by Jamie Droke
Child Life Specialist

The last blog post from me addressed the purposes of play. Play is the work of childhood and is of utmost importance in a child’s growth and development. Play is how children learn about the world and gain skills that help them in many areas of their lives.  Today I want to outline the different stages of play. You might not have ever thought about there being different stages of play, but several psychologists and researchers (particularly Mildred Parten) have studied children and their play to determine six stages of play.

These six stages are not always moved through one step at a time by all children. Some children will demonstrate multiple stages at once and some, for example, may reach the third or fourth stage without ever demonstrating the first or second one. For all practical purposes, though, the first few stages of play tend to decrease as a child grows and develops while the last few stages tend to increase. So here are the six stages of play:

1. Unoccupied play
2. Solitary play
3. Onlooker play
4. Parallel play
5. Associative play
6. Cooperative play

Unoccupied play, while a relatively infrequent stage of play, most often occurs in infancy. An infant might be engaging in unoccupied play when it appears to adults that they are moving their arms and legs without purpose. As children grow, they begin to engage in play with objects. These objects can be toys, but they can also be ordinary every-day objects that children use for play. In this stage of solitary play, children seem to not even notice if other children are around.

The next stage is onlooker play. This stage involves children watching, but not participating, in the play of others. Children may ask questions of the child who is playing, but they will not engage in play until the next stage. In parallel play, children will imitate the play of another child with the same type of toy, right next to that child, but not engage in playing with the child. In associative play, children will engage in play together as the social interaction aspect of play begins to play a larger role than the toys. This stage of play may seem unorganized to adults because it often does not have a goal or set of rules. The goal and rules come into play in the final stage of play. In cooperative play, children play towards a certain goal or under the authority of pre-determined rules. This stage of play is what occurs when children play board games, but it is also apparent when children play house.

While these are interesting stages of play to notice as your children grow and develop, they are not stages to hurry your children through. Just because an older child tends to engage in solitary play every once in a while does not mean he or she needs to be pushed to the next stage. As children play, they will learn and grow and most often, these stages will occur naturally. Next post I will give you an idea of different types of play and the benefits of each.