CreativePlay Plus: Ideas in Play and Child Development

Educational systems that are focused on traditional learning, like language arts and math, do not give children struggling in these areas a chance to learn other potential strengths. Children who have strengths in music, dance, theater, and art aren’t necessarily given opportunities during the school day to hone their skills. Most importantly, these children are lacking opportunities to feel good about themselves in ways that arts education can provide. Imagine not having at least a little time during the day to do something you are good at or express yourself in a way you feel comfortable. For children who struggle in traditional classrooms it could be a constant reminder that they are not “good enough.”

Something to consider- think about what arts education really provides. Is it really just downtime during the school day for children to do craft projects or take music lessons? I argue that it’s not.

• Arts education can be a way for children to process, reflect, and organize content in a way that is perhaps more meaningful than traditional learning.
• Arts education also helps children practice higher level thinking like: analysis of information, problem solving, and execution of ideas while also expressing their selves.
• For example, asking a child to make a bird and nest out of clay requires the child to recall a mental picture of what that means to them, attempt to represent this image, and also learn to manage challenges along the way, like birds have feathers but I’m working with clay and not feathers.

Arts education is an important part of school and unfortunately it seems to be less valued than traditional academics.  In what ways does your child’s school allow your child to explore non-traditional academic subjects? Are there things you do at home or extracurricular activities you and your child are involved in to help supplement traditional learning?

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?

It seems like every time the New Year rolls around, we make resolutions to ourselves.  Lose weight. Stick to a budget.  Get organized.  So often, it seems as if those resolutions just end up falling by the wayside!  Maybe it’s time to make some resolutions that are easier to stick to, more specific, and more realistic so that we may actually accomplish them.  Instead of worrying about that extra 10 pounds, why not resolve to make 2010 the year creative play becomes an important part of life in your home?

Start by taking a look at the toys in your household – are there things the kids have outgrown?  Give them to charity!  Most likely, those toys won’t even be missed.

Next, cast a critical eye at the quality of the toys – can kids learn from and be inspired by them, or are they the types of toys which lead children into specific forms of directed play?  If you’re seeing a lot of things that wouldn’t lend a creative spark to play, put them away!  You don’t have to get rid of them, but take this opportunity to make these toys a “last resort” for an especially snowy or rainy day.

Finally, note what you have around the house that could be used for creative play, and if you haven’t already, start a “prop box” for kids to go to when you hear the words all caregivers dread the most – “I’m bored!”  The box can contain almost anything, from last year’s Halloween costumes, to towels, to stuffed animals, and even your old clothes.  Kids have the creative capacity to be inspired by almost anything, and chances are, your house is a treasure trove of potentially exciting and stimulating props that will allow them to imagine, create, and explore well into the next year, and beyond!

The holiday season is in full swing, and for many people, this means Christmas shopping for children is at the top of their list. If you have kids on your list this year, there are plenty of ways to make sure they aren’t just overwhelmed by store-bought Christmas gifts, but instead get a chance to receive some great toys for creative play which can be used all year long!

One way to avoid the pressures of the retail world at Christmas is to make your own Christmas gifts for the children on your list. For toddlers, homemade play dough is a sure hit. You can create endless options using food coloring, and storage is simple with the use of disposable storage containers. Just be sure you use the kind with tight lids to keep the dough from drying out too quickly.

Homemade blocks are another great idea for toddlers. Using such simple things as empty milk cartons and paper bags, you can quickly and easily make a full set of alphabet or number blocks — Christmas gifts little ones will be entertained by for hours.

For slightly older children, Christmas gifts like playsilks are a versatile and fun alternative to traditional dress-up costumes. Purchased in basic white, these inexpensive playsilks can be dyed with Kool-Aid (yes, Kool-Aid!) and used in a variety of ways to create endless costume combinations.

Finally, if you spend any amount of time around kids, chances are you’ve built up a supply of crayons, many of which have been worn down to almost nothing. But that doesn’t mean these hard-to-handle nubs can’t be repurposed! In fact, you can use them to make colorful, chunky crayons which are easy to hold, and fun Christmas gifts for children of almost any age.

The holiday season is made up of several major holidays, of which Hanukkah is first. If you follow the Jewish faith, this is a great time to commemorate the holiday with children through creative play, while allowing them to take part in important family and religious traditions.  Even if you don’t traditionally celebrate Hanukkah, but are interested in exposing kids to religious diversity, there are plenty of ways to do that, too.

One way to get kids involved in celebrating and understanding Hanukkah is by grabbing your prop box and encouraging them to act out the Hanukkah story.

For the less theatrical group, crafting may be more your thing.  There are a variety of different ways to use creative crafts to celebrate Hanukkah.  Anything from the traditional menorah to a fun dreidel can be crafted easily and inexpensively out of things you have on hand or even in your own backyard!

Another fun (and yummy!) way to celebrate Hanukkah is by making specific traditional foods.  Delicious Hanukkah recipes for dishes such as potato latkes, kugel, and apple fritters are widely available, and often simple to make.  Just be sure that an adult is on hand to help supervise the cooking!  If you sit down for a special meal of Hanukkah favorites, you may want to include a special holiday blessing.

Lastly, there are many games and activities which can make what is often known as the “Festival of Lights” into an educational but fun time for the whole family.  From coloring pages, to puzzles, to the traditional dreidel game, there are many ways to celebrate Hanukkah, while honoring the ancient traditions of the holiday.

The holidays are here, and if you’re a parent or caregiver to children, it’s a great time to start thinking about winter break activities that will keep kids busy and having fun.  As an added bonus, if the activities result in a little learning, well then, all the better!

Some of the best winter break activities are fairly traditional, like making snowmen in colder climates when weather permits.  But how about taking that outdoor fun to a new level by creating different kinds of snow creatures, from snowdogs to snowmonsters?  Don’t forget to utilize your creative play prop box during this activity – you’ll be amazed at what kids will find to “dress up” their creations!

Another great winter break activity for a frosty day is baking or cooking (with an adult’s supervision, of course!).  Have a book of child-friendly recipes on hand and let them choose what they want to make (make sure it’s age-appropriate – even kids’ cookbooks generally span a range of ages).  Then take them to the grocery store with a list of needed ingredients.  For older children, this is a great time to start shaping skills such as selecting produce or even budgeting.  Let them pick out what’s on the list, and only guide them when they get off track.  Once you get everything home, make a production out of it!  Tie on aprons, make chefs hats out of napkins, and get cooking!

For a simpler take on baking, buy refrigerated sugar cookie dough, and let kids of all ages have a chance to shape, bake, and decorate the final product.  Don’t feel limited to traditional holiday themes –a little cookie dough and a lot of creative energy will produce hours of incredible, edible art in all shapes and sizes.

Finally, the holidays are a time when many children receive gifts from various friends and relatives, and the perfect winter break activity to thank others for their generosity is making homemade thank you cards.  This is an excellent way to let kids get creative, while making a lasting and much-appreciated memento for the gift giver.  Gather up whatever art supplies you have on hand, a list of recipients and you’re ready to go!  This is the ideal opportunity to have a little messy, crafty fun, while learning the art of expressing gratitude to those around us at a very special time of year.

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Halloween is a great time to have some fun combining a learning activity — shape identification — with one of the best-loved activities of the season – pumpkin carving!

Shape identification is an important skill for children to practice and learn, starting as early as nursery and pre-school.  When children recognize, identify, and become able to name different shapes, they are learning to tie words (such as “Square” or “Circle”) to mathematical concepts, forming a foundation for later learning in this area.

If you plan on integrating shape identification lessons into your evening of pumpkin carving, your best bet is to have more than one pumpkin on hand, because as with all creative play

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-related activities, you want to let your kids direct the activity themselves.  This will likely result in lots of fun and creative ideas, but also a great big mess, so it’s good to have more than one “subject” to carve on (with an adult’s help and safety knives, of course!).

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Starting out, let your kids draw on the pumpkin with a marker (you can always help them if they’re too young for drawing) in order to create whatever face or scene they want on the pumpkin.  Have them name the shapes they’re drawing as they go.  Then, go back and carve the shapes into the pumpkin, again having them give names to the shapes as the pumpkin carving progresses.

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Remember, this should be fun – don’t feel like the design on the pumpkin needs to look like anything in particular.  Pumpkin carving is an act of creativity for your kids, so let them do what they’d like with their pumpkin, even if it may not look exactly like something you’d generally want on your front porch!  In this case, shape identification skills are simply a helpful by-product of a wonderful opportunity to spend some quality time with your children.

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Of course, pumpkin carving isn’t the only way to help your children enhance their shape identification skills.  Try a 20-minute shape walk on one of these last beautiful days of fall, and help your kids get active while learning at the same time!

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With Halloween “creep”-ing up fast, it’s a great time to let your kids’ imaginations run wild with their Halloween costumes.  Rather than purchasing store-bought costumes off the rack, why not spend some time with your kids brainstorming different ideas for homemade Halloween costumes?  You don’t have to be the Queen or King of Crafting to make something wonderful at home, and it’s a great way to involve your kids in the creation of their own Halloween costumes.  Kaboose.com has some excellent directions on how to make your own homemade Halloween costumes

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and Funny Food costumes.

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Once you have the costume dilemma under control, and you’ve successfully navigated yet another Halloween night, you may find yourself wondering what to do with the costumes you’ve made.  Well, don’t forget to repurpose those costumes by putting them away in your dress-up box!  Kids love costumes no matter what the reason or the season, so recycling old costumes for later creative play is a great way to make sure all of your hard work doesn’t go to waste.  Although the general guidelines for creative play don’t generally endorse the use of full costumes for creative playtime, you’ll be amazed at how pieces and parts of what you’ve made for Halloween finds new life in your kids’ imagination later on.  A pirate sword could become a walking stick, or a set of angel wings the perfect way to lift a butterfly off the ground.  The beauty of creative play is that truly, anything is possible!

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One of the primary benefits of creative play is the development of specific important skills in children.  However, the introduction of so many narrowly-focused toys and games since the 1950s has actually shown to impede the growth of children’s cognitive abilities, most specifically in an area called executive function.  This is truly one of the most important skill sets children can acquire during their formative years. голова болит секс голова болит секс

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are much like other cognitive skills in that they must be learned. These skills include planning, cognitive flexibility, abstract thinking, and self regulation. However, the way executive functions develop is a bit more complex than with other learned abilities. Research is increasingly showing the way kids play now, versus how they played earlier in the century (directed play versus creative play), could very well be the leading cause of the overall decrease in executive functioning in children.

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Because poor executive function is associated with negative outcomes such as high drop-out rates, drug use, and crime, getting back to a style of play that encourages the development of these “higher skills” is extremely important for putting kids on the right track early in life.  One of the best ways to do this is through the introduction of creative play early and often.

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Although play had been relegated to the margins of childhood development training during the last part of the century in large part to the emphasis on standardized testing, a push from researchers in the area of creative play has put it back in the spotlight as an invaluable tool, both in the classroom, and at home.  As these researchers continue to push forward, creative play will likely be even more widely accepted as a natural way to teach kids the skills they need in order to succeed both now, and later in life.

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With kids back in school, it’s easy for families to fall into the familiar grind of a daily routine.  Trying to remember to take time for creative play can be difficult, which means it often falls by the wayside, as other seemingly more “important” things rise to the top, such as extracurricular activities or homework.  However, putting aside time to be sure your kids engage in creative play is every bit as important as what they need to do for school.  Creative play develops problem-solving and leadership skills as well as behavioral control, among other valuable abilities.

Transmorphers move When everyone’s schedule seems packed, remembering that creative play shouldn’t be work can also be difficult. Simply making sure your kids’ schedules allow for some time to play is really all you need to do as a parent.  But just in case you’re finding yourself at a loss as to how to get your kids away from video games and the television, here are three great ways to get them playing in no time!

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1.    Dress Up:  Some things never change, and the fact that kids love to play dress up is no exception.  Rather than giving away all of your old clothes, start a dress-up box Starsky & Hutch movies

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!  You’ll be amazed at what your kids come up with when they don old dresses or suits.

2.    Prop Box:  Creative play shouldn’t be ruled by specific props, such as store-bought things (i.e. a pirate’s sword, or a princess crown).  However, this doesn’t mean props can’t be made or imagined!  Whenever you think of throwing something out, think of how your child might see it.  An old blanket can easily become a cape; an old scarf, a bandage.

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3.    Art supplies:  Having kids get creative doesn’t have to be expensive. Simple paper and crayons can get your children actively participating in creative play in minutes.  Add glitter, glue, safety scissors, construction paper – the possibilities are as endless as your child’s imagination.

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How do you spur creative play in your children?