Don't Let THEM Take Away Play

Play is the foundation of all early learning; children learn by playing with their environment. Their fingers, toes, and mouths are their first playthings. As knowledge of the world grows, so does the list of items integrated into their play: stacking cups, blocks, paint, crayons, dolls, pots, pans, and cardboard boxes. They also learn by playing with ideas, feelings, and language. Play is an amazing and natural process.

The problem is that there are forces in our society that seem bent on making the natural learning-through-play process difficult--even taking it away from our children entirely. I am not implying that there is a malicious band of evildoers conspiring to rid the world of play. In fact I suppose in their minds they are doing the right thing and believe what they are doing is positive and will benefit children. I just believe they happen to be wrong.

The THEY I speak of are businesses that play on parental fears, insecurities, and lack of knowledge about how to promote early learning. These are the businesses that urge parents to buy baby videos, flash cards, and toys embedded with computer chips; business that claim the products will make your infant the smartest six month old on the block and give them a leg up on the competition; businesses that imply it is never too early for a baby to get ahead in the rat race.

The other part of THEY is the government. A goodhearted desire to leave no child behind is leaving children behind. Government paper pushers and policy wonks have devised systems and policies that are forcing educators to teach children how to pass tests instead of helping them learn. These efforts have also resulted in the loss of recess, music, sports, art, and other enrichment activities thought to be superfluous. Play-based early learning is literally being pushed out of our schools as more and more seatwork and “real” learning is pushed from the upper grades into kindergarten and first grade.

Parents are under unbearable pressure to assure their baby is smarter than all the other babies are so they will succeed in school and get a good job in 25 years. This pressure can result in stressed out parents, fretful children, and strained or broken marriages. Families where even the dog is on anxiety medication.

It does not have to be this way. Early learning is simple—in fact, it is probably harder to stop a young child from learning than it is to help them learn through play. To promote learning through play focus on the following:

• Emotional Environment. Create a safe, relaxed, and nurturing emotional environment. Children are only able to go off and explore the world when they feel safe. We need to focus on meeting their emotional and physical needs in preparation for learning. One of the most important things we can do to create an effective emotional environment is let go of the past and future and focuses on being in the moment with the children in our care. Children feed off our emotions—a stressed caregiver means stressed children.

• Physical Environment. Set up a physical environment that offers a variety of simple, engaging, and open-ended materials. There is no need for expensive and fancy toys. Children will play with anything. Just make sure the items are safe and that there is some variety. Too many toys can be overwhelming. They love things like empty boxes and plastic containers. For example, I’ve been tracking how they use an empty one-quart yogurt container. In the last few weeks, it has been use as a cage for small dinosaurs, a shoe, a roller skate, a birthday cake, a cup, a doll car, a baby bed, and a block. The children have kicked it, stood on it, spun it, hauled it, dropped it, tossed it, filled it with plastic eggs, hid things in it, and used it as a home for imaginary caterpillars. This one empty container has contributed to hours of play. Play—and learning--happen.

• Get Out Of The Way. Fade into the background as the child plays, explores, and discovers, but be available to assist as needed. Your job is to set the stage for learning and then move aside so it can happen. You should not make yourself the center of attention. This idea of teaching-by-getting-out-of-the-way may sound odd, but it is important that you do not let your desire to teach get in the way of the child’s desire to learn.

Don’t let THEM get to you. Children come pre-programmed to learn through self-directed play, exploration, and discovery. Their natural curiosity and drive to know the world is innate. We do not have to spend piles of money on computerized teddy bears, flash cards, and learning toys. We do not have to let THEM stress us out about early learning for most children, early learning just happens.

If you are concerned about helping your young child get ahead, I suggest you share a bowl of yogurt with them and then go see what you can do with the container.