Why Dramatic Play is Essential for Early Childhood Development
Ever heard of Dramatic Play? Believe it or not, you probably enjoyed it yourself as a child, and may have even seen your own children do it at home or playing with others.
According to Play and Playground Encyclopedia, Dramatic Play can be described as “a form of symbolic play where a child pretends to take on a role of someone else, imitating actions and speech from earlier observed situations.”
But why is Dramatic Play so important, you ask?
Well, it sets the stage for some important milestones for your kids. Below are just a few reasons why it’s so essential to early childhood development.
IMAGINATION
Let’s face it - Dramatic Play is just a fancy word for playing make-believe! So naturally, this type of interaction helps kids develop their sense of creativity and imagination. Using props, tools and open-ended toys helps little ones learn to think outside the box, imagine themselves in different roles and practice storytelling.
SOCIAL SKILLS
Dramatic Play is also a great way for children to develop crucial social skills. When little ones engage in Dramatic Play with others, it’s called sociodramatic play. Children learn and practice communication, sharing, collaboration and negotiating, as well as how to respect one another and adapt to changes. This type of play provides various teachable moments focusing on conflict resolution, cooperation and impulse control, as well as providing opportunities for children to step into leadership roles and learn to communicate their own ideas.
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
Through Dramatic Play, children are able to expand their vocabularies and engage in intentional language development by communicating with each other, listening to each other, asking questions and using new words with a motive. Children are encouraged to use expressive language in order to embody their imaginary roles, improving their ability to verbalize feelings, actions, commands and more.
FINE MOTOR SKILLS
Dramatic Play presents several opportunities for developing fine motor skills. Children are able to fine tune their hand-eye coordination and reflexes via anything from doing make-believe laundry to preparing imaginary dishes in a play kitchen and helping with clean up (whether pretending or in real life)! The fine motor skills developed during Dramatic Play inevitably carry over into real-world activities in a beneficial way.
EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
Through interaction with others via Dramatic Play, children are able to improve their ability to self-regulate emotions and actions. This type of play also helps children learn to curb their own impulsive behavior, as being assigned a role or character encourages them to follow rules and guidelines. According to Tinkergarten, “pretend play is the way that children learn to take different perspectives…Even though pretend play starts quite simply, early experiences with pretending form strong roots of perspective-taking from which more sophisticated cognitive empathy can grow.”
Dramatic Play is not only fun for the little ones, it also enhances early childhood development by encouraging self-expression and building vital life skills. Sounds like a win-win situation to us!
