Question

1. Select one piece of furniture and one piece of play equipment/toy you would select either for an infant room or a toddler room. Describe your selections and why you chose them. Then we can see how the class would collaboratively design an infant or a toddler environment!

2. Many parents don't understand the importance of construction play (such as blocks) for young children. In fact, a lot of preschool teachers see this area as a constant frustration (social conflict, messy, etc.) usually because the play area is too small or there are not enough blocks or other props. So- how might you tell or show parents and other teachers the benefits of this type of play? What would you say or do?

Answer 1

One piece of furniture would be a ladder to climb and attached on other side with a slide. This is suitable for infant or toddler and even bigger child.

One piece of toy would be building blocks or tower game for children to put them together.

I chose this as it can prove to be of great help for play therapy in children. Slide and ladder can help in gross motor development of the child . And the toy that I selected can help in developing cognitive function and after completion of the game or task child can feel that he has achieved something and feel independent.

2. Yes it's true that many parents don't understand the importance of play therapy that's because they have never been told about the benefits it can have in development of their child. I would make the parents aware of the benefits play therapy has, would tell them in detail about what play therapy is? Play therapy has been proved to be very effective form of Psychotherapy in infants,toddlers and even adolescents. This helps children to express their feelings indirectly and easily, their repressed feelings are expressed which helps them to feel free and emotionally well. It also enhances lot of cognitive capacity of the child. Child feels free to learn new things and develop new skills easily and efficiently. I will try and demonstrate use of few games and props on kids in front of their parents so that they see how good their child is performing during therapy and what changes they can see after the therapy session so that it becomes easy to convince them.