Guided Play: Turning Everyday Play into Meaningful STEM Learning Opportunities

Are you looking for ways to help children learn STEM concepts and processes naturally and in a fun and engaging way? In this blog, we will explore the teaching practice of guided play, also known as play-based learning. This approach involves adults intentionally guiding play to support children’s learning goals.

What is Guided Play or Play-Based Learning?

Guided play, or play-based learning, is a teaching strategy that helps young children learn while they play. It keeps play fun and child-led, meaning children decide what and how they want to play. Adults play a key role by creating a prepared environment, offering interesting materials, and providing gentle guidance without interrupting the child’s autonomy.

Instead of directing children’s actions, adults observe, listen, and provide just the right amount of support—or scaffolding—when needed. This approach encourages children to explore ideas, ask questions, and develop new skills and understandings naturally through play. For example:

• During block play, an adult might ask, “How tall can you make your tower?” to encourage problem-solving or math thinking.
• While exploring water and cups, an adult might say, “What happens if you use a bigger cup to fill this one?” to prompt exploration of measurement or cause and effect.

Guided play builds on children’s natural curiosity and eagerness to learn, making it especially effective in early childhood. It allows children to explore STEM concepts and processes in meaningful ways while keeping play engaging and joyful. (Weisberg et al., 2016)

Why is Guided Play Important?

Guided play has proven to be an effective way to foster deep learning in young children. While children are naturally inclined to explore the world around them, guided play helps them engage with STEM concepts and processes more intentionally. It provides opportunities to nurture children’s curiosity while teaching them valuable problem-solving, critical thinking, and social collaboration skills. (Bayley et al., 2024)

Research has shown that guided play supports STEM learning and helps in other areas such as early literacy, socioemotional development, and executive functioning (Fuligni et al., 2012; Cavanaugh et al., 2016). This approach works for children of all abilities, including children with disabilities (Movahedazarhouligh, 2018). By combining a playful learning environment with thoughtful adult guidance, children can make meaningful connections between their natural play and the STEM concepts and processes they are exploring.

How to Guide Play

Guiding play does not mean interrupting or dictating what children do. Instead, it is about setting up the environment, offering interesting materials, and stepping in with support when needed. Here are some ways to guide play effectively:

1. Set Up Engaging Environments: Prepare the space with materials that encourage exploration of STEM concepts. For example, building blocks can introduce engineering and spatial reasoning, while materials like water, sand, or magnets can help children explore scientific principles.
   • Use STEMIE’s Guide to Adaptations to help set up the environment and materials in a way that is supportive and inclusive for all children.
2. Observe: Pay attention to what children are interested in and what they are curious about. This will help you guide their exploration in ways that feel natural and meaningful to them.
   • Use STEMIE’s Guide to Noticing STEM Learning to help you identify what children are interested in by how they are using their senses to explore and investigate their environment.
3. Ask Questions: Encourage deeper thinking by asking open-ended questions that prompt children to reflect on what they are doing. For example, “What do you think will happen if you add more blocks to your tower?” or “Can you describe how the ball moved when you pushed it?”
   • Use STEMIE’s Guide to Asking Open-Ended Questions to develop guiding questions that cultivate curiosity and encourage children to think deeply, make predictions, and explain their ideas. Open-ended questions like, “How did you figure that out?” or “What else could we try?” allow children to explore and take ownership of their learning.
4. Provide Scaffolding: Scaffolding is when an adult gives support to a young child as they learn something new or challenging. It involves breaking down the task into smaller, more manageable steps and guiding them through each part. Offer just enough support to help children succeed. This might mean modeling a new strategy or giving them a hint when they are stuck. Over time, this support should gradually decrease, allowing children to take on more responsibility for their learning.
   • Use STEMIE’s Guide to Teaching Practices to learn more about scaffolding and other teaching strategies that can support STEM learning. 

How to Use Guided Play for Informal Assessment of STEM Learning

You might wonder how to assess a child’s understanding of STEM concepts while using play-based learning. Guided play offers a fantastic way to informally assess a child’s understanding of STEM concepts and processes through observation and interaction. Here is how you can do it:

• Observe: Watch how children engage with the materials. Are they experimenting with how things work? Are they using math, science, or engineering concepts as they play? Pay attention to the language children use. Are they communicating about patterns, measurements, or cause-and-effect relationships? Are they able to explain what they are doing and why?
• Ask Questions: Ask open-ended questions to help children reflect on their experiences. This can help you gauge their understanding of STEM concepts and processes. For example, you might ask, “How did you figure out how to make the robot move?” or “What did you learn when you tried to build your bridge?”
• Document: As children engage in different guided play activities, you can track how their understanding of STEM concepts develops over time.  Record observations in a notebook or on sticky notes. Take notes of what STEM vocabulary they are using. Take pictures of what art they create based on their guided STEM play. 

Guided play is a powerful tool for cultivating STEM learning in young children. By setting up environments that invite exploration and empower children’s engagement, asking thoughtful questions, and offering just the right amount of guidance, you can help children engage with STEM concepts in a fun and meaningful way. Additionally, guided play offers a unique opportunity for informal assessment, allowing you to observe children’s understanding and progress as they learn through play.

The next time you see a child building with blocks, exploring with magnets, or playing with a toy robot, remember that they are engaging in vital STEM learning. With your support, their play can become even more rich and meaningful, laying the foundation for a lifetime of curiosity and learning in science, technology, engineering, and math.