Play

Do you remember imaginative play?  I do.  I remember it with such envy.  I remember getting lost for hours playing with my button collection.  I still remember how I played and the names of certain families buttons.  And I sometimes bring my buttons down from the attic and hold them in my hands. 

I suppose that is why I can’t take enough pictures of imaginative play.  I might have more pictures of abandoned toy set-ups than pics of my children! 

“The adult has various means at his disposal of coming to terms with the whole range of his environment…but the path of children is and remains that of play.  Simply by a staircase of games, children have reached the world of adults from time immemorial.  Each step is made up of the games of a particular age-group.”  –Children at Play (Heidi Britz-Crecelius)

I struggle some days with Norah’s “schooling.”  She’s a December baby so she would not begin kindergarten until this fall.  We homeschool.  Which, at this point, mostly means she has unrestricted free play.  That is the bulk of her school.  I remember the year I went to kindergarten.  It was half-day then.  And I remember playing.  It seemed like that is all we did.  Sometimes we made peanut butter on saltine crackers.  I don’t think kindergarten is like that anymore.   

Re-centering involves reassuring yourself that you have made a good choice, that you have recognized that the true center of childhood is play, not work.  After all, play is the primary way children were designed to learn…research shows that a child’s intellectual awakening takes place during the normal adult-child interactions that occur in everyday, purposeful activities…playful environments and spontaneous learning opportunities hold the keys for a happy, emotionally healthy, and intelligent child–and for a fulfilled parent.  –Einstein Never Used Flashcards (Hirsh-Pasek and Golinkoff)

I hope I can stay relaxed and trust she is climbing the staircase.  I need to find ways to play more, too.