{"id":1083,"date":"2016-05-11T06:45:39","date_gmt":"2016-05-11T06:45:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thewisefamily.com\/?p=1083"},"modified":"2016-05-11T06:45:39","modified_gmt":"2016-05-11T06:45:39","slug":"important-importance-playing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thewisefamily.com\/important-importance-playing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Very-Important Importance of Playing"},"content":{"rendered":"

As I mentioned last week<\/a>, I recently finished a great book called, The Importance of Being Little<\/em> by Erika Christakis.\u00a0 And the Important take away for me was the Very-Important Importance of PLAY<\/b>!<\/b>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Last week, I had a parent call me in a frantic state because her 4-year-old son had been expelled from Pre-school.\u00a0 He was running on the playground (pretty fast, I imagine) and ran into another child, causing the other child to fall down and bust open his chin.\u00a0 An ER visit and 8 stitches later, the falling-kid was made a heroic and brave victim and running-kid was OUT!<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I am sure there is much more to the story but, really?\u00a0 Pre-school expulsion?\u00a0 How can that possibly bode well for running-kid\u2019s future?<\/p>\n

According to Christakis, we\u2019ve got a growing problem of preschool expulsions.\u00a0 And a growing problem of young children being medicated off-label for attention problems.\u00a0 And a growing problem with parents who are frustrated and feeling overwhelmed!<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a lot of growing problems!<\/p>\n

A classic of the preschool curriculum\u2026remember this\u2026kids sit in a circle and review the calendar.\u00a0 \u201cToday is \u2013 MONDAY.\u00a0 And today the weather is \u2013 SUNNY. \u201c\u00a0 A study noted in the Journal of the National Association for the Education of Young Children (2008) of this curriculum strategy stated that, after a whole year of this activity, over half of the children still had no idea what day they were on!<\/p>\n

Christakis encourages \u201cPlayful Learning\u201d.\u00a0 This type of learning is embedded in relationship building and in things that are meaningful to children.\u00a0 She uses the example of the iconic (handprint) Thanksgiving turkey\u2026a cute craft organized around the calendar and something that is done in classrooms across the country.<\/p>\n

But when you look at how children learn, they learn when something is meaningful to them, when they have a chance to learn through building relationships, interacting with one another and using skills like negotiation, conflict resolution and social practice.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to get parents to buy into this idea that their kids may not come home with refrigerator art because they spent the week building forts together.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlayful learning\u201d also involves much more unstructured time \u2013 at school and at home.\u00a0 Christakis argues that we don\u2019t have faith in our young children \u2013 or in ourselves.\u00a0 We\u2019ve been programmed to believe that the more enrichments we can add on, the better.<\/p>\n

Boredom is a friend to imagination!\u00a0\u00a0<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sometimes when kids appear to be bored, they actually haven\u2019t had enough time to engage in something.\u00a0 As parents, we often quickly whisk the thing away and move them along to the next thing.\u00a0 And that\u2019s a moment when we can say, \u201cHow can I help my child look at this in a new way?\u201d\u00a0 \u201cHow can I help him to try something new?\u201d \u201cHow can I help her be more patient?\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve turned childhood into \u201cadultified\u201d time where kids have a structured schedule and tasks to complete throughout the day.\u00a0 Some friends of The Wise Family have their own Google calendars on their own iPhones \u2013 in 2nd grade!!<\/p>\n

Kids no longer have long, uninterrupted stretches of time to engage in fantasy play.<\/p>\n

We need to engage in some repair process \u2013 because kids have gotten used to lessons, and coaches, and playing with toys that only have one way to use them \u2013 and they often don’t know what to do on their own anymore.<\/p>\n

The question I want to ask is\u2026What can we do to recapture childhood for our children?<\/p>\n

It starts with more play, and less structure.\u00a0 But then what?<\/p>\n

The only way we are going to begin this repair process, is to figure out how to play ourselves.\u00a0 Once we can do that again, maybe we can actually stop the growing of problems\u2026<\/p>\n

And re-start the growing of WISE families!<\/p>\n

Be Wise!<\/p>\n

\"Amy\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Reference:<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0 https:\/\/www.naeyc.org\/files\/tyc\/file\/CalendarTime.pdf\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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