Playing and Learning

I read an article before Christmas in Better Homes and Gardens and pulled out this quote:

"But we also need to make room for unstructured time, and for toys- like building blocks and modeling clay-that can be played with in a lot of different ways." The need for this kind of creative play is crucial. In developmental studies of schoolchildren over the past 20 years, researchers at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, found that kids who got more time for this kind of play were able to use their creativity in other areas of their lives as they grew up. In particular, research showed a strong link between creative play and the development of effective problem-solving and coping skills, which will serve children well for the rest of their lives.

Study or not, I have thought for a while that many kids today don't have enough time to just play and be kids. I never really have bought into the idea that kids need to spend more time in school or more time in activities.

Our homeschool bears this out. In the early years we do the regular stuff, like reading out loud, letters, numbers, shapes, colors. But those years are also more relaxed with lots of time to play.

This is my favorite, recent example of what kinds of things they do during this play time. This is Samuel's movie theater built from Duplo blocks. You are looking from the back up toward the front at the screen.


This is looking from the front of the theater to the seats. You'll see 2 alligators there in the front row. A red gemstone and a frog in the middle row and a little monkey in the back.

This is the projection booth run by a lizard whose tail you can see. As far as I know Sam has been to 2 movies at the theater in his life, so I can't believe he thought to make a projection booth, but John says it's the engineer in Sam that brought it to mind.

After I took these pictures Sam kept building with his blocks. "What are you making now?" I asked him. "I have to make the potty," he replied clearly astonished that I could forget something so important. That is perfect Sam. He really gets a kick out of all things potty. I'm afraid to imagine how that sort of play "will serve him well the rest of his life".