| Summary: | Play forms the basis of most quality early childhood education (ECE) curricula around the world (OECD, 2006; Sylva et al., 2014). Yet turning children’s play interests (e.g., Spiderman, Barbie) into important learning reified in curricula (e.g., literacy, numeracy) is a difficult challenge for most educators (Anning, 2010; Cooney, 2004; Rogers & Evans, 2008). Cultural historical theory provides one explanation why.History shows that children’s play has always reflected traditional societies’ most valued activities (Elkonin, 2005). For example, 18th-Century records show Ostiak children’s play in Siberia almost exclusively reflected the main way adult society subsisted: bow-hunting (Zuev, 1771/1947). Similarly, in remote Pacific island communities, children played in small dugout canoes, imitating the fishing so central to the communities’ livelihoods.Research also shows that imitation is the very way that children learn these prized adult practices (Rogoff, Mistry, Göncü, & Mosier, 1993). Through ‘legitimate peripheral participation’, children observe and increasingly imitate traditional societies’ subsistence activities (Lave, 1991, p. 63). How play connects to learning in these contexts is clear. However, in post-industrial societies, adults typically work outside the home (Rogoff et al., 2006) and so opportunities to influence children’s play are limited. Additionally, extraneous influences on children’s play are abundant in mass media, intensified by powerful, research-driven marketing, increasingly targeting children’s consumerism (Calvert, 2008). Thus, in post-industrial societies, the connection between children’s freely chosen play and useful learning is muddied by multiple factors. Little surprise, then, that educators struggle to connect children’s play interests to curriculum content (e.g., Anning, 2010). The Footsteps intervention described in this presentation sought to solve this problem, doing so in partnership with families, given the importance of continuity between home and ECE ...
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