Abstract

Objectives The purpose of this study was to compare the effects between physical play and block play on young children’s motor ability, cognitive ability, sociality, and spatial ability. Methods Thirty young children were included in this study as the subjects, and their average age was 57.76 (SD=3.31) months. Experimental group1 and experimental group2 were selected randomly. Experimental group1 was applied in physical play and Experimental group2 was applied in block play for 4weeks. ‘Motor Proficiency Test for Young Children,’ ‘K-WIPPSI-Ⅳ’, ‘The Bronson Social and Task Skill Profile’, ‘Children’s mathematical ability test(spatial ability)’ were used in collection of data, and t-test for analyzing them. Results As the results, the scores of the physical play group's motor activity and sociality were significantly higher than the scores of the block play group. On the other hand, there was no significant difference between the two groups in overall cognitive ability, but it was found that the physical play group significantly improved than the block play group in verbal comprehension, fluid reasoning, and working memory, which are sub-area of cognitive ability. There was no significant difference between the two groups in the overall spatial ability, but it was found that the block play group significantly improved than the physical play group in the figure comprehension, a sub-area of the spatial ability. Conclusions The results of this study showed that physical play was more effective than block play in enhancing motor ability, sociality, and cognitive ability. It was found that block play enhances children's spatial ability more effectively than physical play. This reveals that children's physical play and building play were positive for children's development, and suggests that there is more effective play in a specific developmental area.

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