ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the role of explorative learning and play. It argues that it is vital to continue to promote a playful, explorative attitude to learning, which in turn promotes the essential learning capacities, such as independence, creative thinking, problem-solving and resilience, that children need for well-being and success. Explorative learning is about children learning through investigation, speculation, experiment and discovery, stimulated by their curiosity and wondering. The chapter looks at the importance of play and exploration in children’s learning. It identifies the key role of the teacher in providing the emotional and physical conditions to promote these key characteristics of effective learning and in pro-actively facilitating, modelling and engaging with playful behaviour. The national curriculum provides an outline of core knowledge around which teachers can develop exciting and stimulating lessons to promote the development of pupils’ knowledge, understanding and skills as part of the wider school curriculum.
