What is free play?

• Free play is not limited to outdoor free play or play in nature.

• It can be an individual time to create artwork, for example by making use of the loose parts.

• It can be in the form of child-initiated play activities during the self-selected period.

The elements of exploration

• Free play should highlight the elements of exploration, involving the child using all their senses to search, discover, and learn more about something.

• Exploratory play activities include cooking, outdoor nature walks, building and taking things apart, mixing paint to find primary and secondary colors, sand, water, messy play, listening to a noise, music, airplane flying, etc.

• Through exploratory play, children learn about things, such as the relationships between shapes, spatial relations, numbers and patterns, etc.