“Learning a new language is usually not an easy task for adults, but for children, it happens in such a natural way.” This is a sentence that I hear every now and then while speaking to people who have started learning a new language. In my opinion, the biggest reason for children to learn a new language so quickly is that they have no fear, especially because most of the time they don’t realise they are learning. And this is the secret to a happy and successful learning environment, PLAY. The tricky side is to choose what kind of play we, as adults, should expose our children to so that they are engaged, motivated, and willing to learn. Learning through play requires thoughtful play opportunities, which should be prepared and planned based on the children’s interests.

Having taught young children for nearly 20 years, I have been exposed to a variety of learning styles, which helped me develop my own, based on play. It is the most successful I have experienced so far, as it brings joy to the children, as well as to the teacher and parents. The first thing a child needs to be able to learn a new topic or a new language is a connection with the person who is going to teach it. And the best way to do this is by having fun, right? I would like to give you an example of what learning through play really means. A few months ago, I brought some cupcakes to celebrate my birthday with the children. Before I gave the cake to them, I talked about birthdays and showed them some objects related to birthday celebrations, balloons, candles, a crown, etc. Even though most children don’t have enough vocabulary to understand sentences in German yet, they all knew what I was talking about. Some just listened to the new words and absorbed them like a little sponge, while others were ready to attempt to speak the words. Nobody was pressured to learn, they were all willing to learn, as it was something they were interested in. They got so engaged in this topic that we continued learning about birthdays for weeks. Each time we repeated the words we had learned in the past sessions, then I introduced some new ones to them. We ended up having a party with disco lights, balloons, music, and lots of fun! The children improved their vocabulary without realising it. Now imagine if I had put them all sitting down and just talked about these words. They would probably have learned half of the vocabulary they did, and it would have been the most boring topic…

The more fun we have, the best we can learn! So play, play, play!