Understanding Schematic Play

Have you ever wondered why your child carries around their bag of toys whilst playing rather than leaving it in one spot or why they are constantly tipping toys out of boxes leaving a huge mess to tidy up and refuse to stop? These underlying patterns of behaviour can sometimes be frustrating for an adult to watch, but not only are they essential to a child’s development, they also act as a dynamic route for playful learning. These patterns of repeated actions are known as schemas. Schematic play is when babies, toddlers or young children feel an urge to repeat certain actions to investigate and understand how the world around them works. Practising the same activity over and again helps a child’s brain development by consolidating their learning experience.

By recognising different schemas, we can give children activities and resources that will maintain their interest as well as helping them through their stages of development. Let's explore 4 common schemas that you may recognise as a parent/carer…

Scattering

Scattering can be present in childhood behaviour in many ways, examples of this may be: throwing toys out of boxes, creating random marks on their drawing/painting, digging and throwing mud/sand or pouring out glitter pots. By scattering items, children may be exploring textures and sizes, experiencing a feeling of freedom and curiosity, prompting them to explore the outcomes of their actions and they will also be learning how to tidy up.

Due to children wanting to scatter items, they may be interested in the following resources: glitter, sand, mud and watering cans/funnels.

Here are some ideas for promoting this type of development through play:

• Water play – use resources such as funnels, watering cans or jugs to fill up different colour or sized buckets.
• Create glitter pictures or for a more contained messy play solution our Glitter Panels offer the same memorising view of falling/ scattered glitter but secured in our signature Easy Hold Panel frame.
• Scatter toys such as our tickit translucent fish, jewels or shells and allow your child to sort them into the correct coloured bowls.
• Create a sensory tray or table with different sections filled with different textures such as sand, rice, pasta, soil etc. Our Discovery Trays are perfect for this type of activity!

Rotational

Children are absorbed with circular movement and enjoy whirling, twirling, drawing circles and round shapes, turning taps on and off, watching fans, spinning tops, playing on roundabouts, moving wheels, using rolling pins and waving ribbons or streamers. This can help them to learn about shapes, space and movement.

Allow your children to play with toys with turning wheels and cogs, balls of different shapes and sizes, roundabouts and spinning toys.

Here are some ideas for supporting a rotational interest:

• Provide balls of different shapes and sizes and allow your child to participate in kicking and throwing and catching games. Our tickit Constellation Ball offers an added glitter sensory experience to the traditional ball games.
• Create a car small world play scene – by providing your child with small car toys, it not only helps with learning about rotation but is also ideal for your child to use in imaginative play and to encourage descriptive language skills.
• Our tickit Rainbow Wooden Community People is a perfect resource for exploring rotation. They can practice this essential skill with this resource by screwing on the rainbow coloured ‘clothing’ on to the threaded bodies and then creating little people by screwing on the feet.

Enveloping

Children will be observed covering objects or themselves with different materials, enjoy hiding, making dark dens and wrapping things in paper or fabric. They are learning about awareness of their bodies and exploring how their bodies and objects link with the physical world. They will also be learning about how objects maintain their form in different scenarios.

Provide resources to allow them to create dens, dress up and hide items:

• Dress up with different materials like organza, scarves, hats etc.
• Resources similar to the Hedgehog Sorting Wheel allow children to hide shapes and objects whilst also improving their shape and colour recognition skills.

Connecting

Children spend time joining things together with string, tape or ribbon. They enjoy building chains out of objects and fastening fabrics together. By doing these actions, they will be exploring how objects join together and come apart whilst developing their fine motor skills.  You will most likely find that the will start to like construction toys, and doing arts and crafts where they can glue pieces of material together.

Here are some fun play ideas to support the connecting schema:

• Create jewellery with string and loose parts such as our Rainbow Wooden Hoops.
• Our Connecting Camels provide an opportunity for a variety of sequencing and connecting challenges as they are easy to push together and pull apart.
• Decorate the play area by creating paper chains! Join pieces of paper together to create a beautiful decoration. You can even create little drawings on the paper before you connect them for an added fun challenge!

In conclusion, there are so many more schemas to be explored but understanding and recognising these common schemas in children's play is essential for supporting their cognitive and physical development. These recurring patterns of behavior, such as scattering, rotational actions, enveloping, and connecting, are not just random or disruptive; they are purposeful explorations that help children make sense of the world around them. By providing children with the right resources and opportunities to engage in schematic play, parents and educators can facilitate deeper learning experiences and foster creativity, problem-solving, and fine motor skills. Ultimately, embracing schematic play allows us to nurture a child's natural curiosity and help them build a strong foundation for future learning.