Bring Back Play!

Barbara, the author of our third entry on chapter 5, is pictured here with her siblings when they were children. She said, "This is me standing in the back at Grandma's house. I'm eight and it's my first communion; my brother Gabriel (7 yrs); Esther "BabyDoll" (6 yrs); and the youngest Christina (2 yrs). We spent a lot of time at my grandparents' (my dad's parents) in Tulare where they lived about 3 blocks from us. Every Sunday, we spent time at my mom's parents; they lived in Porterville. We still go to my grandparents' house (Tulare) every month. They're gone now but my aunt and uncle bought the house. Family has always been a big part of our life and we are raising our kids the same way. Daddy was a big part of our life and playing with the cousins and our dad was big for us. Miss him every day." Barbara lost her dad this summer, so you can imagine just how precious all of those childhood memories are now. And you'll see in her entry that she has many more wonderful memories of play with her dad and entire family. Enjoy!

The beginning of this chapter tells a story of a young girl who is confined because her father believes she is retarded. When she is finally removed from this environment, she is taken to a store and discovers new smells, sights, and sounds she hadn’t been exposed to before in her childhood. Elkind explains the role adults play in the learning process and how that role affects their learning. Society has rushed our children to learn everything quickly and lost the opportunities to learn through play.

The first misunderstanding is the “watch me” theory of learning and instruction (Elkind, p.91). Elkind explains that we don’t learn by watching, but by doing. Instead of the teacher or parent watching the child and giving them the opportunity to learn on their own, we’re expecting them to learn by watching us. Sometimes as adults we need to release the control and encourage “self-directed activities” even if they don’t seem related to what we are trying to teach.

The second misunderstanding is the “Little Sponge” theory of learning and instruction (Elkind, p.93). As adults we tend to have our own agenda when we try to teach through activities or events, and may get frustrated if we don’t think they are getting our lessons. However, children in effect, are always learning, just not always the way we think they are learning. The little sponge method has become a justification for the push to teach everything to our children during their preschool through elementary school years when their brain growth is the greatest. Elkind points out that there is no evidence to support this belief. Although they can readily take in a lot of information, it takes a lot longer for children to process the information because of their immature mental capabilities.

The third misunderstanding is the “Look Harder” theory of learning and instruction (Elkind, p. 98). Elkind basically explains that just because we see it, hear it, or read it doesn’t mean we understand it. He uses the example of reading a German phrase; you can read it, but unless you speak German, you’re not going to understand it. A lot of the school work now is rote memorization. Our children are taught to memorize the ‘math facts,’ which are pages of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division problems starting from kindergarten, and the same for sight words. Does this help them comprehend the information or just memorize the information? I believe Elkind when he says that kids need to learn through play, which plays an important part in their cognitive growth.

My own elementary years were in the middle sixties to the early seventies, and I remember having longer recesses and more creative art and hands-on activities. I started kindergarten when I was four because of my birthdate, and we mostly did role playing, arts and crafts and had nap time. From first grade through high school, learning came easily to me and I was mostly a straight A student. My family participated in sports, Boy Scouts/Girl Scouts, and stayed out almost every night, playing outside rain or shine. When it rained my mom would give us a bucket and cooking utensils and we would make mud pies on the porch. My mom and dad were big on playing outdoors and just being kids for as long as possible. Our homework was done by the time dad got home and he would take us to play handball, catch, four square, freeze tag, duck-duck-goose, or to fly kites. We grew up in a large family of thirty-four cousins and spent a lot of time at grandma’s three or four times a week. Dad was our softball coach and mom was our softball manager. Playing was a big part of our life.

My husband and I are trying to do the same with our kids; Samuel is in cross-country, baseball, football, robotics club, drama club, and Boy Scouts, and our daughter is in softball, volleyball, reading book club (library) and Girl Scouts. These are things they enjoy and we want them to have fun and play as much as possible, however, schoolwork is making it harder and harder. Their recesses are shorter, days longer, and homework for both every night: six to eight pages. This does not include time they spend in class learning lessons, doing daily benchmark tests, and studying for state exams.

I understand academic learning is important to a child’s success later in their adult life, but I believe play teaches other values and lessons needed to succeed in their adult life. I feel play teaches children how to explore their world using both their body and mind, and teaches them to know themselves, and understand how to work socially in their environment. I’m like every parent and want my children to succeed in their future and continue their education through college, but it saddens me that they are getting pushed harder and losing play time, making them more frustrated with school.