Nursery World - Learning & Development: ICT

In an extract from her new book Young Children in a Digital Age, Lorraine Kaye explains why technology should be incorporated into early years settings to support play and learning

Since the establishment of the first nursery school there have been a vast number of developments in early childhood education. However, current developments seem to have neglected to take account of the advances in technology and the digital society in which young children live.

The separation of play and technologies in early childhood curriculum documents persists despite rapid advances in the pace of digitisation in post-industrial societies (Hobbs, 2010) and the consequent need for young children to develop ‘new’ skills in reading, navigating and participating in highly digitally mediated environments (Bittman et al, 2011).

This situation suggests that new ways of thinking about play and technology are needed to address the gap between pedagogical perspectives on play and the use of technologies in early childhood education so we are better equipped to support children's learning in a digital age.

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