Are your children playing enough?

Play is so important in child development that it's been recognized by the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights as a right of every child. Playtime ensures that children use their creativity while developing their imagination and physical, emotional and cognitive skills. They learn how to work in groups, resolve conflict, develop social skills, practice adult roles and gain confidence, but unfortunately due to increasing academic pressure, children are spending lesser and lesser time playing at home and school. 

'All work and no play', as they say, 'makes Jack a dull boy'. When children are allowed to play, they are enabled to be themselves and it is a great stress-buster as well. In this high-pressure world, children are succumbing to depression and anxiety at a very early age. They say instead of stopping a child from playing as a punishment for bad behavior, children are better behaved when allowed to play. 

Both structured and unstructured playtime is very crucial to a child’s development. Unstructured playtime lets children use their own imagination whether they want to role play and become a superhero; they can play 'make-believe', where anything is possible and this helps children develop their creative skills. Structured playtime is adult-led, like playing board games together, going to the park, teaching your child how to ride a bike, playing soccer, swimming or any other sport. Younger children (toddlers and pre-schoolers) do not need structured play but as they grow older (school-aged children) they need more structured play.

A lot of schools have now introduced the concept of unstructured play-time within the curriculum for primary classes. Senior classes have sports introduced in their curriculum which teaches them to work as a team, to reduce stress levels, handle situations with confidence, enhances communication and increase general confidence levels. We should encourage younger children to play in the park but not stress them too early in life to join a sport.

 I remember I had encouraged my son to join skating classes when he was three, but he wasn’t happy doing so, and he told me that he did not like it. I felt like I was forcing him to do something that he did not enjoy doing. I asked him which physical activity he would enjoy doing. He told me that he liked running and enjoyed riding his bicycle. So we did just that. Both forms of activities help develop leg muscle and improve strength. We get so influenced by mothers around when we see that their children have joined either a tennis class or a soccer class, but we shouldn’t do that - in their younger years let the children themselves decide which physical activity they would enjoy taking-up, as it is for pleasure and it is not a job. Unless of course your child has inborn talent and you see a future in sports, don’t force your child, but expose the child to the sport. Encourage the child, but do not be too pushy.

Unstructured play should not include technological entertainment like the television or the ipad. Encourage them to go to the park, climb trees, play hide and seek etc. Introduce board games; the very first board game I brought home for my son was chess, when he was 3.5 years old, and he very quickly understood the game and wanted to play chess with his grandfather when he got back from school. Then we brought home a lot of other games like Junior Monopoly, Business, Scrabble Junior, Uno, Boggle, Rolling Tales, Cluedo, Tangram, Brainvita , Let’s go Fishing , Ludo, Snakes & Ladders, Origami and of course a lot of puzzles. All these games help in improving gross and fine motor skills, cognitive skills, analytical and critical thinking, enhancing creativity and team play.

We need to teach our child to play independently as well. It is not always possible for someone to be around all the time to play with your child. Tell your child that we will play together but I want you to first spend ten minutes playing on your own or doing some activity on your own without mumma or any adult. This will ensure that your child picks up an independent hobby and doesn’t always need a companion to keep himself or herself occupied. 

Too many toys can also confuse a child and not give him clarity as to what he should play or do on his own. We generally make a child watch tv or give them the ipad for independent play instead make them read, listen to music or play an indoor game. There should be lots of interactive play but it should also be balanced out with independent play. My son loves to play with cars, he calls it “car walli game”, which he loves playing with his grandparents and of course at times I tell him to play it on his own. I see him let his imagination run wild; his stories range from going on a trip to earthquake disaster management, crisis management, being in the army and so on and so forth. In this process of unstructured creative play he learns to communicate, listen and work as team. 

Initially he wanted to do all the talking and wouldn’t want anybody else’s input in the game but gradually I had to explain to him that if I respect his input so he needs to respect mine as well. Even during structured play there are times when your child wants to win every game and not lose. You need to intervene and tell your child that winning or losing doesn’t matter, you are playing the game for fun and the person who plays the best wins and you can’t always win. We sometimes let our child win a game just to make them happy, but we shouldn’t do that, it’s counterproductive and the child plays the game only if he or she feels that the outcome will be their winning the game.

Play is often talked about as if it was relief from serious learning. But for children, play is serious learning – Mr Rogers