Belle’s OT Corner
Belle’s OT Corner
Play Season: Ep 6 Cooperative and Pretend Play
Cooperative play marks a change within play where children begin working together to achieve shared goals. Whether building a tower, creating a fort, or solving an imaginary problem, this collaborative play helps children build so many skills within a fun, playful environment!
When you watch children negotiate who gets which role in their pretend restaurant or see them problem-solve together to build the perfect blanket fort, you're witnessing the emergence of teamwork, communication, and regulation in real-time.
When children step into different roles within dramatic pretend play, they're building so many skills from perspective taking to problem solving, and sequencing skills. Being playful allows children to build these critical thinking skills in a low pressure environment where their creativity can be set free!
As always, please do share it around with anyone that you think could benefit from it and follow me on @bellesotcorner on instagram and Facebook for more insights.
DISCLAIMER:
Whilst I will always make evert effort to share correct information as at the date of the podcast, research is constantly happening and as a profession we learn more everyday. One therapist may have a different way of doing things to another, and every child's needs are unique. By listening to this podcast, you agree not to use this podcast as medical advice to treat any medical condition in either yourself or others Consult your child's paediatrician or therapist for any recommendations for your child.
Hey everyone and welcome back to Belzo Tea Corner. Today we're going to be jumping into our second, last episode in the play season and we're going to be talking all about cooperative play and pretend play. So, coming off last week, where we talked about those associative play and symbolic play skills and we started to touch on some of those early pretend play skills, we're going to dive into pretend play a little bit more today and really focusing on what we call that like dramatic pretend play, which we'll get into in a second. I can't believe we're rounding out, or coming close to rounding out, the play season. Guys. It's crazy. I hope everyone's been having a really great week and we'll dive in.
Speaker 1:So cooperative play is, as we see kids start to move into this later play stage and this is where they're really working together or playing together to problem solve and achieve a shared goal. So, instead of this idea of I'm doing my thing, you're doing your thing, or a more competitive based game where we're kind of fighting against not fighting against each other, but when we're competing against each other that's the word I was looking for and we have this kind of winner loser dynamic Cooperative play is when we really do have a common goal, and that common goal might be one that we decide together. It might be one that's set up by somebody else, but it's this idea of we're working together to figure something out to achieve a common goal Sounds a bit familiar to a lot of skills that we use later in life. Right, but play, as I've always said, is the way way our kids start to build these skills and start to explore some of these skills that become quite important for later life, because I know that a lot of like my job, for example. Yes, I'm an OT, but I'm thinking my job in terms of working with other OTs and other allied health professionals.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of cooperative play. There's a lot of cooperative play. There's a lot of shared problem solving. There's a lot of figuring out a common goal and who's going to do what bits and how are we going to split this up. But we're really talking within the play side of things. But just keep that in the back of your mind that this sort of play really does help facilitate a lot of those problem solving skills, and that's why play is so important. It's not just oh, they're playing for the sake of playing. Yes, they're playing for the sake of playing, but in the process of playing they're learning so many important skills, and so allowing that play time is so, so, so important, as I have always said and will continue to say, I'm sure, many, many times before we finish out this season.
Speaker 1:So what do we start to see in cooperative play? It's where we start to see early bits of organisation who's going to do what and why. You see kids that will start to understand and accept roles within play. So maybe they're looking at building a tower. I'm just going to start to throw out some examples. But we're not building separate towers, we're building a tower together, and so we've decided that actually we're going to have, you know, these two towers and they're going to join here and they're going to go up even taller and I'll do this bit, but can you do that bit, or can you hold it whilst I build it so that it keeps stable? Starting to assign a bit of those roles and starting to figure out how to get to that same goal of their shared tower that they were building together.
Speaker 1:It's where you'll see kids start to not start but continue to exchange ideas and toys, and so maybe, if we go with this same idea of building a shared tower together. It doesn't work the first time and one person goes oh, maybe we need more bricks. So they try with more bricks and it still doesn't work. Okay, maybe we need bigger bricks at the bottom. So then we get some bigger bricks at the bottom and that works a little bit, but it still falls over. And then maybe another child or maybe they you know just the two of them someone goes oh, actually I think we need to be really careful where we're putting the bricks. So they're right on top, and so they start to share these ideas and exchange ideas, and a lot of the time it could be no, that's silly, I'm going to keep doing it this way and you see a little bit of those which we'll talk about later on.
Speaker 1:But some of these negotiation tactics and natural frustrations that will arise within this play and there's out, you know, and they'll try and solve between themselves. But I'm sure that there'll be times where they go so and so did this, or she's not playing properly. And you know, it's where this idea of playing properly becomes a thing, because there are different roles that we're assigning to people and as soon as we do that, one kid will have a predetermined idea in their brain of what that should look like and it's up to them to be able to explain that idea. And if they don't, or they have difficulties explaining that idea, or the other person they're playing with has a completely different idea, but all they've said is we're going to do a tower, how do they figure out and merge their ideas together? How do they figure out which idea they're going with? All of these skills that start to happen and it works sometimes and it doesn't work other times, and that's okay. That's part of the process and part of the learning that these kids go through.
Speaker 1:So you'll start to see some of the really nice skills that we see within this type of play is you'll see perspective taking. What did they want? What did I want? Oh, maybe we could do it that way. Well, that's a different idea that I hadn't thought of before, but I wonder what would happen if I try. You'll see a lot of conflict resolution, sometimes successful, sometimes not so successful. A lot of conflict resolution, sometimes successful, sometimes not so successful.
Speaker 1:And so if you think about what we can do as we're facilitating this type of play is, let's say, you're, I'll do one like school example and one home example. But at school, let's say, you're watching, you know two learners that are playing together and you're going oh, they're bubbling, but they've kind of got it under control and you can probably see exactly where the breakdown is. Sometimes it's quite obvious in the sense of oh yeah, well, bobby wants to do this, and I can really see that sarah doesn't, has a different idea, but they both think that they're doing the same thing, but they're not, and so just sit back and watch and, depending upon where their frustration levels are at, let them have a try at solving it. And then you might come over and go hmm, what are we doing? So we're building a tower. I'm going to stick with the building a tower analogy. I will talk about other types of play and other types of play that we can do within cooperative play and other games that we can do. That's what I was looking for.
Speaker 1:But you might come over to these two and say guys, what are we doing? And they'll say we're building a tower. Okay, cool, how are we building a tower? Or what tower are we building? And so you can ask those open-ended questions that help them to go Sarah, what's your idea? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And Bobby, what's your idea? Blah, blah, blah, blah. Huh, they're different ideas. I wonder what you could do. So see how I'm not giving the answer, but what I'm doing is structuring, how I'm prompting so that the idea becomes more and more. The problem becomes more and more obvious.
Speaker 1:In this case, the problem is that they're trying to build this tower together, but they've both got very different ideas of how to build the tower, and so then it was leading to a bit of this conflict, and see if they can prompt it and if they're still having difficulties, and I go well, what would happen if we did this? And see if they can figure that out. So you give them small little bits, small little stepping stones to help with that kind of conflict resolution that they're doing, because sometimes they're not aware of what the problem is, because they're very focused on how they're going to be doing it and they think they've talked about it, and so all it takes most of the time is just being like oh, we have different ideas here. I wonder what we could do and just leaving it and letting them think and giving them time to think. You want to give their brains time to go. I don't know, but maybe this or maybe that, and allowing that bits and pieces also within this play, you'll see there's that early bits of not early bits, but that next stage of following rules and this is where you'll get the. She's not playing properly, he's not following the rules, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 1:We've all heard it, and part of the rules are those implicit rules where we don't need to say them. Everyone understands it. For example, eventually all kids learn how to play tag and there's rules around tag, and so if someone says we're playing tag, we don't need to say the rules every time. Other times it's explicit where kids will sit there and debate what the rules are, or you'll be playing a structured game that's led by an adult and the adult's scripted what the rules are, and then it's the dynamics of how to follow those rules. You'll see kids as a part of the conflict resolution and even making up their own rules. There'll be this communication and compromise. That happens um, which is a tricky skill but such an important one, and it will look different for different kids as to what that communication looks like and how they approach it. But within play it's a really great place to do it because the stakes aren't that high and at the end of the day, if it's not working, they can just leave the play and go and play with someone else. So it's a really safe space to start to build and explore some of these skills.
Speaker 1:So if we think of what cooperative play could look like, obviously I had my lovely analogy of building a tower, which I think I've used almost every episode now. Blocks or a tower in some form, and you can tell I love blocks and towers and that sort of abstract play. It's one of my one of my favorites and one of my go-tos. But what else could this look like? It could be kids that are deciding and agreeing on a game and going through that negotiation process. It could be cooperative board games deciding and agreeing on a game and going through that negotiation process. It could be cooperative board games where they're working together to solve a problem or achieve a common goal. It could be bits of role playing and pretend play, which we'll talk about a bit more in a second.
Speaker 1:If we think about how we could bring play into the home, it could be doing cooking and assigning roles to different people within their cooking. So maybe, okay, well, we're all going to cook together, guys, and it's going to be your job to cut the veggies, and you're going to have to be the one that's mixing it all together, and you're going to be the one that's I don't know getting the plates out, or you're going to be the one that's I don't know getting the plates out, or you're going to be the one that's making sure we're following the recipe. You've got the right amounts of everything, whatever it might be, but all of a sudden, you've taken one job, split it into three or four different roles, and now we're all having to work together to get to achieve this, and so we're doing a little bit of cooperative play. Yes, it's in the context of cooking, but cooking is fun anyway, particularly for like doing baking and stuff. Baking is great fun, especially when you get to lick out the bowl and clean up. Well, clean up, get to, you know, use your finger to clean out the bowl at the end of it's the best part of the whole thing. Same thing you could do at like a clean up time turn cleaning up into a bit of a game and you could do it where they're working together to clean everything up before the music runs out or before the time runs out and you might go one step further and be like right, your job is picking up everything and your job is to carry the box and make sure that they can put it through them all in, and so all of a sudden, we've got different roles but we're working together to achieve this. Or it could be that you know your job is to sweep and your job is to get everything out of the way while she's sweeping or while they're sweeping, and so you can see how these little tweaks bring in a fun element like some music or a little bit of a time pressure element for them, and that's not. They're racing against each other. It's not competition, but they're racing against each other. It's not competition, but they're racing against something external together.
Speaker 1:Um, there are some great songs out there as well, particularly for younger kids. There's one, uh, what's it called? Let's play, pack away, love it. I think that's what it's called. Hang on, I'm gonna have to check now, but I'm pretty sure it's called let's play back away, and it has this lovely little timer sound in it and it starts and stops and starts and stops. Um, and it's just fantastic to help kids, kind of like, really stay motivated. Yes, it is called let's play, pack away, um, but so things like that, where you can bring in that sort of play dynamic, but we've still got different roles here that each kid's doing, but they're working together. Can you see the difference between that and the kind of competitive play where you'll see a lot of pushing against each other? This is actually we're working together to do something.
Speaker 1:Other things that you could do at home are things like shared storytelling. So I might start the story and be like there were once two little pigs and then the next person has to add what those two little pigs do and the next person has to then add what those two little pigs do when it goes around and around and around and they get really silly and everything else, and maybe you could have someone acting it out. I don't know. The opportunities are endless. But this idea of I can't keep going with the story until someone else adds their bit and you get that kind of cooperation and that shared problem-solving element. You can do lots of role-playing and pretend, play bits and pieces which I'll talk about more in a second around that kind of more dramatic play. You could do things like oh gosh, there's so many options. You could do things like build an obstacle course but instead of me as the adult setting up the obstacle course, we're all going to set it up together, but it's not one person setting it up, it's okay. First I'm going to say in the obstacle course, we're going to do this, what's going to happen next? Who's going to add the next bit? But a negotiation, someone chooses the next bit, okay, and then what? Who adds the next bit after? And so then you're kind of all in that building it together and the common goal there is to have an obstacle course to do, and then you can complete the obstacle course and it's great fun. But see how the play actually comes around the building of it.
Speaker 1:Or like making tents. I made so many tents growing up. Oh bless my parents for the amount of chaos that we created. All under the dining room table, over everything. We had tents that stayed up days and we would eat under them. It was a fantastic fun. But true chaos, and part of the fun actually all of the fun, most of the time was building the tent. Yes, it stayed up for a couple days, but that's because we had improvements to make on the tent. You know, know, one bit didn't structurally work and so then we have to figure that out and problem solve it and get a different sheet or some heavier books or whatever it was that we needed, or a different chair in a different position to start to do this problem solving together, because our shared goal was making this really cool tent. And then, once we had the tent, it just kind of became another play space, which is, you know, fantastic fun. Sometimes there were stories that happened in the tent and it became part of the pretend play, but a lot of the time the fun was actually in the building of it together.
Speaker 1:I say fun, fun and arguments and debates, but arguments and debates that are important because they help us build all of those skills that we were talking about before, but overall mostly fun. And so think about in your kind of day-to-day play, when you're looking at this type of play, it's that idea of well, how can we figure something out together, how can we give the kids a little bit of choice, a little bit of control and some autonomy where they can try and figure it out together? And then, if it starts to break down, how and when can we step in to facilitate that problem solving, so that there is that ultimate success. So that's our cooperative play Now, if we chat about pretend play and dramatic play, so let's take a step back first. If we think about pretend play.
Speaker 1:You may have noticed I've talked about bits of pretend play in previous episodes, particularly in our symbolic play episode. I definitely talked about bits of pretend play that we could start to do In our functional play. There were elements of pretend play that started to come in, less so in our onlooker and parallel play, but you might have heard it started to pop up a couple times and that's because pretend play is quite broad. Pretend play includes everything from when we're doing the really dramatic, socio-dramatic pretend play of different characters, different roles, we're debating things. I'm playing mums and dads, we're playing kitchen, we're playing small world games. I'll go into all of these in a second.
Speaker 1:But it also goes all the way down to objects substitution. It goes down to kind of early storytelling, starting to explore role playing, some of the stuff that we've talked about before. Around this idea of all, I can pretend that, um, this block is actually a phone again me and blocks, but this block is actually a phone Again me and blocks, but this block is actually a phone, and I can pretend that mum and dad's shoes are actually my shoes and I'm going to put them on and walk around the house, and I can pretend that my I don't know my sister's top is now my top and it's actually a dress, not a top anymore. So you can see, there's lots of that pretend play that starts to come at those early ages. But what we're talking about today when I reference pretend play, is I'm more talking about the dramatic play that comes along with pretend play. So this is when we have that really story based pretend play.
Speaker 1:So there's a sequence of things that are happening. There's a bit of problem solving that's involved. We've got different roles and sometimes it's great when you see it really start to emerge and it'll be like we're playing I don't care, we're playing mums and dads. And all of a sudden it's like I'm the mummy, I'm the mummy, I'm the daddy, I'm the daddy, I'm the mummy. And all of a sudden we've got five kids being parents and one kid being the baby. But it works because they all have their roles and they all go about it and then as we move through the stages, it might get a little bit more. Well, no, you were the mummy last time, so I'm going to be the mummy this time and you can be the other mummy and we're going to do this, or I'm going to be the daddy and you can be. And it starts to become a little bit more structured within their play and there start to be more rules that they adhere to, and so as we start to think about the dramatic play that comes in, that's where we get that sort of element of persisting through a story, and you know my own childhood.
Speaker 1:We had so many stories that we would keep coming back to. You know great cops and robbers, stories that we would come back to time and time again. I would frequently play I'm the teacher and my siblings are the students. I'm not sure they loved it, but you know it was a very structured game that we kept coming back to, clearly destined to work with kids from a young age, um, but they start to have these scripts and each time they come back to them they get more detailed, more refined and more deliberate. What we love about pretend play is it's where kids get to explore and experiment with different roles, different emotions, different experiences in this really safe space, because I'm imagining. I know it's not real, but I can try and I can pretend.
Speaker 1:And for some kids, stepping into this role of being silly and being pretend can be really tricky. I had one kid I worked with who, when we were going to do pretend, we had to go through a little bit of a. It's okay, it's not what we're doing, we're going to pretend and we'll tell us. When we were going to do pretend, we had to go through a little bit of a. It's okay, it's not what we're doing, we're going to pretend and we'll tell us when we're stopped finishing. And so that they knew that as soon as we would say right, pretend's finished, we're going back to bell and you know whatever. Don't say okay, great that that's done and now I can go back into my me. But but when we got into the pretend play, it was great. His whole face would light up because all of a sudden he was an astronaut. And then we were firefighters and we were going down and we were taking dressing gown ropes to firefight all the fires that were burning. You know this bit of pretend play and what we both had to do within this pretend play is great fun.
Speaker 1:So what might you need for pretend play. You can use different costumes and dress ups. What might you need for pretend play? You can use different costumes and dress-ups. You can use, like pretend play, kits like mini kitchens or doctor kits or supermarket shopping kits all that stuff. It's kind of based in real world experiences. Um, and also, just a little aside, it's also really really great to use play to help someone get ready for an experience. Like doctor kits are really great so that kids can become a little bit familiar with what might be happening if we go to the doctors. So maybe if you're going to get your um vaccinations or you've got to go to a checkup for the doctors, getting a 10 play kit, you being the doctor, and you can pretend like right now we're kind of the doctors, so we got to look after ourselves and I'm gonna check that you're healthy and to keep you healthy, we're gonna give you a little shot and like modeling and playing through all of that also can be a really really nice bit within pretend play. But you don't need all of this stuff as well. Pretend play is just as effective where you take random objects and give them random properties and use that kind of real object substitution stuff that we were talking about in the previous episodes to support the play as well.
Speaker 1:So why do we care about pretend play? Because there's lots of reasons why I care about pretend play and lots of things that develop through pretend play that often aren't as easily understood because they aren't as explicitly obvious. So I wanted to spend some time in today's episode to talk through a bit of the why behind it and we can then quickly talk through some of the games and things that you can try at home. But there's more of that that's really easily accessible online, like if you're stuck and you Google pretend play ideas for an insert, age, year old or pretend play ideas just in general, you'll get thousands upon thousands of different pretend play ideas Everything from. You know you could go out in the backyard and collect leaves to make soup Great pretend play, you know. And you get all your the backyard and collect leaves to make soup Great pretend play, you know. And you get all your sticks and things and mix them all together all the way through to some of the more real-world pretend play like we talked about around mums and dads play, or doctor-based play or cooking-based play.
Speaker 1:I love when kids do the little, like cafe setup and you can say that's this much and you go to their restaurant, you sit down and you know they go and pretend to cook it for you and you wait and they bring it over and all of that play is lovely, lovely pretend play as well. But a bit of the why about? Why do we care From a cognition perspective and some that cognitive development? This is where we really see a big leap in kids problem solving skills. And when I say problem solving skills, it's this idea of both being able to problem solve an obstacle they might encounter or a naturally occurring problem within the play. So, for example, if I'm doing play, doing a pretend play, for example, if I'm doing play, doing a pretend play, let's say I'm doing some cooking but I realize I need to mix something and I don't have a spoon but I do have a random like stick from musical instrument that problem solving of oh, I can use that stick and I'm going to make that mix as well but also into some of that problem solving skills around how to handle conflict.
Speaker 1:Or if someone else shares an idea and goes, let's say they're doing a pretend play script outside and they're all running away from monsters and someone goes I'm stuck, the monster got me, okay, well, everyone else then needs to do the problem solving, of right, I know what that means. But what are we going to do now? How are we going to add to this story to save this person from the monster? Um, and it's figuring out how, what my character's going to do. How are we going to stay within this interaction and stay in this play script? So I'm not coming out of it and going don't be silly. Staying in that play script and going I'm gonna get you, I've got my sword and all of a sudden pretending to hold a sword and fight the monster, um, it's where we see some like critical thinking and some of that like problem solving skills to be able to go okay, well, what else could we do there? And start to do that like flexibility and thought. So, either if it's like switching between different characters, which kids will do all the time and you know being able to keep track of who's doing what role now but also being able to um respond when someone else brings in an idea into a play script, because, particularly if I've worked really hard to think of what we're going to play, then someone else gives a new idea into that play scenario. How can I keep myself regulated? How can I accept that idea? Change my plan? So do a little bit of flexibility so that our two plans can merge together.
Speaker 1:From a language perspective and I'm not a speech and language therapist, but if we think about language that happens in play this is where we see kids start to negotiate. They will create dialogue within their characters and they can, you know, have their scenarios and express their ideas. So build these multi-step sequences and scenarios but then be able to express their ideas to their peers and express their thoughts and their emotions in a way that supports the play to continue as well. When we think of some of the social and emotional skills, I already mentioned a bit about regulation, but this is where you'll see kids that will start to go, you know, either exploring new feelings or start to be able to manage their feelings, their frustrations, to be able to then persist with the play, looking at that cooperation that we talked about, looking at being able to empathize with others and understand something from someone else's perspective, because I pretended to be them and I had a little bit of feeling what it felt like to be them, and so you see, some of these early skills start to build and emerge. That can be really important for that later, um move towards self-regulation as well.
Speaker 1:If we think of some of the other general skills that these, the kids, can develop in this area, we see like self-care skills, and so the OT and me, like you know, when you've got kids doing pretend play and dress up, they're practicing dressing. Um, you know they're taking on and off clothing, they're doing buttons and zippers. If it's like their fine motor skills are getting a workout, they're using their bodies to do different movements. So they're building that course, motor skills as well. You know they've got great bits like balance, coordination, how am I going to navigate my body? How can I use the right amount of strength all of that great stuff comes in as well. And the really nice bit that we start to see as well is this self-confidence start to develop. I can try something different and it doesn't matter if it goes wrong because I'm just playing. I can gain confidence in, like what I can do and how I can do it, and you know what are ways that I can navigate this and persist through this and hey, it worked and that's great fun, and so that side of play is really important as well, because we start to see these kids go. Well, I had a problem and we were playing, but I kept going, or I tried this and it worked and that felt really good, and so you start to see all of these skills come out as well. So that's a bit of the why behind, why we care about pretend play and why it's not just playing but actually there's so much that the brain is doing in the background as well.
Speaker 1:Before we wrap up today, guys, I'm just going to run through like a couple little pretend play activities that you could do at home, and maybe some that you could do in the classroom as well, and then we'll wrap up the episode and then there'll just be one left. So, if we think about pretend play activities, you could do things like restaurant based play so I mentioned that one earlier with the sort of cafe and maybe you're working together in the restaurant, or there's a couple of kids that are working together in the restaurant that you're helping set up and organize. You could do things like a pirate adventure, and sometimes these are really nice. If you like, if you have kids that are having difficulties coming up with ideas, read a book together and then be like, hey, let's go on our own pirate adventure because they've got some ideas of what that might look like from the book that they just read. But then they can also go. Okay, yeah, no, I can do this. I can, I can have a go at being a pirate and pretending this.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, you could do things like be pretending to be vets, and so you take the stuffed toys and you treat them for different things and you wrap them up in sheets. Or you know if you've got a little vet kit you can use that. Or you can just get, you know, a fork and a spoon and all of a sudden you've got a thermometer. Excuse me, all of a sudden you've got a thermometer and you know a stethoscope or whatever else and you can pretend to be looking after the um pets at the vet. You could, oh, what else could you do? There are so many options firefighters I mentioned.
Speaker 1:Um, another really nice, easy one is looking at like talent show games where we can pretend and be silly and show off something, and so then it takes the pressure off having to be perfect or having to do exactly the right thing, but we're all just being silly together as well. And honestly, guys, there's 15,000 different ones. There were just some from the top of my head. But I promise you, if you Google pretend play activities, there will be thousands upon thousands that come up and some that have resources for you to support that as well. But the biggest bit is if you can keep it, particularly initially, if you can keep it closer to experiences that they know and then, over time, help them expand to that real imaginative play of experiences that they don't know as well. Look at that, guys. Nice, short and sweet 30 minutes ones today. But that wraps up our pretend play.
Speaker 1:The last episode that I'm going to do within our play season is a bit about that idea of persistence in play and problem solving within play.
Speaker 1:I know we touched on it a little bit today, but I really want to dig a bit deeper into what we can do as adults to support that problem solving, support that persistence, and a part of that is supporting their regulation within play as well.
Speaker 1:But we'll touch on that next episode and then if there's anything that you'd really like to hear for the next season, guys, let me know. I'm in the process of planning bits and pieces now. Me know, I'm in the process of planning bits and pieces now, but if there's a particular topic that you really want to know about, or that your OT's talked about, or that your teacher's talked about, whatever it might be, or you're just curious about, send me a message on Instagram or send me an email to bellsotcorner at gmailcom and I'll see if I can work it in for you guys. But otherwise, have a fantastic week as always. Please do rate and review um and share the podcast around. It means a lot and it helps helps more than you can imagine. It's really really, really helpful, um, and yeah, otherwise, guys, have a fantastic week and I will see you soon. Bye, thank you.