Playing to Learn (PTL) – The purpose of this project is to address the need for more empirical research surrounding teaching complex play to children with disabilities and to develop an innovative curriculum— Playing to Learn (PTL) Curriculum for Teaching Complex Play to Young Children with Disabilities.

PTL will support play skills of young children with disabilities who are known to be at risk for delays in play and is designed to be used by early childhood educators regardless of their education and experience—including child care providers, preschool teachers, special educators—in facilitating the play skills in young children with disabilities.

The PTL curriculum supports the creation of environments to promote play in children with disabilities, including social play with peers. Throughout this project Barton and her research team are further refining an intervention package, expanding their focus to different types of play (i.e., outdoor and block play), and contributing to the evidence base for effective strategies to increase the play complexity of young children with disabilities across activities.

Given the clear and replicated research highlighting the benefits of play, our research continues to focus on teaching play to children who do not play in the same manner as their peers. The PTL curriculum will directly address this need. This project was generously funded by the Caplan Foundation for Early Childhood.

PTL-Implementer-Manual

PTL-Implementation-Fidelity-Checklist