When in doubt, play!

Two items hit my “in” box last week on the topic of PLAY. The first was an infographic sharing “50 Reasons to Believe in the Power of Play” and the second was an invitation to join Toca Boca’s new “Take a Stand for Play” campaign. The buzz about PLAY isn’t about a trendy new app or an acronym for a new company, it’s just about play, the run-around-like-it’s-recess-laugh-and-play-games sort of play. No wonder these items caught my eye. I’m a camp girl from the word “go”. (more specifically, sleep-away camp) Silly songs? Craft projects? Games to play in the rain (or when it rains)? I’m in! But these posts were aiming to highlight a growing problem with the lack of play in kids lives. It’s aimed at getting adults to think about the value of play and its positive impact on kids health, education, creativity, and virtually every other area of their lives.

Way back in 2007 the American Academy of Pediatrics released a report titled “The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds”. Guess it’s taken a while to get the message out. It seems so odd that we need to be reminded to play. Why would we be avoiding something that makes us feel good? Seems that over time many of us have gotten caught in a self-perpetuating loop that keeps us pushing off play ‘til we finish _____ (fill in the blank)...you know, finish that something that you’re supposed to be finishing. Since we value this work-before-play attitude, we often communicate it to our kids, and their schools and teachers too. We tell schools to focus on teaching our kids more, and to aim higher, and that often comes at the expense of free play time. Parents often say they hate the increase in testing, but at the same time, schools hear parents saying they want to be sure their child is achieving at his/her potential. We’ve spun ourselves into a decision-making process where all time is now evaluated against our personal ROI. How will this activity move my life forward, make me a better person, get me a better job, grade, spouse, etc.? Now, the same questions get asked about a child’s time: How will this activity move my child’s life forward, make him/her a better person, get him/her a better grade, friends, job, etc? If the answer isn’t quantifiable, if it doesn’t guarantee us that if we do X, Y will happen, we often push the activity to the bottom of our (or our child’s) to-do list. Consider that many of the organized activities ruling the lives of today’s kids were created with the intention of pushing out “frivolous” play time. But what have we lost in the bargain?

While it may feel counter-intuitive, the research shows that unstructured, imaginative, open play helps kids develop creativity, empathy, self esteem, learn self-regulation, and build effective social-emotional skills.

A lightbulb about play appeared for me soon after I became a parent. When I finally became a parent (after many, many adult years without a child) I was hyper-conscious of exactly how my life was changing, and one of the biggest changes was with PLAY. That is, I had more play in my life. I was playing. I was going to playgrounds and playing pretend games and making art out of found objects. I was trying to model for my daughter how to play with exuberance, the whole concept of playing like no one is watching. After doing this for a while, I realized how much I loved it. I felt more present; not just with her, but present in all aspects of my life. Having a child is (among many other glorious things) a consistent excuse to play. Of course this is especially true when our children are young and everything about life is new and easy to turn into a game. But I find that it’s still true now that my daughter is a teenager. When she and I allow a moment to leap into play and let our sillier selves out, the laughter reconnects us and helps us get through those times when we aren’t agreeing quite so much.

We’re vulnerable when we play. The rules may not be so clear. We might look goofy or uncoordinated. We will make mistakes. That’s play.

But we need that.

I think a reason kids aren’t getting enough play is because adults are too often willing to push the play out of their own lives and simply forget how great play feels and how important play is to feeling good. Mr. Rogers (as in Mr. Rogers Neighborhood) said that “play is the work of childhood”. But maybe play isn’t just “the work of childhood”, maybe play is the work of life. Maybe play is the secret ingredient to enjoying our days and feeling more connected-- and maybe even accomplishing the items on our personal to-do list.