Joeys Unplugged
"Play is the highest form of research."
Play is how children begin to understand and process their world. Play is the foundation of all learning for young children as they learn best through physical and mental challenges. These anecdotes have served as a light house and lies at the core of our curriculum at Joeys, Ambli campus. An exclusive area - Joeys Juggling Junction has been put up which offers a wide range of opportunities/materials to explore, experiment and construct their own understanding of the small world around them. The benefits of play time are innumerable; at the top of the list stands physical development that helps children to develop a positive sense of wellbeing and improve their skills of movement, coordination, control and manipulation. Most importantly play offers a child the ability to master skills that will help enhance self-confidence and the ability to recover quickly from setbacks. For example, a child may feel pride in stacking blocks and at times gets disappointed when the last block makes the stack fall but keeps trying happily till he / she succeeds. Moreover, children develop a sense of ownership, learn to interact with other children and enlarge their peer group.
Talking about our play time curriculum - it encapsulates all the above mentioned benefits and serves as a complete package that caters to all the major domains of child development. Beginning with the development of gross motor skills - we have parachute play, trampoline, balancing beam, football, obstacle trail (hop, jump, skip, run, crawl, etc.) apart from slides and swings. It not only provides them with the daily dose of exercise but ample dose of Vitamin D right in the morning. Moreover while playing they see, hear, touch, move, taste and smell. These sensory experiences and discrimination forms the base for the development of concepts. Vocabulary and language skills are deeply embedded in their play time conversations, for example, playing with a doll house allows them to re-enact what happens in their everyday life. They also learn to use language to communicate meaning as well as picking up new words and hearing the grammatical structure of the English language. Children can solve complex problems that arise and master the art of estimation and aiming as they play with blocks, disposable glasses, papers, balls, etc. For example, balancing a glass on the paper or making castles/tower with paper glasses or catching a ball with the glass. While trying to put puzzle pieces together, they are gaining important pre-math and problem solving experience. Organized games like musical chair, dog & the bone, kho-kho contributes to their social-emotional development. Playing with other children helps a child learn how to be part of a group and allows him/her to learn the skill of sharing, working within groups and develops the sportsman spirit.
Bright sunlight, colourful sport/games equipment coupled with joyful screams of children turns Joeys campus into a vibrant, lively place touching the pinnacle of joy and exhilaration. It reaffirms our belief in the fact that - Active Kids turn into Active Adults.
