What is Dramatic Play and How Does It Support Literacy Development in Preschool?

There’s no disputing it: children absolutely love playing pretend. They can use their imagination to create (or become) almost anything. When we provide play clothing and props, we give children tools to alter reality; they are no longer a preschooler, but instead a firefighter, scientist, or princess trying to find her missing glass slipper. But through all this dramatic play, children are also building a strong foundation in literacy and developing pre-reading skills. Shocking, right? Below you will find excerpts from Literacy-Building Play in Preschool: Lit Kits, Prop Boxes, and Other Easy-To-Make Tools To Boost Emergent Reading and Writing Skills Through Dramatic Play. This article perfectly describes the purpose of dramatic play and the ways it helps boost a child’s performance in writing and reading. 

Dramatic Play allows children to experiment with purposes for literacy they’ve seen at home

By including functional print (such as newspapers, personal letters, menus, shelf signs, coupons and labeled food containers) in children’s play and giving them paper and pens for writing, we create an environment that allows them to interact with print as adults do. We give them a chance to see, firsthand, the many ways we use text in everyday life.

Dramatic Play allows children to recognize that different tasks require different texts 

By regularly and systematically incorporating literacy props into dramatic play, you help children realize that different tasks require different text. For example the firefighters might need a map of the city to locate emergencies, but the veterinarian needs an appointment book and pamphlets about petcare to hand out to his patients’ owners. The restaurant has menus and order pads, but the flower shop has seed packets and price lists. This exposure to a wide range of texts helps children differentiate text features.

Dramatic play allows children to produce a wide variety of texts

Many of us are drawn to story books because that’s what we were raised on. However there are so many more options for young children today. By exposing children to a wide variety of functional texts, we encourage them to create a wide variety of functional texts, too. Children make traffic signs to post in the block area, a list for use at the grocery store, a receipt for a customer at the pizza shop, or a letter to a friend to mail at the post office.

Dramatic play builds comprehension by allowing children to act out familiar stories

Acting out and or retelling a story helps children make that story their own–and truly comprehend it. They gain an understanding of the characters, the structure, and the themes. By taking on different roles, they gain an understanding that characters have different personalities and motivations. 

It’s truly fortunate that children can grow so much when they engage in dramatic play. This gives us all the more reason to encourage it at school and at home. Consider becoming a part of the play. With any luck, you’ll be the one who finds that missing glass slipper!