Effort to Restore Children’s Play Gains Momentum.

[elleng]

'Most of the social and intellectual skills one needs to succeed in life and work are first developed through childhood play. Children learn to control their impulses through games like Simon Says, play advocates believe, and they learn to solve problems, negotiate, think creatively and work as a team when they dig together in a sandbox or build a fort with sofa cushions. (The experts define play as a game or activity initiated and directed by children. So video games don’t count, they say, except perhaps ones that involve creating something, and neither, really, do the many educational toys that do things like sing the A B C’s with the push of a button.)

Much of the movement has focused on the educational value of play, and efforts to restore recess and unstructured playtime to early childhood and elementary school curriculums.'

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/garden/06play.html?src=me&ref=homepage

[Kali]

1. dirt, rocks, sticks and a modicum of privacy

no plastic, no electronic crap, no hovering parents
a touch of risk and imagination

THAT is fun

[postulater]

2. I still prefer dirt, rocks and sticks.

[immoderate]

4. Ah, to dig a hole...

And the treasures you find. Rocks, bugs, roots, subsoil, maybe water. And then to climb a tree...

--imm

[patrice]

3. I have a nephew who is very successful middle school teacher who uses games extensively in his

curriculum, role playing board games. There are all kinds of them. He was teacher of the year in his school a couple of years ago.

I have watched him on more than one occasion with several of his nephews, little guys who normally run rowdy from one end of my sister's house to the other, sitting quietly for up to 3 hours sometimes, discussing amongst themselves the play, which often includes some math and negotiations and decisions of various kinds, in some game situation.

[Reader Rabbit]

5. Hurrah!

Maybe we are finally seeing a backlash against this dehumanizing, data-driven insanity!

[txlibdem]

6. Unsupervised "play" is just another word for bullies' mayhem time

Unbalanced children and those being brought up in Republican households can be as vicious as animals if left unsupervised for even a minute. The article is NOT saying that bringing back play is the school's job: it clearly states it is the parents' job:

Parents have to reassert themselves in this process and teach them how to play. It’s critical that parents take some ownership and get out and play with their children.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/garden/06play.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=homepage

Play time is time spent at home. During school hours, keep children occupied with constructive learning activities and fun exercise for physical fitness. Sports has no place in the school, that is just a subsidy to the mega billion dollar sports industry that has no business in schools.