Try it out!

Enter the world of endless possibilities! The sky is the limit as children create imaginary play experiences to explore scenarios from their world in different ways.

Make-believe play is an important part of a research-based curriculum and the education practices you use every day. It begins with pretend play, where children begin to use objects in imaginary situations. As children grow, their play may begin to involve social interactions and take on more characteristics of make-believe. Head Start staff can build on children’s interests with pretend or make-believe play in many ways.

Be intentional in your exploration.

• Observe and talk to children about their interests and follow their lead when engaging in pretend play!
• Watch for what children's pretend play tells you about important cultural behaviors, such as how children eat meals or how family members interact with each other.
• Regardless of your age, it's fun to play make-believe. When adults play with children, it provides an opportunity to extend children’s learning. You can help create rich interactions and experiences, including back-and-forth conversations and asking open-ended questions.
• During home visits, discuss open-ended materials, cooperative use of toys, and using materials found at home as play props that encourage interactions and opportunities for social play with family members and peers.
• For home-based group socializations, create a physical space that encourages children to be in the same area as other children. Guide families to pause and watch how their child interacts with play equipment and materials. Ask them to notice the ways their child uses the materials to imitate routines in the home. Did they see their child pretend to cook dinner or put a doll down for a nap? Encourage families to play alongside their child, ask questions, and see where the play goes next.
• Families can be a resource for ideas and materials for pretend play. For example, a field trip to the local library might spark children’s interest in creating a library in the dramatic play area. You can then brainstorm possibilities with children and ask their families for ideas and appropriate materials to contribute to the learning environment. When families and children contribute, they see themselves in the setting and know they belong!

Gather materials to support your nature outing.

• Clothes, costumes, and tools can encourage children to engage in different types of play scenarios and roles and introduce role-specific language.
• To support infants in the early stages of pretend play, give them a variety of toys, like rattles, squeaking toys, or plastic blocks. This helps infants learn that different toys have different purposes, an important first step in pretend play.
• Adults can model pretend play with infants and toddlers during routines or play times — from zooming a spoon like an airplane during mealtime to using spoons and pans as drums and drumsticks and more.
• Open-ended materials such as scarves, boxes in different sizes, or blocks can be used by many different ages, developmental levels, and in a variety of ways to promote children's curiosity, exploration, discovery, and imagination. Pretending common objects like blocks are something else like phones can be a great way to encourage executive function skills!
• Get creative! You can use toys that look like the real thing if you have them at home or in your learning environment, or you can use everyday objects or recyclables to make props. For example, you can play “hospital” with fabric bandages or hand towels or make “bandages” by cutting them out of a cereal box. Engage families by asking for ideas and materials they may have to donate.
• Make prop boxes by collecting items over time. For example, make a restaurant prop box with menus, tablecloths, small notebooks for taking customer orders, aprons, and other items. for from Consider asking local businesses to donate items like pizza boxes, takeout containers, and old menus. If you can store a variety of prop boxes, you will have materials ready in the moment when children have an interest in a particular make-believe play plot.
• Encourage pretend play situations that are common to the children in your program, like going to the zoo, grocery store, or camping, and create an environment around that scenario. For example, have dance regalia, small camping chairs, and small tents available for when children want to make-believe that they are at a party or cultural gathering such as a powwow. Ask children to think about what kinds of roles they want to play and what they see at the event that can be added to the space.
• Encourage children to act out parts of their favorite books, stories, chants, or songs. Ask children for ideas for materials they will need. Add books to the dramatic play space as a reference for how to act out the story as it is or extend it in new and different ways using their imaginations.
• Brainstorm with families about what materials and household items might be safe and appropriate for their child to use in pretend play. Talk about indoor and outdoor spaces where pretend play can take place. Assure parents that pretend play does not always require the use of toys and objects. Talk with them about following their child’s lead in pretend play scenarios such as imitating different animals and how they sound and move, throwing and catching an invisible ball, and routines such as napping and waking up.
• Consider adaptations that help everyone to engage.
• Shorten the time or distance of your exploration to ensure the path works for all ages and abilities.
• Help children interact with materials by modeling/teaching them to touch (safe) items with one finger or using instructions like “touch softly.”
• Adjust your level of language while still using descriptive words and phrases; include home or Indigenous languages whenever possible, use communication cards or devices and sign language to support communication with all children.
• For urban areas, consider if local parks are available or find examples of nature in the city- birds, insects, plants and trees can usually be found. The sun, rain, snow, wind and temperature are part of nature, too! Encourage children to observe the mix of nature and urban sounds, smells, and sights.

Consider adaptations that help everyone engage.

• Make sure dramatic play space and materials can be accessed by all children and staff. Allow enough space to move around and low shelves and open tubs to get materials.
• Ensure dramatic and pretend play materials can be used by all children. For example, provide scarves that can be attached to a wrist band and offer different sizes of “dress up” clothing or hats. Make sure materials are not a choking hazard or can be mouthed safely if that is developmentally appropriate for the child.
• Provide opportunities for all children to create play scenarios using prompting questions (e.g., “Who do you want to be in your pretend play today?”). Help children join pretend play by suggesting roles they could fill or by modeling.
• Encourage pretend play throughout the learning environment or home, not only dramatic play. Help children build ideas with supportive props, ideas, or questions and positively reinforce engagement in pretend play through words and gestures. This will be especially helpful in home-based settings where more everyday items might be used in pretend play rather than specific costumes or pretend play materials.

Look for connections to the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework (ELOF) goals shown below, though this activity can be adapted with any domain.

• Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Development 4: Child shows interest in, interacts with, and develops personal relationships with other children.
• Infant-Toddler Cognition 13: Child uses pretend play to increase understanding of culture, environment, and experiences.
• Preschool Approaches to Learning 13: Child uses imagination in play and interaction with others.
• Preschool Language and Communication 5: Child expresses self in increasingly long, detailed and sophisticated ways.

Connect and Extend

Create a culture of inquiry with great questions.

Joining children in make-believe play provides opportunities for back-and-forth conversations. Asking children meaningful questions is one strategy for extending conversations. Questions that ask children to provide explanations and make predictions offer opportunities for children to express ideas. For some children, especially infants and toddlers, this may mean watching for non-verbal responses and giving prompts or labeling their gestures.

Ask open-ended questions with many possible answers (including gestures) to encourage more than a one-word response. For example:

• What do you think will happen next?
• Playing store can be so fun with so many things and people to see! What do you see?
• I see you are using the block as a phone, how fun! I think I hear it ringing — can you say, 'Hello, who is it?'
• What will we see at the pretend powwow? What do we need to take with us? What do we need for our dance regalia?

Develop creative connections and be a “good relative.”

What does it mean to be a good relative? In many American Indian and Alaska Native cultures, being a good relative is a way to describe treating others, the land, and all living creatures with care, kindness, and respect. It is a practice we want to encourage in all children and adults, inclusive of all cultural backgrounds.

During pretend or make-believe play, children learn about positive connections to each other. They also engage in cooperative play and learn to use problem-solving skills to resolve conflicts with other children. With the support of familiar adults, infants and toddler can:

• Begin building pretend play skills
• Recognize and interpret the emotions of others
• Express care and concern toward others in play and learning settings

You can practice being a good relative. When children engage in pretend and make-believe play, it is an extension of their lived experiences. Being intentional in planning the curriculum and environment sets the stage for children’s creativity. Consider the following strategies and ideas to build meaningful and culturally rich experiences:

• Engage in conversations with families as the experts in everything about their child. It's important to include children's cultures and home and Indigenous languages. Work with families to create engaging, pretend play experiences at home and in the program. Brainstorm play ideas and find materials around the home to support this play.
• Observation is key! Listen and learn from children and expand on their ideas. For example, if you notice children talking about an event in the community such as a parade, you could ask them how they could recreate a parade in their learning environment. Ask questions such as, “What do we need to create a parade?” and “Where can we find it?” If horses are part of the parade, ask questions such as, “How do we treat our horse relatives?” Connect the word for horse in the child’s home or Indigenous language.

Take a Look

A Creative Adventure
For a child, life is a creative adventure. A time to explore, imagine, and express themselves. Experiences in art, music, and drama are all ways for children to get in touch with who they are. The more adults support children’s creativity, the more they’ll learn and the greater their success. Watch this video to see the impact of creativity and make-believe play in classrooms. Watch this webinar with your teams to make connections to the ELOF and inspire intentional planning.

Playful Learning and Joyful Teaching in Preschools
The preschool years are filled with excitement and wonder. Children learn new skills and build upon their existing capabilities through meaningful and exploratory play. This webinar connects play and the Framework for Effective Practice, which describes six integral elements of quality teaching and learning for young children in all program options. Fill your teacher toolbox with practical strategies for engaging in guided play to foster curiosity, joy, and lifelong learning.

Supporting Creativity in Infants and Toddlers
Infants and toddlers use creativity in every part of their lives — whether they're finding new things to do with familiar objects, making up novel sounds and words, or using their imagination in make-believe play. Creativity is the driving force! This Teacher Time episode focuses on how infants’ and toddlers’ creativity in supports understanding and learning about the world. It also features teaching practices to enhance their development.

Digging Deeper into Why Pretend Play Matters

Children are born ready to explore and imagine as they learn about the world. To make-believe during play, children need the skills to imitate sounds and behaviors, understand that objects or symbols represent something else, and develop positive relationships with their peers.

Research shows a relationship between make-believe play and children’s developing self-regulation, oral language, social and emotional, creative thinking, and cognition skills. Skills like these, in addition to teamwork and emergent reading and writing, support children’s school readiness. Children can also practice executive functioning skills through play. For example, children use their imagination to create a new function for an object, like using a block as a telephone. Executive function skills build the foundation for ongoing learning and later academic skills.

Pretend and make-believe play matters. When intentionally and respectfully planned, it honors children, their worldview, culture, and language. When a child’s lead is followed, it sends the message, “You matter, let’s create a space where you can pretend and make-believe in ways that are meaningful to you because you belong here!”

Read About It

Imitation and Symbolic Representation in Play 
The ELOF Effective Practice Guides provide information about domain-specific teaching practices that support children’s development. The guide focused on imitation and symbolic representation in play shows what related effective practices look like in early learning settings and helps staff reflect on and improve their teaching practices. Check out these ideas to learn more, see this type of play in action, and get ideas you can use in your setting!

Make-believe Play
This 15-minute in-service suite describes what play looks like for children ages birth to 5. It also highlights the developmental stages needed to engage in make-believe play. Explore the cycle of make-believe play and strategies for supporting it in the learning environment.

Supporting Language: Culturally Rich Dramatic Play
This article provides information teachers can use to support children who are dual language learners in make-believe play. It also touches on ways to create culturally rich dramatic play.

Joy for the Journey

Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand. — Albert Einstein

Last Updated: October 17, 2024