CHILDHOOD THAT IMAGINES: PLAYFULNESS, MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND LEARNING IN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the importance of playfulness and multiple languages for learning in Early Childhood Education, understanding the child as a historical, social, cultural subject and a holder of rights. It is based on the understanding that playing, imagining, narrating, singing, drawing, moving and interacting are legitimate forms of expression and knowledge construction in childhood. Methodologically, this is a bibliographic study with a qualitative approach, grounded in studies on childhood, playfulness, multiliteracies and pedagogical practices in Early Childhood Education. The discussion is supported by authors who address play as a formative principle, multiple languages as ways of reading the world and children’s learning as a process mediated by interactions and experiences. The results indicate that playful pedagogical practices, when planned with teaching intentionality, favor children’s integral development, expand their participation and strengthen more meaningful learning experiences. It is concluded that Early Childhood Education must preserve children’s right to imagination, play and expression, avoiding school-like practices that reduce childhood to the anticipation of formal content.