Play Strategy For Scotland: Learning About Play - Investigating Play Through Relevant Qualifications In Scotland

Section F: Discussion

DISCUSSION

Research Question:

1. To what extent is play covered in formal qualifications within education, childcare (and play) settings? ( Action 7.1)

SSSC Register Qualifications

Within all of the main qualifications accepted for admittance to the SSSC register in terms of children and young people, routes can be clearly mapped to demonstrate that, even taking the fundamental playwork principles and play theory approach to play, from support worker to practitioner there are choices of eight qualifications, which cover such practice in their core units. This includes Playwork SVQs at levels 9, 7, and 6, The HNC and NC in Early Education and Childcare, the OU DipHE in childhood practice (including E100 accepted for support workers) and the National Progression Award in Playwork and Childcare, at level 5. At the lead practitioner level, at degree level or above, more than half (5 from 8 course providers) of the Childhood Practice BA, BA (Hons) MEd, PGDip and PDA level 9 Qualifications covered this topic in detail, albeit, mainly in optional modules (with also little information on two of the eight qualification providers assessed). In all of the HNC/SVQ routes (bar one), where playwork and play theory is not covered in the core units, there is always at least one optional unit covering play in this fundamental sense. One qualification for support workers the HNC in Additional Support Needs did not meet any play or development and learning criteria, so it was not included in any further analysis.

There is also potential to take a qualifications route where play in this fundamental sense is not covered at all, if not choosing playwork theory as an option, at each level, from support worker level 5 up to and including degree and postgraduate qualifications.

Therefore, in such cases, the question of whether play in the wider child development literature and theory, and the learning through play sense, is in the core of such qualifications becomes more crucial. There is reassurance that the Childhood Practice BA, BA (Hons) MEd, PGDip and PDA level 9 Qualifications (and above) courses do cover all of these aspects of development, often in core as well as optional modules.

In the SVQ CCLD routes at level 5, 7 and 9, (bearing in mind all of these qualifications are phasing out), child development, as such, is covered at levels 9, 7 and 5 in core units, while at level 5, there is also a mandatory core unit on learning through play. Across level 9, play was not mentioned at all.

For the SVQ Social Services (CYP) set of qualifications, child development and learning through play are covered in optional units, there are generally more than one unit covering these topics, especially in terms of active learning and curriculum. Would someone choosing this qualification route, from support worker up to practitioner at SVQ level 9, be able to avoid play in either the fundamental playwork sense or the wider child development and learning sense?

This, although on "paper" a possibility, is highly unlikely given the requirement that workers on the register must take the professional qualifications, and combinations of units within them, relevant for their role, setting and their own learning needs (SSSC & IRISS,2008).

Across many units the Social Services (CYP) provided a definition of "activities" as including play, however, this is not consistently applied across every potentially relevant unit, and it might be worth ensuring that this link to play is applied across all (CYP) units, which include the term "activities" to ensure clarity and consistency.

The PDA Education Support Assistance at SCQF level 6, has one optional unit relating to play and playwork but has two core units and one optional unit, related to child development, learning and the curriculum.

The eight qualifications, which included play in the fundamental playwork principles sense, also covered child development, usually in core units. This aspect was least covered in the NPA in Playwork and Childcare and the Playwork SVQs in terms of core or optional units containing reference to child development. The strongest qualifications in these terms are the NC and HNC in Early Education and Childcare, which also covered play, learning and the curriculum in core and/or optional units.

All of the Childhood Practice BA, BA (Hons) MEd, PGDip and PDA level 9 Qualifications cover children's rights, often in specialist modules, with some mentioning play rights. The Playwork SVQ units across all levels could be updated to include more about the General Comment on Article 31, as indeed should all optional units across other qualifications relating to play rights.

In general terms, at most support worker and some practitioner level qualifications, children's rights are framed much more as child protection, or inclusion, than participation or agency, therefore, most need updating. There is an underpinning value statement about children's agency and choice across all of the Social Services (CYP) qualifications, which can be construed as paying attention to children's rights, and recent theoretical perspectives on child development in terms of child agency, this values statement might be worth including in other qualifications. The SVQ Playwork at level 6 also mentions defending play rights, in one unit. The SVQ CCLD at level 5 does not mention children's rights at all.

The holistic environment for play, development and learning was identified in the literature review as of crucial importance; this is covered well, across the Childhood Practice BA, BA (Hons) MEd, PGDip and PDA level 9 Qualifications and further qualifications, and in the former lead practitioner and current practitioner qualifications. However, at support worker level, this is not covered in The National Progression Award in Playwork and Childcare at level 5 or the PDA Education Support Assistance at SCQF level 6.

The SCQ CCLD level 5 has one unit about caring for a child in the home, while the SVQ Playwork at level 6 has a unit about supporting playwork in a school setting.

Also developed from the literature review, the categories of active learning, curriculum (including digital topics and international comparisons) and creativity, formed the last analytical sub theme.

The analytical discussion in the Play in Education section, demonstrated that when qualifications modules or units relate to the topic of active learning or aspects of CfE, especially in the early and primary years, that play, both planned and spontaneous free play, comes under such headings. All of the Childhood Practice BA, BA (Hons) MEd, PGDip and PDA level 9 Qualifications covered active learning and the CfE, while some had modules on digital or mathematical learning. At least two (Aberdeen and UWS) cover play based international curriculums such as Te Whariki (New Zealand), while some have optional specialist modules on creativity (e.g. Dundee), playful learning (Strathclyde) and covering Reggio Emilia (UWS).

The SVQs Social Services (CYP) and CCLD at level 9 both have specific optional units on creativity and a number of units relating to learning and the curriculum. The SVQ Playwork at level 9 does not cover active learning, curriculum or creativity. There is perhaps potential, (if and when) this qualification is updated, to include more about creativity and to link to concepts such as active learning, even in terms of debating different approaches to play. All of the other practitioner level qualifications except the SVQ Playwork at level 7, cover active learning and the curriculum, all also touch upon creativity but not in much depth.

In the seven support worker qualifications, the NC covered active learning, curriculum and has a specific optional unit on creativity, all the others cover learning and curriculum, and just touch on creativity, except the National Progression Award in Playwork and Childcare at level 5 and the SVQ Playwork at level 6, which do not cover learning, curriculum or creativity.

Creativity is both an important element of play, child development and active learning, furthermore, some of the processes and materials can provide the means to measure learning without impinging on the natural, spontaneous play processes. Therefore, although this topic has specific units at Childhood practice and above, at SVQ level 9 and occasionally at other levels, it is suggested it is included at all levels in all relevant qualifications, specifically the playwork qualifications could say much more about creativity and play.

A further two qualifications were looked at in terms of the SSSC register they are the:

Table 9: Robert Gordon University of Aberdeen BA Social Pedagogy (Working with Children / Working with Adults) and

Table 10: University of Strathclyde: The MSc in Advanced Residential Child Care

For both courses there was limited information but child development and care, global and contemporary issues are covered while the lifespace relates to the ecological environment. Play in itself is not mentioned on either course descriptor but might be assumed to be part of both developmental and therapeutic topics. As mentioned in the literature review the Camphill communities (Camphill website. n.d.) take a Waldorf/ Steiner creative approach, and they provide work placements for the BA Social Pedagogy students.

Play in Education

Given a lack of in depth material on what are mainly quite new and updated teacher training routes, including moving towards more masters level qualifications, the Play in Education section examined teacher registration standards, curriculum content and a range of specific guidance relating to the curriculum, birth to three, early learning and childcare, outdoor learning, and professional development resources. In addition, three teacher-training providers responded to an online survey and two teachers and three PSAs took part in a focus group. An interview was also held with Tom Hamilton of the General Teaching Council Scotland.

It was found that:

• Free play is included in the curriculum and is a strong feature of guidance for the youngest children, including reference to the play strategy and playwork principles in Building the Ambition (Scottish Government, 2014a) and guidelines for Birth to Three (Scottish Executive, 2007) also mention a version of the playwork principles.
• Child development and learning though play is well understood in a range of guidance materials and especially through using the concept of active learning, which does include spontaneous free as well as planned play. Outdoor learning guidance also includes active learning and child agency and choice.
• Through registration standards and links to the UNCRC (UN, 1989) and GIRFEC (Scottish Government, 2008a), teacher training includes children's rights and agency, as well as their holistic wellbeing needs under GIRFEC, which is also reflecting in the CfE ( Scottish Executive, 2004) overarching indicators.
• Teacher training providers cover play and child learning and development, with one mentioned this comprised around a third of their course, however, one teacher interviewed in the focus group who had done the PGDE (2011) felt neither play or child development were covered.
• The OU courses for education support assistants (Table 15) are very focused on play in both the playwork principles sense and on active learning, creativity, the environment for play and children's rights, as well as curriculum and specific topics.
• Teachers and PSAs interviewed in the focus group believed in children having opportunities to play, even take risks, and play in school for this to help make learning fun. They felt that there was not support for this from society, and this was also borne out in early year's curriculum guidance, which noted it, might be hard to convince parents of the value of learning through play in schools, although teachers should try to do so.

From the interviews and in looking at standards, resources and courses, it is clear that teachers are expected, like social service registered workers, to engage in ongoing learning and development beyond their initial training and admittance to the register. GTCS also can accredit "professional update" courses, and there is an example given of a recent award developed on the topic of outdoor learning, which has been taken up by a number of teachers.

Play is included in education in Scotland, especially in recent guidance for early learning and childcare (Scottish Government, 2014a), but also in curriculum guidance and contents, and is, or should be, therefore part of teacher training courses to various levels.

Research Question 2: Are there existing courses or units in qualifications or CPD courses relating to play that could be integrated into other qualifications where there is little/no evidence of play? (Action 7.1)

Given that, apart from one historical support worker qualification held by few staff (HNC for ASN), every qualification contains either play in the fundamental playwork sense in core or optional units, and (other than playwork related) definitely play in the wider active learning and child development sense, this question needs to be slightly reframed. What additional units or CPD courses could complement the training already in place on play in qualifications?

At the degree level and above SSSC registration qualifications, it was demonstrated that at least five courses contained a range of optional in depth materials on play pedagogies, playwork theory and principles. It is also expected that the updated Standard for Childhood Practice will incorporate Government legislation and guidance as part of the updating process (interviews), therefore, it is likely that GIRFEC (Scottish Government, 2008a) and the National Play Strategy and Associated Action Plan (Scottish Government, 2013 a&b) and the Children and Young People Act 2014, and associated guidance, will be included.

Given that courses must map on to the Standard for Childhood Practice (QAA, 2007), those that already include play theories, play pedagogy and principles, will not have much to change, however, others might need to develop additional materials or units. The courses, however, retain their core focus on management and leadership; therefore, any additional material may be in optional modules or units.

Above BA level, there are opportunities to develop modules covering play in both the widest sense and in the free play sense, which could be applicable to both childhood practice graduates and to teachers. E.g. The University of Strathclyde: Early Years Pedagogue (Table 11) contains all of the elements of the criteria developed to analysis the different types of play, play in learning and development, the play environment, children's rights, global and modern theories, children's languages and creativity and curriculum such as Te Whariki.

Play is expected to be part of the learning practice in P1 and P2, through CfE, and this is perhaps an area where teachers might want new and updated guidance and support from training colleagues in the related early learning and childcare fields. Unless the Playwork SVQs are updated to include more material about active learning and the curriculum, whilst their play experience and expertise might be highly useful, being able to translate this into the teacher's role in classroom practice, and indeed in outdoor learning too, is also needed.

This is an area where qualifications for Pupil Support Assistants provide a bridge across the active learning, curriculum and playwork, especially where options to cover playwork are taken up by assistants. The playwork unit, supporting playwork in schools, might be useful here, but again, perhaps this is needed at level 7 as well as level 6 and could be updated to include more knowledge of the curriculum, active learning and child development.

In the interviews, it was identified that suitable professional update courses could be accredited by GTCS and a CPD course on play could be developed, similar to the outdoor learning professional update award.

It was suggested (interviews) that units from level 5 national progression award might be useful for teachers to learn basic play principles and theory but whether teachers would be willing to go "backwards" to take a lower level qualification is an issue.

Although those covering P1 and P2 (and indeed across primary school) might need further support in creating play based learning in the classroom, as the Finnish case study shows, even in a culture and school system where play is highly valued, such processes are not always simple to understand, deliver or assess. If there is a play professional update developed, it might be better to develop this at a higher academic level, which includes learning how to access different type of play as a process and using creative methods to measure progress. Some modules from the PDA Childhood Practice could be relevant here, e.g. PDA Childhood Practice (L8) - Leading & Managing a Playwork Service. Or PDA Childhood Practice (L0) - Childhood Practice Playwork (Teacher... playwork focus) (Interviews).

Although childminders are not required to register or to hold specific qualifications, the phased out SVQ CCLD at level 5, did have a useful unit on caring for children at home, therefore, it would be useful for childminders for a successor unit to this to be developed in the Social Services (CYP) level 6 qualifications.

We would mention here one of the limitations of this study was the time constraint in covering the sheer volume of units (we covered over 350 units) for the Social Services (CYP); therefore, there may be such a successor unit we have missed in our analysis.

Research question 3: What potential is there for the playwork-qualified workforce to support play opportunities within more formal education/settings other than their more usual play/childcare settings? (Action point. 9.8)

As identified in the literature review, and through interviews and focus group discussions, the area that has strong potential for development here is during in the break and play time, as well as in play and childcare, out of school care, breakfast and holiday clubs often co-located in schools.

The Finnish case study (Sahlberg, 2014a, b & c) is of particular relevance is terms of the information about how the school day is broken up with frequent breaks for play, rest and restoration. Overall, Finnish school children spend much less time in the classroom than peers in the USA or UK, yet consistently the Finnish PISA scores are in the top ranking three (Sahlberg, 2014 a, b & c).

Play based learning techniques are used within and outside the classroom as Hyvönen (2011) demonstrates, and highly trained and highly respected and autonomous teachers have a positive effect, according to Sahlberg (2014a). Following the Donaldson Report (Scottish Government, 2011) there are moves to make teaching a Masters level occupation in Scotland, (interviews, play in education section), so it will be interesting to see if in the future, this also has a positive effect.

As the break time project website information and articles (Blatchford and Baines,2013) demonstrated, children and young people's time for breaks in schools are getting shorter in the UK, with less time for play, relaxation, eating lunch or the personal time restoration required as a break from learning.

As the Finnish study (Hyvönen,2011) suggests, more time for play and/ or short frequent breaks from learning, longer lunch breaks and play based learning can enhance children's educational outcomes as well as their general wellbeing, as well as giving teachers more time away from the classroom, for professional collaboration and planning work, as well as their own work breaks.

Extending children and young people's break time should include extending and improving the environment of the playground, as the recently published grounds for learning studies demonstrate (Robinson, 2014a, 2014b & 2014c).

This is where, in terms of the holistic environment e.g. (Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 2007), extending the role of playwork trained staff to support play and leisure activities for children and young people, during breaks is an opportunity. Especially if creating or preserving longer lunch breaks and perhaps more frequent play breaks throughout the day, as well as being able to work with many of the same children in the breakfast, out of school and holiday clubs, or indeed the classroom as a support assistant too.

They could work with the children and school management in improving the physical play environment, and how it is used, and they can support and facilitate play using playworker methods, which ensure children's autonomy, choice, balanced risk and the joy and fun of play.

This is not entirely new; it is already the case, for example, in Fife council (interviews), where playwork trained staff work across schools, nurseries and out of school care services and holiday clubs.

What might be quite radical is in meeting the needs for children to have slightly longer or more frequent breaks, inside and outside the classroom, where both free play, including risky play, and active learning in terms of using the processes of play can support, indeed enhance, learning, development and educational outcomes.

Even if it is not possible to extend the time for breaks, the literature, interviews and survey responses suggested that improved play during break times was highlighted as being the most realistic time free play and risky play opportunities within schools. It was suggested in interviews, that those schools which have focused on play during playtime and in the playgrounds, and where there is a whole school approach in place tend to find greater success ( interviews).

Playground supervising staff have a clear idea of what they are to do, as this will have been clearly discussed and approaches agreed since it will be embedded as part of the play ethos of the school; this then also allows children and parents to understand what to expect.

Certainly supporting teachers, creating a whole school approach, and utilising the skills of play trained staff during breaks, in the classroom and in wider play activities for children before and after school contributes towards the outcomes set out in the introduction, from the National Play Strategy Action Plan (Scottish Government, 2013a).

"Outcome: All children and young people enjoy high quality play opportunities, particularly outdoor free play in stimulating spaces with access to nature, on a daily basis in school, nursery and early learning and childcare.

Impact: All school staff and early years' practitioners will receive play training, as part of their initial education and career long professional learning. They will have sufficient skills, knowledge and understanding of play to support play opportunities. Al schools and settings will have well designed inclusive spaces for play in local communities. Education managers and leaders in school and early years settings demonstrate their commitment to increasing and developing play opportunities and to supporting staff to do so through priorities in the improvement planning cycle, ethos and community life of their establishments and their own professional learning" (Scottish Government, 2013a, p.20).

Therefore, the use of the school as a site of play in breakfast clubs, breaks, lunchtime, after school and holiday clubs is an essential component of supporting play in the community, while utilising playwork trained staff across these settings and times would help facilitate such opportunities for children.

Because of the process and findings of the research, the following additional questions are also partly addressed:

Research question 4: What does the literature tells us about the benefits of play? (Relating to Action 7.2)

The literature review tries to synthesis play in the playwork principles sense and in the wider child development and learning sense in order to demonstrate that the processes of free play can be utilised for child development and learning outcomes without taking away the intrinsic motivation and freedom of the child's own personally determined play choices. It also demonstrates that play as a process and the affordance of play, can be justified within learning frameworks, as well as supporting children's wellbeing and happiness on a day-to-day level. The literature also affirms the centrality of social relationships to child development and play is very much part of the process of creating social relationships and learning social skills relevant for their culture and environment.

There is little literature on the play needs of children of school age, in school, which is why the break time study, grounds for learning and the Finnish case study extend the literature to cover this age range and setting in more detail.

Research question 5: Where are the gaps and how can professional development opportunities be extended in studying play (Relating to Action 9.9)

Although much relating to this question is covered in the discussion of question 2, the content of other courses such as Gloucestershire; Professional Studies in Children's Play (Masters) (Table 12); and Leeds Beckett University: BA (Hons) Playwork (Table 13); demonstrate that there are not, at this level, similar specialist playwork courses in Scotland. In the interviews, some respondents believed that there is not enough knowledge of Playwork at this level amongst those delivering degree level and higher courses. Suggested solutions to address this gap included:

Funded play Doctorates (Professional doctorates)

• Academic play research network

Professional Doctorates and Part-Time PhDs

Most Scottish universities will offer these advanced level degree options. Both of these particular qualifications are research-based and lead to the conferring of the title 'Dr' on graduation. Fees for a sample university for 2014/15 are:

M.Phil. part-time - £2050 per year

Ph.D., part-time - £2050 per year

Professional Doctorate - £3160 per year

The interviews also identified a gap in terms of the promotion of Playwork in Scotland. This is the responsibility of SkillsActive, however, due to cutbacks, personnel changes, and covering staff leave arrangements, there have been gaps in their work in Scotland, which they are aware of and keen to address (interviews).

The interviews also brought out that funding has been obtained to update the Playwork National Occupation Standards later this year; therefore, this is an opportunity to address some of the issues highlighted in this report.

Further discussion points emerging from the research

Responsibilities and Resources

In terms of this enquiry, we looked at the contents of qualifications and noted in the above discussion of the results that there are various paths a learner might take in terms of including a great deal, or much less, play focused units or modules at difference levels of qualifications. We also noted that, apart from specialist playwork qualifications, to cover play in this playwork principles sense required choosing available optional units or modules, which are playwork focused. In addition, it was found that at least three initial teacher training over longer courses do cover play, including free and spontaneous play, but for at least one other PGDE course, in the past, it was not covered (focus group).

Given the optional factor of studying play in many courses, this then relates to the point (interviews) that qualifications should be seen to be not the end but the start of an individual's professional learning journey, which should embrace lifelong learning and Continued Professional Development (CPD).

The individual professional should therefore take responsibility for their learning to ensure that their skills and knowledge fit with their role and setting, this if includes changing roles or settings, looking to address any new gaps in learning.

However, the employer must also take responsibility and ensure that employees are provided with the resources and opportunities to allow their employee to meet the gap in their skills or knowledge. Both the roles and responsibilities of the individual and employer are covered by the SSSC Codes of Practice for Social Service Workers and Social Service Employers (SSSC, 2003). While GTCS registration (GTCS, 2012) also includes a requirement to engage in professional updates.

As discussed in the interviews, for employers and individuals to legally be required to engage in lifelong professional development, also has resource implications, in terms of the time of staff involved, and the funding, costs and availability of the CPD resources. Indeed, staff motivation, after a whole career building up experience in the field, with many teaching staff and a high proportion of childcare managers in their fifties (Chart 1, and statistics background section), in taking further CPD, might be also an issue to be addressed.

Additional CPD resources to fill gaps therefore need to be to be attractive, accessible and affordable. This requires investment and to attract a wide range of learners, including resources covering different stages in their careers, across the broader children's services workforce.

As we have identified in the discussion, if the playwork NOS are updated to include more links to play development and learning, and qualifications such as the OU primary school assistants qualifications, and others for PSAs are utilised more for school staff, then this does bring in more play-based qualifications to schools. There are also potential opportunities for professional update courses on play to be developed for teachers and PSAs and then accredited by the GTCS for teachers.

There are cost implication for childcare, teaching and PSA staff, as well as for employers across the public, voluntary and private sector, and time implications for all staff. Therefore, we would recommend, in order to meet aspirations for the workforce to more educated in play and to understand delivering more play based work with children, then this requires investment in both qualifications and in CPD resources.

Play, safety and risk

We have identified that for school age children the play breaks and lunchtimes could both be extended in terms of time and in terms of content of facilitated risky play as well as using play processes within classroom practice.

The approach to risky play in early learning and childcare, and out of school care, holiday care services, especially those with playwork trained staff, has developed over the years to looking at the positive risk benefits to children and young people of extending their skills, judgement and knowledge of risk taking, as well as those related to keeping children safe.

As the literature (Moss and Petrie, 2002) also covered, using risk to constrain and control children's play and freedom can be seen as part of wider social attitudes as well as, parental fears and expectations about child safety and "learning not play" (Focus group, Scottish Executive, 2007). As the interviews demonstrated, for childcare providers to move beyond this and extend children's development and enjoyment of risky play through using scooters or skateboard, should they choose, has been difficult to do in terms of the strict requirements of insurance companies. While the health and safety executive is quite clear that there should be risk in play (Health & Safety Executive, 2012), insurance companies take a tougher stance.

A head teacher will have overall responsibility for health and safety in their school so is not necessarily teachers being risky play averse personally (focus group) if they do not allow certain risky play activities, as they have to manage both legal responsibilities and parental perceptions of how they are keeping children safe.

Therefore, as Bronfenbrenner & Morris (2007) clearly identify, the environment for play, as well as for learning and developing through play, is highly influenced by wider cultural factors; in this case insurance companies (national and internationally influenced by growing litigation cultures) perceptions of risk in play. This is an area, therefore, that must be addressed for future development of a play friendly culture in Scotland.

Limitations of the research

There were limitations imposed by not receiving material on course content from teacher training providers, although this is mitigated by the shorter follow up online survey results and the contextual information provided in the play in education section; there is still a gap on information on every course.

For the SVQ qualifications for SSSC registered CYP workforce over 350 individual units were examined for play content. This was time consuming and laborious as while SSSC (CYP) NOS were accessible, the category, for example, of manager of an out of school care service was not available on the NOS Navigator. Various sources had to be used to discover content of units of other qualifications; therefore, it is not always exactly equivalent information on each qualification.

Information received from degree level and beyond childhood practice course providers varied from a great deal to very little. Again, courses usually had a number of optional as well as core modules to sift through and this took up more time than anticipated for this stage of the research. We therefore, especially for information on Glasgow and Edinburgh University childhood practice courses, advise caution in comparing them with the more detailed information provided by others.

Given the sheer numbers of units or degree level course modules we studied, it is perfectly possible we may have missed, within some of the qualifications, any of the more oblique references to play, development and learning, or did not feature similar successor units to the CCLD which are available through the Social Services (CYP) qualifications.

Youth and community work qualifications, or any that voluntary organisations providing play activities within their remit such as cubs and brownies, junior and indeed youth clubs were not covered in this research and neither were the long lists of other professionals such as speech and language therapists who might be able to be part of the SSSC register. Certainly, we would suggest that youth and community worker's role in supporting play warrants further investigation. However in line with this wider field of SSSC registrants, again, perhaps speech therapists might want to use play processes in supporting their work, so this is another potential future area of enquiry.

The literature review is, in the main, not a critical, evaluative review but a scoping review, intended to demonstrate how and why the fields of child development and learning must be included if assessing play content of qualifications and not to restrict this to playwork principles definition of play. Where it does go further is in discussion of play as a process in and out with the classroom and play as part of children's breaks in school.

We also acknowledge in terms of the presentation of the research and findings, we are constricted by the time limits to look for further discussion points and conclusions, than those outlined here, but we would encourage those further points to be developed.

We have deliberately included a large amount of course materials in the appendices. We have often compressed information for reasons of space, but the references section and table contains direct links to most sources, therefore, we would encourage others to use this as an information resource and as a tool to look for further discussion points.

This is a specialist report, covering the content and structure of qualifications, training and related legislative policy documents, therefore the report uses abbreviations, technical terms and tables, while the literature review uses academic conventions for citations. This might make the report less accessible to the public; however, an easy read version of the executive summary could be produced.

Conclusion and next steps

In conclusion, we found that play in both the strict playwork principles sense and the wider child development and learning sense is covered, to different degrees, in the whole range of main qualifications assessed, albeit it is often only an optional choice to study play in the stricter sense. We found that it is up to the individual and their employer to ensure that they fill gaps in their learning about play, as required by registration bodies and the needs of their setting. We found a rich tradition of learning through play and spontaneous play in terms of early learning and childcare guidance. We see an opportunity for schools to become better sites of the complementary support to learning, development and wellbeing of children through the provision of play opportunities and processes in both free time and in classroom practice, as well as before and after school and holiday care services.

We found some areas in some qualifications, which need to be updated or clarifications provided and we engaged with a range of opinions on current practice and ideas for future developments.

We make the following specific recommendations for next steps:

Qualifications contents

• Every qualification unit at the SVQs related to playwork could be updated in terms of reference to UNCRC (UN, 1989), especially Article 31 and the UNCRC in general.
• Child development should be a compulsory core, not only an optional unit, in all relevant qualifications.
• If and when playwork NOS/ related qualifications are updated consideration should be given to including play in terms of learning and development topics to make the qualification more useful to a wider range of staff, especially PSAs in Scotland. Creativity could also be a stronger focus.
• The Social Services (CYP) qualifications should be clear about "activities" including planned or free play as defined in some, but not all, relevant units.
• The PDA level 5 in playwork and childcare needs updating especially on child development and children's rights.
• While there are some specialist units on creativity, there should be more about creativity and creative play techniques, embedded across all qualifications
• For Childhood Practice degree level courses, in terms of the play principles or play and child development, if these topics are not covered (where we did not have information), then it is clear from other course providers than modules can be developed. If the Play Strategy and Action Plan are included in the updated Standard for Childhood Practice, it is likely they may have to do this in the future, while child development is a crucial element at all levels.

Qualifications promotion and development

• SkillsActive have the role to promote Playwork in Scotland and to update the playwork qualifications, which will now have to meet the SSSC NOS standards too.
• The possibility of funding or supporting doctoral level play related qualifications could be investigated
• There is a possibility that a professional update for teachers on play could be developed and then accredited by GTCS.
• Financial support could be provided to enable access to CPD including paid time for staff to do so.
• It might be worth reminding employers that they have responsibility to support CPD as well as qualifications.

Promoting and Extending Play in Schools Practice

• With CfE and official guidance clear, that play is a learning process, there needs to be more opportunities for teachers to learn and understand techniques to facilitate this type of learning in the classroom and to allow for spontaneous play.
• The literature review demonstrated that play and breaks actually enhance and support children young people's wellbeing in school, and their readiness to learn, therefore we recommend schools find ways to incorporate longer, more frequent breaks during the school day and week, or at least preserve and do not cut what breaks they have now.
• To support the above recommendations we recommend using play trained PSAs across the school, in class, in play and break times and linking with or also working in the before, after school and during holiday out of school childcare services.
• Play training should include how children learn and develop through play, especially in terms of social relationships and skills, which enhance the ability to engage in learning across subjects.
• Taking risks is also part of learning and development therefore there should be opportunities for risky play supported by a whole school approach, trained staff, and understanding risk benefits, including outdoor activities and trips.

Further Research

• Perhaps as part of funded doctorates or Masters level courses, there should be a body of new studies into play as a process and how it supports learning and development in schools, out of school care and holiday services.
• Building the Ambition (Scottish Government, 2014) could be useful catalyst for new units, courses or research studies relating to younger children in early learning and childcare.
• This research did not cover the play and leisure needs of young people except those in the breaktime and grounds for learning studies, it also did not cover youth and community work, therefore, these are areas for further study.

Wider Recommendations

• Parents should be told more about the benefits of play, especially play and breaks beyond the early years, in school and how this helps not hinders wellbeing and learning. learning. Therefore, we suggest an awareness campaign similar to play talk read but for primary aged children.
• There should be more done on a national UK level to change insurance companies' attitudes to risky play.