Developmental Play Assessment for Practitioners (DPA-P) Guidebook and Training Website: Project Play offers a comprehensive assessment of naturally occurring play activities for evaluating young children’s developmental progress accurately, so that useful interventions can take place as early as possible. It can be used by practitioners in a wide range of educational and therapeutic settings and is designed to support developmental progress through planning interventions in play, and using what we know about a child’s progress in play to plan play-based interventions in cognition, language, motor, social-emotional, and self-help skills. The guidebook and training website provide a comprehensive introduction to how to successfully use the assessment with infants, toddlers, and young children with disabilities or at risk for disabilities. The comprehensive guidebook offers an overview of the DPA-P and Project Play, defines play, discusses the background literature on play, and explains why this assessment is needed. Clear guidance helps practitioners and family members understand play, how to evaluate play, and how to use play for different purposes. The guidebook offers: an introduction to the comprehensive training website and how to use it understanding of the categories of play assessed and their definitions guidance on how to administer the assessment and prepare a summary evaluation of a child’s performance clear instructions for the coding sheets and scoring guidelines for constructing sets of toys guidance on taking the results of the DPA-P evaluation of a child’s progress in play to develop a plan of activities for intervention explanation of how you evaluate activities at the absence, basic, emergence, and mastery levels for developing a plan suggestions for assembling sets of toys for intervention, based on toys available in children’s homes and early childhood settings procedures for facilitating or teaching play activities to children who are developing more slowly than their peers technical aspects of the assessment To make the DPA-P as flexible as possible for all practitioners, it also offers guidance on adaptations for administering the test, in the coding sheets, with toys to enhance cultural appropriateness for gathering the observations, and for supporting interventions in play. The Developmental Play Assessment for Practitioners (DPA-P) can be used in natural settings and takes 30 minutes to complete. It is a valuable tool for all those who serve, or are training to serve, young children in early childhood settings, schools, service agencies, colleges, and universities. It will be of great benefit for early intervention personnel, speech-language pathologists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, and psychologists. Please visit https://www.routledge.com/Developmental-Play-Assessment-for-Practitioners-DPA-P-Coding-Sheets/Lifter-Mason-Cannarella-Cameron/p/book/9781032190310 to purchase sets of the Developmental Play Assessment for Practitioners (DPA-P) color-coded coding sheets.

The authoritative guide to implementing the Joint Attention, Symbolic Play, Engagement, and Regulation (JASPER) intervention. With a strong evidence base, JASPER provides a clear, flexible structure to bolster early skills core to social communication development. The authors show how to assess 1- to 8-year-olds with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), set treatment targets, choose engaging play materials, tailor JASPER strategies to each individual, and troubleshoot common challenges.

Play is a ubiquitous and universal aspect of early childhood. Although it may take different forms throughout development and across cultures, decades of research have found play to be related to important, positive outcomes. Play provides children with valuable cognitive, emotional, and interpersonal learning opportunities. It can act as a mode of communication for young children and allows them to practice ways of managing complex interpersonal interactions. Specific aspects of play, such as children’s creativity in pretend play, have been associated with resilience and coping. The significance of play in childhood has led to its frequent use in the assessment of child development and in the implementation of child and parent-child psychological and educational interventions. Historically, however, the validity and efficacy of these interventions have not been rigorously evaluated. Further, few assessment and intervention models have included parents, teachers, and other key caregivers, but have focused only on the child. This Research Topic will bring together the most current literature on the use of play in child assessment and intervention.

This complete guide to LEGO® Therapy contains everything you need to know in order to set up and run a LEGO® Club for children with autism spectrum disorders or related social communication difficulties and anxiety conditions. By providing a joint interest and goal, LEGO® building can become a medium for social development such as sharing, turn-taking, making eye-contact, and following social rules. This book outlines the theory and research base of the approach and gives advice on all practical considerations including space, the physical layout of the room and choosing and maintaining materials, as well as strategies for managing behaviour, further skill development, and how to assess progress. Written by the pioneer of the approach alongside those who helped form it through their research and evaluation, this evidence-based manual is essential reading for professionals working with autism who are interested in running a LEGO® Club or learning more about the therapy.

In light of recent standards-based and testing movements, the issue of play in child development has taken on increased meaning for educational professionals and social scientists. This third edition of Play From Birth to Twelve offers comprehensive coverage of what we now know about play and its guiding principles, dynamics, and importance in early learning. These up-to-date essays, written by some of the most distinguished experts in the field, help educators, psychologists, anthropologists, parents, health service personnel, and students explore a variety of theoretical and practical ideas, such as: all aspects of play, including historical and diverse perspectives as well as new approaches not yet covered in the literature how teachers in various classroom situations set up and guide play to facilitate learning how play is affected by societal violence, media reportage, technological innovations, and other contemporary issues play and imagination within the current scope of educational policies, childrearing methods, educational variations, cultural differences, and intellectual diversity New chapters in the third edition of Play From Birth to Twelve cover current and projected future developments in the field of play, such as executive function, neuroscience, autism, play in museums, "small world" play, global issues, media, and technology. The book also suggests ways to support children’s play across different environments at home, in communities, and within various institutional settings.

There are many reasons to be curious about the way people learn, and the past several decades have seen an explosion of research that has important implications for individual learning, schooling, workforce training, and policy. In 2000, How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition was published and its influence has been wide and deep. The report summarized insights on the nature of learning in school-aged children; described principles for the design of effective learning environments; and provided examples of how that could be implemented in the classroom. Since then, researchers have continued to investigate the nature of learning and have generated new findings related to the neurological processes involved in learning, individual and cultural variability related to learning, and educational technologies. In addition to expanding scientific understanding of the mechanisms of learning and how the brain adapts throughout the lifespan, there have been important discoveries about influences on learning, particularly sociocultural factors and the structure of learning environments. How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures provides a much-needed update incorporating insights gained from this research over the past decade. The book expands on the foundation laid out in the 2000 report and takes an in-depth look at the constellation of influences that affect individual learning. How People Learn II will become an indispensable resource to understand learning throughout the lifespan for educators of students and adults.