The article discusses the importance and the effectiveness of didactic play on foreign language learning in preschool. Foreign language is offered as a paid additional educational activity in Bulgarian kindergartens. Taking this into account, parents expect the achievement of high results by the educator in the process of learning. This requires a topical training and methods that meet the both children’s interests and needs and parent’s expectations. It is deniable that digital technology is the medium of choice for children, but play remains the leading activity in the educational process. This paper presents didactic play as an essential tool that has proved its successful applicability in foreign language education in kindergarten. Its inclusion provides positive motivation and active position of children in the pedagogical process, which in turn appear to be an essential prerequisite for successful acquisition of foreign language competences. A questionnaire survey among kindergarten English teachers is also presented. The aim of the study was to investigate teachers' opinions about the place of didactic play in English language teaching. From the presented analyses of the results, conclusions were drawn that confirm its importance in the teaching process.

Keywords: Kindergarten, children, preschool age, didactic play, foreign language education.