CreativePlay Plus: Ideas in Play and Child Development

Dealing with challenging behavior is one of the most stressful aspects of parenting. Decades ago “hitting” children was an acceptable response to their negative behavior.  As parents learned that physical punishment fails to prevent misbehavior, “hitting” became taboo and putting a child in “time-out” became the popular alternative.  In “time-out” a child is sent or taken to an isolated area where s/he is expected to remain for a specified period of time; the time spent in “time-out” typically correlates with the child’s age, (i.e. three minutes for a three year old; five minutes for a five year old.)

Time-Out became popular for the following reasons:

• It is a relatively easy way to interrupt unwanted behavior.
• It offers the adult a needed space away from the child so the adult can calm down.
• It helps the adult refrain from using physical punishment by providing an alternative approach of responding to a child’s misbehavior

While “time-out” is preferable to physical punishment, it has limitations:

• A child who is naturally loquacious may need to talk out loud in order to think through a situation; this child sorts out his/her thoughts as they are expressed to others.  Time-out alone will shut down this child’s thinking.
• A child who processes experiences with feelings and then later thoughts may shut down both thoughts and feelings when sent to “time-out.”
• If a child lacks information or skills, “time-out” alone will not provide them.
• “Time-out” may feel like the withdrawal of love or promote feelings of abandonment, both of which can be very frightening to a child.
• When children regard “time-out” as a punishment they often use their discomfort to blame the parent rather than learn fro the experience.

The ultimate goal with discipline is to have the child experience the uncomfortable feelings associated with making a poor choice and then learn from the experience. The following model will help achieve this:

• Provide the child with guidance and explain what is likely to occur.  For example, “If you leave your bike out in the street it’s possible someone might take it.”
• Allow the child to experience the natural consequences of his/her actions or behavior.
• Always model self control by remaining calm and composed without attributing blame or guilt to the child; blame or guilt decrease the likelihood that meaningful learning will occur.
• Offer much empathy when the child experiences an unpleasant outcome; you don’t have to agree with the child in order to understand and/or appreciate the child’s uncomfortable feelings.
• Assist the child in learning new strategies to prevent the same mistake or one of a similar nature to repeat.

Parents have several important responsibilities among them; to protect children and keep them safe and to help children grow and become independent.  As Hodding Carter noted, “There are two lasting bequests we can give our children, one is roots, and the other is wings.”

While it comes naturally for parents to keep their children out of harms way, promoting children’s independence can be a more daunting task.  We can encourage independence, self-reliance and promote positive self – esteem in young children by involving them in household tasks.  This helps children make valuable contributions to family life.

Involving children in household chores:

• Increases family togetherness
• Helps children acquire new skills and gain new masteries that promote healthy self-esteem.
• Enables children to experience first-hand what it means to be a family “producer” rather than simply a family “consumer.”
• Helps children learn from an early age that real work is fun and rewarding.
• Nurtures young children’s natural desire to feel useful and/or helpful.

When encouraging young children to participate in “real” work efforts, chores should always be developmentally appropriate and adapted to a youngster’s interests and abilities.  The following suggestions can serve as a helpful guideline.

• Notice what adult behaviors children are imitating, especially those related to adult tasks.
• Always involve children in deciding what tasks they would like to do; greater input typically equates to greater buy-in!
• Help children learn how to do a given task before they attempt it on their own.
• Divide larger jobs into smaller and more manageable parts.  For example, when sorting laundry, first have your child pick out all the socks and then introduce the idea of finding matching pairs.
• Encourage and reinforce children’s efforts.  While their standards may not be the same as an adult’s, resist redoing a task a child has already completed.
• Avoid communicating that tasks are boring and need to be endured.  Children have a propensity for mimicking adult behavior and manifesting adult attitudes.
• Acknowledge children’s accomplishments with very specific praise.  For example, “Setting the table allowed us to sit down and eat together as soon as dinner was ready; that was helpful, thank you!”

Children want to be a part of the adult world just as much as they want adults to share their world.  If children are encouraged to contribute their efforts in accomplishing appropriate tasks at home, the lives of both parents and children become enriched.

Undoubtedly an important aspect of child development is a child’s ability to be playful. No one knew this better than Dr. Seuss who said:

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope, which is what I do. And that enables you to laugh at life’s realities.”

To be playful means to have a flexible understanding and approach to life. It also means having the ability to make an experience more joyful and entertaining. If you have a child, you understand that most children inherently have this gift to make a lot of situations fun when given the opportunity. Even something as simple as walking from the car to the front door could mean a chance to skip, twirl, fly, and buzz all the way home.  We write a lot about the importance of giving children time to play, but having a playful disposition may be just as important as the act of playing itself. One way to help your child be playful: reading books by creative writers like Dr. Seuss. Another way, be a playful parent! That way, when they come up against a boring or scary situation they have the freedom to escape into their imagination and make light of some of life’s tedious tasks.

Most parents will agree that mathematical skills are big deal.  So what do you do when your child doesn’t seem interested in numbers? Try this clever number match game from mommy blogger Allison at No Time For Flash Cards.  What we like about this game is that you can adjust it to be more or less challenging for kids depending on their development level.  The best part is you only need colored construction paper and a marker to get your math magicians learning!

The social and cognitive benefits of recess and free play are too important to be ignored. During recess children learn valuable social skills like learning to negotiate with peers in order to keep playing with them.

“I want to play on the monkey bars too.  How about we take turns?”

“You got to choose 4-square yesterday, today let’s play tag, okay?”

“Come play with us! We need more people to play kickball! It will be fun!”

Recess also gives children opportunities to become comfortable with deciding how they want to spend their free time and who they want to spend their time with.

The argument that physical education is a good substitute for recess is not adequately supported. The instructional nature and highly structured time found in physical education classes does not allow children the same sort of free time to explore, be creative, or control how they spend their time with peers, on their terms. Physical education also does not give them the time to practice sophisticated ways to compromise and resolve conflicts.

Dr. Anthony Pelligrini has studied important questions like, does what children do on the playground predict school achievement? In fact, Dr. Pelligrini found that the behavioral measures he developed to observe children at recess actually predicted first grade achievement better than kindergarten test scores.  Meaning, playground behaviors should be considered an important part of child development that could determine academic success of children early on in child education.

How do you feel about the amount of free-play time your children gets at school? Do you agree that play could potentially promote academic success?

Dr. Anthony Pelligrini is a notable scholar of recess and the education system. According to him, recess is disappearing because school administrators are more concerned with increasing instructional time and claim that recess promotes bullying and aggressive behaviors.

The argument that recess is not as developmentally important as instructional time is not well founded. We know from extensive research, that children who are asked to perform a school task are significantly more attentive after recess than when they are deprived of a break. (See our previous posts, A breath of fresh air and More than just a walk in the park)

Moreover, the argument that recess promotes negative interactions between children is also not supported. In a cross-cultural study, conducted by Pelligrini, they found that less than 2% of behaviors observed on playgrounds are physically or verbally aggressive. Additionally, with adequate adult supervision, this rate becomes even lower. We also know that children who are bullied are also bullied at lunch, on buses, in bathrooms, just about anywhere where children are not well monitored by adults. In actuality, lack of adult supervision may more likely be the culprit in creating opportunities for children to be aggressive.

How much time does your school district allot for recess or free play periods? Are your children monitored well during recess? What do you think of this argument? Do you think children are bullied more on the playground than any other setting at school?

School age kids are all about getting things done. The famous psychologist, Erik Erikson, wrote (famously) that the core of development at this age is the crisis of “industry versus inferiority.”  In other words, children need to feel capable and competent. They need to make things, know things, and master skills. You can plug into this powerful drive when picking out the perfect presents for the kids on your list.

Projects: Children love to have special projects they can create on their own.  For younger children, look for kits that come with instructions. Older and more experienced creators need higher quality materials, and the freedom to follow their creative urges.

• Think about supplies for painting, drawing, candle-making, woodworking, macramé, knitting, assembling electronics, flower arranging, photography, and similar ventures.

Tools for science: Children with a natural curiosity about the world may enjoy a gift that helps them explore and learn about science. For that matter, it’s hard to imagine a child who wouldn’t be curious about nature, given a proper invitation. By invitation, I mean an adult who gets excited about natural things, and gives a child an opportunity to take an interest and learn about the natural world.

• Consider if your child may like a microscope and slides, a telescope, a star map, a gyroscope, binoculars for birding, a starter rock collection, a pick for digging up fossils (or just interesting junk), or a butterfly net.

Lessons: You might have bitter memories of lessons that were forced upon you. But if a child shows urges in an artistic direction, lesions can be joyful and meaningful.

• A child whose feet move with the beat might love dance lessons.

• A child who is always humming tunes may blossom with singing lessons or with a musical instrument.

• The key –and where you have to be a little lucky – is matching the child’s interest with a great teacher.
  • A great teacher doesn’t have to be the best dancer or singer or actor, but he or she does need to have a love for the subject, and a love for children and for helping them grow.

Sports and Athletics: Many children express their drive for growth and accomplishment through sports and athletics. If they’re already into a particular sport, it’s no trick to find new, better equipment for them. If they are not sporty, they might still enjoy an introduction to a new non-competitive activity.

• For the last few months I’ve been giving out 3-lb weights to patients of mine who need an extra nudge to get moving. I tell them they’re for “TV exercises” –a pleasant way to keep moving, build muscles, while mentally vegging out. The kids always seem excited.

You’ll notice that I’m not advocating out and out asking children what they want, but instead making educated guesses based on what you know about their interests and leanings.

If you do ask, most of the boys (and many of the girls) will say that they want the newest video game console or handheld player. I know this, because I’ve asked. And sure, video games aren’t entirely passive, and they do teach children things (some good things and some bad), and they do feed a child’s hunger for competence. But most relate only to a virtual world, drawing a child away from the real one. Things in everyday life become dull and boring, because they can’t compete with the non-stop action (complete with catchy theme music) in the virtual reality. Anyhow, there’s a good chance that some less original Santa will tie a boy around an electronic whiz-box. Let them. You can do better, developmentally speaking.

The other day, a friend of mine gave me a book. The title of the book is not important.* What is important is the story behind the gift.

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My friend is a pediatrician and mother of three children. As it turns out, they are all star students. The oldest two are attending famous universities, and the youngest has been accepted to a top school as well. Not that getting into a great college is the only index of success, or even the best one. But it is notable that all three children have chosen to play the academic game, and all are finding success.

Being John Malkovich movies It often doesn’t work this way in families. There are families in which one child—often the oldest – is a great student, but the siblings who follow aren’t. They behave as if the “great student” role has been taken, and they choose different paths. One becomes “the artist,” another “the jock,” and perhaps another “the clown.” Of course, it is possible that these roles really are the right ones for each child. But in many cases I think that what drives children is a fear of competition with a sibling who has already staked out a strong position.

In fact, this dynamic did affect my friend’s family. Early on, the eldest son established himself as someone who loved reading and learning. His younger sister, looking up at this budding star, at first shied away from books. How could she hope to compete? And yet, my friend was able to help her daughter get past this fear and develop her own love of learning.

This key, my friend explained, was to find a book that her daughter would fall in love with, a book that was very different from any of the ones that her oldest son favored. The book my friend found for her daughter – and the one she gave to me – was a book of poems about colors and flowers. To a girl who loved pretty things, the appeal of the book was instant. Soon, the girl was reading more and more and writing her own poems. With the third child, it was a different spark that ignited the love of reading.

I’m telling you this story not because all girls need to love flowers, and not even because all children need to love books. I am telling it to you because it shows how a gifted parent finds the keys to unlock each child’s talents.

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*The book was Hailstones and Halibut Bones by Mary O’Neill Phoebe in Wonderland download

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Many parents come in to Dr. Kessler’s book store wanting to find a book to help a child feel more comfortable with a novel situation, like what happens on the first day or school or when parents divorce. Also, parents often want to find books that will help dissuade children from doing bad behaviors, like bullying.

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Dr. Kessler stresses that books that discuss experiences common to children are important to share with your child. Reading books like these provide an opportunity to talk with your child about your concerns, however, remember they cannot change behavior on their own.

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Dr. Kessler recommends looking at the Curious George series of books for good ways to talk about experiences that may be new and/or scary for children. This series offers a number of experiences that children go through, like going to the doctor, getting glasses, and the first day of school.