I am a strong advocate of the importance of play in a child’s life. I think it is very easy to become serious about life and have high expectations of children. Childhood to me seems to becoming shorter. The new stage of tweens seems to have children growing up much earlier than previous generations. Homework workloads now begin early in primary school and the volume of work consumes time that would have once been spent playing.
I was then happy to read the following article in the New York Times:
The article is based on a new study which has been published in the Official Journal Of The American Academy of Pediatrics.
This study examines the amount of recess that children 8 to 9 years of age receive in the United States and compares the group classroom behavior of children receiving daily recess with that of children not receiving daily recess.
The key finding was that the children having better class behavior scores as rated by their teacher’s. This finding may make teachers rethink their discipline strategy whereby the keep children in at recess as a form of punishment for poor behaviour.
As the lead researcher, Dr. Romina M. Barros, a pediatrician and an assistant clinical professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine summed up this situation:
“Recess should be part of the curriculum,” she said. “You don’t punish a kid by having them miss math class, so kids shouldn’t be punished by not getting recess.”
The article then looks at other related studies, one in particular which looks at the importance of play in a child’s life. They quote psychiatrist and founder of National Institute for Play, Dr. Stuart Brown who has collected more than 6,000 “play histories” from human subjects:
Teachers feel like they’re under huge pressures to get academic excellence to the exclusion of having much fun in the classroom. But playful learning leads to better academic success than the skills-and-drills approach.
It is worth reading the complete New York Times article. (You may have to register, it only takes a minute and access is free.) I hope that educators will use this new research and take into consideration when looking at the way they teach this generation of children.
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I am also an advocate of ‘child’s play’. I love that it is starting to be recognised as an essential part of kid’s lives.
Most of the learning we do (as home learners) comes from some kind of game or fun life activity. Kids are kids! It’s bad enough that so many adults lose the ability to ‘play’, why should we beat it out of our kids when it’s their job.
Alisons last blog post..Freaky Home Learner’s Enriching Activity
This is so good to read. I’ve limited my kids (10 and
to two after-school activities only, because I do think they need to spend time just playing. Luckily I live in a street with a lot of kids, so there is always someone to play with.
Meredith Flynns last blog post..6 Predictable Romance Novel Heroes
Fantastic article; thanks for sharing! I wholeheartedly believe in the importance of play for children, especially in regards to “organized learning” like schooltime. It breaks my heart when I hear of schools reducing/eliminating recess time or even physical education instruction time.
Thanks for sharing this post with me. It is really well written and makes a great point. I’ve mentioned to my son’s school several times that even though they go outside twice per day and to the gym twice per week, I would like to see that increased.
Annie @ PhD in Parentings last blog post..BlogHer ‘09
Thanks for promoting the importance of play. It is exciting to see more discussion on recess. Kids need it. I really hope this type of research is going to the trainer teachers too.
Melitsas last blog post..Carnival of Parenting Podcasts No.22
Awesum article and points of view. I too believe in the importance of play for young children. Play is how our children learn in the early years we cant take that away from them. I think the government needs to stop looking at numbers and ranks and look at child enjoyment in learning and encouragement.
I just madea blog post Primary School Maths – should I push my child? – talking about my son and how he’s quite ahead of himself. I liked your ’4th R’ quote so much, I included it into the post. I totally agree. Children should learn to take a step back and have ‘recess’ – and we shouldn’t push them too hard just because we can.
.-= Colin Wee´s last blog ..Primary School Maths – Should I Push My Child? =-.
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