Mapping Playful Strategies in Teaching Chemical Elements: What the Literature Reveals About Their Contributions and Limitations

Chemistry education in the final years of elementary school often faces challenges arising from the traditional transmission-based teaching model, characterized by the rote memorization of abstract concepts, which can lead to student disengagement. In this context, this study aimed to investigate, through the scientific literature, playful strategies applied to the teaching and learning of chemical elements and the periodic table in ninth grade. This is a qualitative literature review, based on a bibliographic search conducted through Google Scholar between 2016 and 2026, using descriptors combined with the Boolean operator AND. Content analysis of the corpus, comprising nine articles, demonstrated that the use of digital educational games, board games, bingo, 3D models, and educational word search puzzles promotes greater student engagement, reduces anxiety toward the subject, and facilitates the spatial and conceptual understanding of atoms. Based on socio-interactionist theory, the findings also indicated that small-group work fosters collaborative learning within the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). It is concluded that playful tools hold considerable promise for revitalizing Science and Chemistry education. However, the consolidation of meaningful learning depends fundamentally on intentional pedagogical mediation and the systematic theoretical integration of content guided by the teacher.