Play is concerned with enabling children to achieve their full potential in developmental terms and is as important as school is in acheiving these goals.
There I said it. Play is as important as School.
Playworkers believe that a flexible environment is critical for a child’s development. The degree of flexibility in the play environment directly effects a child’s opportunities for experimentation, and the level of control that the child is able to exercise. The freedom to experiment, produces positive feelings and a sense of achievement, which in turn, encourages the development of self-confidence and self-acceptance. With increased self-confidence, the child becomes more comfortable with taking risks and consequently their reaction to day-to-day problems becomes more varied. This increasingly flexible approach to problem solving makes the child better able to use the full potential of the play environment. This means that in a flexible play environment, where children are free to manipulate whatever things are in the play space, according to their imaginations, the child moves closer to their developmental potential than would otherwise have been the case.
But, when I think of schools, flexibility is not the first word that comes to mind. In schools, the activities within are governed by a curriculum which the teachers must successfully deliver to their students by years end. Teachers assign the activities and the students must do these activities in order to pass. Let’s face it, as a society we value learning in school as more valuable than learning through play, it’s a simple as that.
But is it? Children who have little control over their world inevitably have fewer positive experiences, which in turn slows the development of their self-confidence. Children who lack confidence are less likely to take risks or try out different solutions to the problems they encounter. In the end, I know school is important on a societal level andI am also convinced that morre free play in flexible environments is a great benefit to our children as well!