School of Education

INTERPLAY: Play, Learning and ICT in Pre-School Education was funded by the ESRC Teaching and Learning Research Programme. The purpose of Interplay was to identify ways of enhancing young children’s experiences with Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) through guided interaction with practitioners. The term ‘ICT‘ is often used to refer mainly to desktop computers but Interplay extended this definition to a much broader range of technologies found in nurseries and playgroups. Practitioners based in eight pre-school settings were directly involved in the research process.

The two-year study was based in the School of Education at the University of Stirling. Research began in September 2003 and was completed in February 2006.

Already at a disadvantage? was an additional study directly linked to Interplay and funded by a BECTA research bursary. The study explored children’s experiences of ICT in the home in the year before they began formal education and the impact of socio-economic disadvantage on pre-school children’s development of competences in ICT.