Reimagining Play as Literacy: Collaborating With Families to Understand Play in Public Space

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Friday 1:30 pm Four Seasons Ballroom 2-3
  In Roundtable Session: Centering Learner and Community Knowledge in Literacy Learning (Table 1)

Abstract

We explore the potential for reimagining play as literacy within a co-design project to build playgrounds with under-resourced community members. By play as a literacy, we mean actions used to make meaning and to inscribe one's self into the world. This study took place during six community events that offered families opportunities to play together and articulate their needs for public play spaces. We examine the ways that young people take up cultural interactions within their play to read the world. We seek to better understand the ways that young people and their families define play and how those conceptions of play might support more equitable design toward critical literacies that have potential to repair and renew educational spaces.

Authors

• Kristina M. Stamatis, University of Nebraska Omaha

• Debora B. Wisneski, University of Nebraska - Omaha

• Paula Jakopovic, University of Nebraska - Omaha

• Kieren Rende Mendoza, University of Nebraska - Omaha