Because we recognize play as “the central teaching practice that facilitates young children’s learning and development” (NAEYC 2020), our daily schedule empowers children to play with curated materials and one another for most of their time at Maple Playschool. Our understanding of play has also been shaped by the work of psychologist Peter Gray (Gray 2013) as well as human development professor Elizabeth Jones and early childhood education professor Gretchen Reynolds (Jones and Reynolds 1992; discussed in Bernt-Santy and Murphy 2021).