PARENTHOOD.IE

We often believe that we need to fill our child’s days with activities and will often feel inadequate as parents if we don’t get to fill our child’s life with organised diversions. As parents we want our children to experience it all and develop in amazing directions.

Activities and experiences

You may not necessarily have a Hyper Parenting style to feel the pressure to expose your child to all kinds of activities. In this well-intended quest to maximise our child’s hidden gifts, we often forget the most basic need a child has, free play.

We all grew up with less toys than our children, and few of us can remember long hours of childhood boredom. We simply forget a very basic fact, less toys leads to more imagination and spontaneous activities. The most enduring and simple toy that entertains children of all ages is the ball. No lights, no voices, nothing more than movements and scope for plenty of uses.

The need to play

Children are programmed to play. Through play a child learns and develops his motor, social and creative skills. The best way to encourage free and spontaneous play is to give time. Children do not box in their days into tight schedules. Time without planned activities does not automatically bore them, but is rather a time for creativity letting them be free to play games.

Children’s play can be very repetitive and it takes more patience than most of us have to keep on playing with your child. We will end up changing the script or the game, to get some variety and creativity, believing your child will have more fun. If left alone, your child will develop his game and it will become more complex. Repetition lets him practice and learn.

Adult perception of fun

As adults we have very ingrained routines and preconceptions of play and fun. We will often correct and lead a child at play, to show them how it is done.

We will also often interrupt our children’s activities to bring them somewhere that are more fun. Your child may be having lots of fun balancing on pathway curb on the way to the park, but we will urge him on to the swings in the park which we think will be more fun for him.

In free play the child leads the play, as an adult your role is to observe and follow your child’s lead on how the game needs to be played. It may sound like an easy route, but we often have very ingrained routines of how even the simplest games should be played. This will lead us to step in and change the game, and become the leaders.

Play for well-being

Play is important to your child’s health and emotional well-being. By observing your child’s games and play you will be able to see him deal with insecurities, fears and delights. In play your child deals with positive and negative issues in his life he can’t express verbally

Free play lets a child:

• Explore materials and used them to play imaginatively
• Express emotions and reveal their inner feelings
• Come to terms with traumatic experiences
• Develop a sense of who there are
• Learn how to deal with conflict, to share and negotiate
• Develop communication and language skills
Source: National Children’s Bureau, UK

Constant telly

A study done in the US by the University of Massachusetts showed that having the telly disrupts a child’s play. The research was done with children aged 12, 24 and 36 months of age and it showed that a television in the background reduced the amount of play and the focused attention during play. The telly does not only interrupt play as a visual diversion, but the audio can also impact on your child’s play and focus.