 Failure is reframed as iteration 3 Learning feels like play 4 Learning happens by doing 5 Feedback immediate/on going
6 Challenge is constant 7 Everything is interconnected. Number two I would word differently without including the word failure. I also liked how the children came and filled out a sheet for what they would like help with. The teachers didn't go around the children and interupt their play to find this out. I liked her approach to Learning Through Play: Pause=Describe what you see.... Notice=what are the child's interests (acknowledge), Sensemaking=Trial and error, wonder, questioning, reflection. Sometimes we forget to stand back and pause, observe the children, they don't always need us to intervene in their play. I will continue to extend my knowledge in Learning Through Play.