Playful Learning at Home Boosts Your Child’s Development

Playful learning is a transformative tool that fosters holistic child development.  

It blends fun and education to help children aged 3 to 6 develop perceptual skills, essential skills, and even lifelong learning skills.  

For parents, it offers a chance to engage children in activities that strengthen physical skills. This type of play nurtures social-emotional skills and introduces maths skills and literacy concepts.  

Here’s how you can integrate learning through play at home and maximise its benefits with tools like the Six Bricks method. 

Why Playful Learning is Essential 

Playful learning combines hands-on activities with structured objectives. The aim is to promote meaningful and engaging experiences.  

Supported by research, this approach nurtures all aspects of child development. This type of hands-on tool helps push cognitive, emotional, and physical growth while ensuring that children enjoy the process.  

Playful activities are a key way to develop core skills.  

Whether through storytelling, role-playing, or solving puzzles, these playful activities prepare children for school and life beyond.  What’s more this is all done without the pressure of traditional methods. 

It's a way of re-imagining learning without your child realising just how many skills they gain. 

The Benefits of Playful Learning 

1. Cognitive Development

• Activities like building with bricks or solving puzzles encourage creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. They help with the application of numeracy skills as well as comprehension skills. 
• Experimentation and exploration help children develop curiosity and a foundation for lifelong learning skills. 

2. Social and Emotional Growth

• Group play teaches cooperation, empathy and relationship-building. As children play with other friends or family, they are developing their executive functioning skills - a key part of their ongoing success at school. 
• Storytelling and collaborative games nurture emotional intelligence and prepare children to navigate social interactions.  
• They help build resilience and when you see these activities in action, you realise just how much is being developed: fine and gross motor movement + mathematical concepts + language skills. 

3. Physical Development

• Engaging in activities like building, balancing, or colouring strengthens fine motor skills and coordination. The primary focus of the method is to incorporate a wide range of skills so that you help with the facilitation of curriculum outcomes without placing the burden solely on the school. 
• Gross motor skills improve through games that involve movement, such as hopping, jumping, or scavenger hunts. There are so many key learning skills and yet children are having such a good time that they don't realise how much they are gaining. 

4. Language and Communication Skills

• Role-playing and storytelling enrich vocabulary and encourage effective communication. This also assists with the achievement of the requirements of the language curriculum. 
• Hands-on activities like counting studs on bricks or creating patterns introduce mathematical and literacy skills in a fun way. 

How to Incorporate Playful Learning at Home 

You don't have to wait for children to all use activities such as bricks in classrooms only! It's possible to easily introduce them at home as well.  

All the activities described below work well for autistic children as well: 

Building with Bricks 

Use bricks as an interactive tool to develop a wide range of skills. Encourage your child to: 

• Create patterns or structures, enhancing spatial awareness. 
• Solve challenges like building the tallest tower, promoting problem-solving skills. 
• Share stories inspired by their creations, fostering creativity and language growth. 

Interactive Storytelling 

Transform reading into a fun and engaging experience: 

• Use Yay4Play’s Build-a-Book (link) series to involve children in storytelling with props and manipulatives. 
• Encourage your child to act out the story, boosting comprehension and imagination. 

Outdoor Adventures 

Take learning outside: 

• Activities like hopscotch and obstacle courses promote teamwork and resilience while enhancing gross motor skills. 
• Introduce math concepts by counting steps or sorting natural objects by colour and shape. 

Art and Craft 

Set up an art corner at home: 

• Use colourful bricks dipped in paint as stamps to create patterns, merging creativity with fine motor skill development. 
• Encourage free-form drawing or collage-making to nurture self-expression. 

DIY Talent Shows 

Organize a family talent show where children: 

• Showcase skills like building unique structures or storytelling. 
• Gain confidence and learn to celebrate achievements. Build collaboration among children of family and friends. 

The Role of Six Bricks in Playful Learning 

The Six Bricks method, supported by Care for Education and the LEGO Foundation, provides a simple yet powerful approach to playful learning.  

With six colourful bricks, children can engage in hundreds of activities that build cognitive, social-emotional, and physical skills. 

The method is used in schools as an innovative play pedagogy to boost academic achievement. But it is also totally suitable for at home use!  

As you use these skill building activities with your child, you begin to notice improvements in so many areas.  Examples include: mathematical skills, critical skills such as patterning and comprehension, observational skills and social-emotional skills. 

What's more, these benefits for children are easily accessible through affordable resources. 

Examples of Six Bricks Activities with Sets 

1. Memory Match: Show your child a sequence of bricks and have them replicate it. 
2. Story Prompts: Assign a meaning to each brick colour and encourage storytelling. 
3. Maths Concepts: Use bricks for counting, addition, and subtraction. 
4. Colour Hunt: Match brick colours to objects around the house. 

Benefits of Six Bricks for the Educational Growth of Children 

• Cognitive Growth: Enhances memory, attention, and problem-solving abilities. 
• Fine Motor Skills: Builds dexterity through stacking and manipulation. 
• Social Skills: Fosters teamwork and empathy through collaborative activities. 
• Emotional Growth: Encourages resilience and adaptability through challenges. 

Practical Tips for Parents 

1. Create a Routine: Incorporate Six Bricks activities into daily schedules for consistency. 
2. Encourage Exploration: Allow your child to take the lead in creating structures or patterns. 
3. Mix and Match: Combine Six Bricks with other hands-on learning tools for a comprehensive approach. 
4. Adapt to Interests: Focus on activities that align with your child’s preferences, whether math-related or creative storytelling. 

Instead of bricks that are in the cupboards or boxes, use them for hands-on, experiential learning. Your child won't even notice that they are learning because they will be having so much fun. 

These hands-on resources are a powerful teaching tool - and no child will even notice that they are learning along the way. These fantastic tools will make all the difference to their future success in the schooling system. 

Turning Holidays into Learning Adventures 

Playful learning, combined with innovative tools like the Six Bricks method, transforms everyday moments into meaningful experiences.  

These activities and key skills ensure that your child is not only prepared for school success but also nurtured emotionally and socially.  

This holiday season, make your home a hub of exploration and creativity. Through play, you’ll watch your child thrive in confidence, skills, and joy. 

NOTE: Are you Homeschooling your child? 

If you are, it is possible to link the Six Bricks approaches to the developmental skills required in the Early Learning and Primary childhood education Curriculum. 

All you need are Six Bricks materials and you are able to map to the curriculum learning outcomes.  

You might also want to visit our sister website, Six Bricks Learning, to find out more about how the method helps with the achievement of curriculum learning requirements. This website focuses on resources for Early Learning Centres and is equally applicable for homeschooling. 

You are also able to be trained in the method. We have many preschool teachers and Primary School teachers who use the method to cement concepts. 

We train childhood educators to adopt this educational approach to playful facilitation. They use our Play and Learn Idea card decks to create a bank of ideas to improve all executive functioning skills. 

You will have access to hundreds of activities based on Six Bricks!  

After the Six Bricks training, you are able to apply the Six Bricks principles and the Six Bricks pedagogy in the activities you do with your child.  

You will then be in a position to tie the method into improved outcomes in mathematics and at the same time notice the improvements in the development of core skills.  

For more information, email us: info@yay4play.com