Against a backdrop of 'play' as the established notion of best practice in early childhood education, this paper sets out to trouble the discourse by exposing for critique the place of teaching within a play-based curriculum. The paper reports on lessons gleaned from a longitudinal play-based intervention in over 100 primary schools in Northern Ireland. Participatory learning theories (PLTs) [Hedges, H., & Cullen, J. (2012). Participatory learning theories: a framework for early childhood pedagogy. "Early Child Development and Care," 182(7), 921-940] are used as the theoretical lens through which the views and practices of teachers have been mapped. The findings highlight how participatory models of learning can illuminate differences between early years practitioners, with many teachers tending to adopt either an overly passive or directed stance in the play experience. In light of the collated evidence, the authors propose an innovative pedagogical framework of what teaching might look like in play-based practice.