"The critical importance of play in early childhood development of children has long been acknowledged but can often be a struggle to defend given the pressures on early childhood in the 21st century. This handbook from a well-respected and diverse group of scholars and practitioners is both timely and enormously helpful to those in the field who are attempting to promote the importance of play in their professional work with parents and young children. They each bring their diverse research and development experience together and attempt the courageous joint act of producing an integrated and unifying play theory. Individually each chapter provides an insight into reflective and dialogic research and practice, but collectively they stand as a model of critical thinking and theory making for practice. As such this handbook should be required reading for students and scholars engaged in early childhood studies, and all practitioner teams aiming to develop excellence in their play practice." - Professor Chris Pascal, Director, Centre for Research in Early Childhood (CREC)"The Routledge Handbook of Early Childhood Play is a very timely and impressive volume. The current resurgence in interest in children's play is both multi-disciplinary and increasingly cross-cultural, and this book represents this new flourishing in both these dimensions. At the same time, the central significance of play within early childhood development, which is finally beginning to be taken on board by the wider research community, is marvellously exemplified is many of the 28 chapters. This book needs to be on the shelf of every serious student of early child development." - Dr. David Whitebread, Director, Centre for Research on Play in Education, Development and Learning (PEDAL), University of Cambridge
