Developmental Movement Play Theory

A Theoretical framework

The theoretical underpinning for the new course encompassed:
• How we know our world
• Links between early movement and future functioning
• Human development
• Supporting children’s learning

Concept 1: Perception is active, often no less active than imagination, and we constitute the shape and meaning of our world as we consciously engage with it.

The felt sense of our reality is as significant as any other means we have of constructing reality. Movement play, as supported through this approach, is concerned with enabling children to engage actively with the lived body as a way of knowing themselves and the world. Developmental Movement Play lies, therefore, within the philosophical tradition of phenomenology and theories of ‘animate organism’.1 (Marcel. Sartre. Merleau-Ponty).

Concept 2: Sensory motor activity supports the development of functioning necessary to be able to learn.

2a. In order for the higher levels of the brain to work, the lower
levels must sort information accurately. Active physical and sensory exploration enables the child to become a more mature, efficient organizer of sensory information. (Sensory Integration: A. Jean Ayres2)

2b. There is a parallel development in perceptual awareness, the development of the brain of the infant and the development of early movement patterns. Patterns established in the first year underlie all other movement. Because each previous stage underlies and supports each successive stage, any skimping, interrupting, or failing to complete a stage of development can lead to alignment / movement problems, imbalances within the body systems, and problems in perception, sequencing, organization, memory, and creativity. (Body Mind Centering: Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen3)

2c. Increasingly, neurophysiologic research demonstrates that
experiences do change both the physical structure and the functioning patterns of the human brain. It points to the importance and influence of physical wellbeing for learning
and the role of movement in helping children with learning disabilities. (Marion Frostig. Florence Scott. Bette Lamont. Carl Delacato. Glen Doman. Sally Goddard Blythe.)

2d. A child’s perceptual and motor abilities are influenced by one another. Developmentally based physical education programmes have the potential to enhance perceptual-motor functioning, to increase readiness for learning, to improve self esteem and to reduce barriers to learning.4 (David L. Gallahue.)

Concept 3. Most children tend to seek out the activities that provide sensory experiences which are most beneficial to them at that point in development.

Children’s drive to move in particular ways is in part biologically driven. (A. Jean Ayres). Their development will be enhanced if adults provide a safe and stimulating environment in which children can explore their innate drives, at their own pace and in their own ways.

Concept 4. Sensory motor exploration is a valuable thing in its own right providing a means to focus on the feeling of life itself.

3a. Movement play is the medium through which human beings
learn ‘in direct participation with the languages of the body –
sensation, feeling, movement, image and instinct’.5 It is a
means of exploration and learning common to all humans and
provides a way to focus on the lived body as a source of
information and delight. It can be a medium through which to develop embodied learning. It is also a medium through which we can learn about adaptability, as ‘the essence of movement is change’6 and relationship. ‘As we move, we are always making connections,
creating relationships, both within ourselves and between ourselves
and the world.7

3b. Attending to sensory motor experience provides the opportunity
to listen to the body in order to uncover the experience of self - internally, in relationship to others and the natural world. In this way of learning, the sense of ‘being that precedes doing’29 is important. (Authentic Movement. Mary Starks Whitehouse.
Janet Adler. Joan Chodorow)
3c. Movement both reflects and affects inner self. The
way we organise our movement reflects the way we organise
our selves. Movement can be used to gain information and
insight, to find coping strategies and to bring about change.
(Dance Therapy practitioners: Marion Chace, Trudi
Schoop, Rudolph Laban)

3d. The feeling of identity arises from a feeling of contact with the body.
To know who one is, a person must be aware of what they feel.
(H Harlow)8

Concept 5. Human development is a discontinuous, self-organising, transactional process between the task, the individual and the environment throughout a person’s life.

Human beings are driven to strive for, and create, opportunities that will promote development. Change happens over time but in a highly individualised way. Typical age periods are of little value. (Bio-ecological perspective: Nicholas Bernstein. Urie Bronfenbrenner).

We decided not to adopt a phase-stage approach, which meant that we would not offer any age guidance to particular stages of development, nor highlight people with ‘developmental delay’ within the group. Our intention is to take people as we find them and emphasize the kind of environment and relationships needed to support the developmental process that everyone makes – however slowly.

Concept 6. Human beings become increasingly open to learning when they feel at a deep level that their subjective experience is both respected and progressively understood.

The structure and organization of the self appears to become more rigid under threat and to relax its boundaries when completely free from threat. ‘Realness, acceptance and empathy’ are required by the facilitator to create an environment in which boundaries can expand. (Carl Rogers). Empathy, in kinesthetic terms, is ‘the capacity to know another person’s inner feelings based on sensory experience.’ Empathy utilizes attunement in tension flow, which is based on kinesthetic identification with the tension changes of another person. This requires openness to kinesthetic awareness. (Judith Kestenberg)9 Physical relationship is a key component of physical, and other, learning; the way children are supported physically has a profound effect on their self confidence, body knowledge, physical and emotional security and communication. (Veronica Sherborne)10.

Adults are part of the learning environment, and just as they have a responsibility to provide ‘wonderful sights, textures, sounds, tastes and smells’11 for children (Maria Montessori), they have a responsibility to provide wonderful movement experiences.

Children need open-ended movement experiences and the movement equivalent of open-ended questions (provided through movement dialogue) to help them to explore their experience through sensory motor means. (Jean Piaget. Maria Montessori)

Being seen – ‘without judgement, interpretation or projection’ 12 – is a key part of the sensory motor learning process. Adults, and children, can enhance and expand the learning environment by learning to be a participating ‘witness’. (Janet Adler)

Careful observation is crucial. Adults provide ‘scaffolding’ to support children’s growing competence based on careful observation of where each child is, rather than where developmental theory suggests they might be. (Lev Vygotsky)

Concept 7. Free-flow play deeply involves children so that they wallow and reach their greatest levels of concentration.

This involves ideas, thoughts, feelings, relationship and physical movements. ‘Free-flow play deeply involves children so that they wallow and reach their greatest levels of concentration. This involves their ideas, thoughts, feelings, relationships and physical movements. Free-flow play enables children to apply what they know, reflect on it , use it in different ways, experiment and explore with what they know and have learnt of relationships, feeling, ideas, thought and the movement of their bodies. 13 (Tina Bruce.)

Concept 8. A rich tactile environment is vital to development
The effects of touch deprivation are strikingly similar to the effects of malnutrition. (Rosebzweig, M R and Diamond, E L and Diamond M C).. 14 Rich tactile experience promotes development.

Developmental Movement Play – a definition

Developmental Movement Play is a new approach for early years settings emphasising two important aspects of movement:
• Opportunities for children to indulge in free-flow, child-led, spontaneous movement play
• Attention to specific early movement patterns and activities that appear to prompt neurological development. These are innate and occur naturally in all children given good health and appropriate opportunities

Developmentally significant activities within the whole are deemed to be:
• Floor play: (on backs and on tummies)
• Belly Crawling
• Crawling
• Spinning-tipping-tilting-falling
• Pushing-pulling-stretching-hanging

What counts as Developmental Movement Play?
Most children naturally engage in spontaneous movement play, involving themselves with the patterns and activities in and out of everything else they do. Developmental Movement Play (DMP) in the curriculum comprises any activities, child-led or adult-led, in which significant developmental activities or patterns can occur, or activities in which a child is obviously indulging in movement or sensation with focus on the feeling of things. It doesn’t necessarily require lengthy activities or structures - it can happen in fleeting moments that interweave with other things.

DMP happens in many different ways, some of which adults play no part in.
Self-motivated explorations - wriggles, jiggles, games and activities with a focus on sensation, feeling, movement, instinct or image. Playing on climbing equipment, or big toys. Small movements and big movements. Movement that happens whilst the given focus is something different (eg rolling on their tummy whilst reading or watching TV up-side-down). Rough and tumble play.

Adults can support greater attention to DMP in a wide variety of ways.
• Getting out of children’s way – reducing the amount we stop children from engaging with their bodies
• Increasing opportunities for children to choose a body focus for their learning (creating a Movement Corner; noticing and valuing information from the body alongside other kinds of information)
• Running Developmental Movement Play sessions (developmental movement circuits; movement games and activity groups; including games and activities in other activity groups)

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