Small World Play: Why Children Love Building Little Worlds

Give a five-year-old a tray of sand, a few plastic animals and a shell, and within minutes there is a desert with a lion who is lost, a camel who knows the way and a storm on its way. Early-years teachers call this small world play: a little scene, a handful of characters, and a story the child makes up as they go.

What small world play is

A small world is any scene a child can look down on and arrange: a farm on the carpet, a dinosaur swamp in a baking tray, a doll's house, a city of blocks with toy cars. What makes it "small world" is the point of view. The child is not playing a role themselves, as in dress-up. They are the director, moving every character and deciding what happens to all of them.

That is why it suits ages four to eight so well. Younger children mostly act out their own day (a meal, a bath, bed). From about four, children start to invent: they plan a scene before they play it, give characters problems to solve and tell what happens in order. The CDC lists "pretends to be something else during play" among the milestones around four, and by five "tells a story she heard or made up with at least two events".

What children practise

• Storytelling. A scene full of characters invites the questions every story needs: who lives here, what goes wrong, what happens next. Telling a story with a beginning, a middle and an end is one of the foundations of reading and writing later.
• Words. A world brings its own vocabulary: shipwreck, coral, astronaut, canyon, savanna, firefighter. Children use the new words because the story needs them.
• Space and planning. Near and far, in front and behind, big and small. Arranging a scene so that it looks right is early planning and spatial thinking.
• Seeing themselves. Children put themselves into their stories. A character that looks like them, with their own skin, hair and favourite clothes, lets them be the hero of the world they made.

Pediatricians count play like this as part of healthy development. Researchers who have looked closely at pretend play are more careful: it goes along with good language and social skills, but it is hard to show that it causes them. What does help is a grown-up who joins in without taking over, which researchers call guided play: the child leads, and the adult asks questions and adds words.

What makes a good scene-making game

Most building and dress-up apps are quick to open and quick to bore. A good scene maker works like a box of small toys:

1. Lots to choose from. Variety is what keeps an inventive child going: different worlds, different characters, things that start different stories.
2. No goal and no score. Nothing to win means the story is the point.
3. Depth. Things further back look smaller, and things in front stand in front, so the picture looks like a place, not a sticker sheet.
4. A way off the screen. The best ending to screen play is real play. A scene that can be printed and coloured in carries the story to the table.

How Make a World handles it

Make a World is a picture maker for ages four to eight.

• Make yourself first. A girl or a boy, seven hairstyles, twenty outfits from pyjamas to a space suit, any colour for skin, hair, top, bottoms and shoes, and extras like glasses, a crown or a top hat. Up to twelve characters can be made, so the whole family can come along.
• Six worlds. Under the sea, space, an enchanted forest, the savanna, a city and the desert, each with two backdrops, twenty characters and about thirty things.
• A real scene. Drag anything anywhere. Things nearer the bottom are drawn bigger and in front, and every thing can be made bigger or smaller, turned round, or put in front or behind.
• A colouring page of the same scene. Every picture has a twin drawn in black lines, so a finished world can be printed and coloured in with crayons.

Tips for grown-ups

• Ask, don't praise. "Who lives here? Why is the astronaut in the desert?" gets a story going. "Lovely!" ends it.
• Write the story down. Children of four and five can tell far longer stories than they can write. Write theirs under the printed page and read it back to them.
• Make the family. Make a character for everyone in the house and put them all in one world. Then ask where everyone is going.
• End on paper. Print the colouring page when screen time is over. The story carries on at the table, and colouring inside lines is good practice for the small hand movements that writing needs.
• Build one for real. A baking tray, some flour or sand, a few toy animals and a bowl of water is a savanna with a watering hole. The game is a starting point, not a replacement.

From here

A child who tells stories is getting ready to read them. If yours is four or older and starting to notice letters, Tiny Hands Learn: Reading is a free phonics program for ages two to seven, and our guide on how a child learns to read and write explains the steps.

Children who love making characters often enjoy Dress-Up Party, and younger brothers and sisters can play Little House, a calm dollhouse for ages two to five. For drawing their own scene from scratch, try Chalk Art.