1. ART OF LEARNING
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PLAY IS WORK
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2 O EARNI MAY 2012 Issue no.- 2 www.artoflearning.in
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Play is, undoubtedly,
the universal
language of
PLAY - LINGUA FRANCA childhood.
THE JOURNEY OF
CHILDHOOD
RUSHING THROUGH WONDER YEARS
Premature ‘adultification’ of childhood has
been getting considerable attention lately.
From advocating 6 as the magical number to
start formal schooling to schools banning The ball- a universal play prop (Location- Leh)
students under 13 from having social
networking sites and, this one really left me
dumb-struck, medically labeling young
children with low emotional quotient as
‘psychopaths’. For me, a common thread runs
through all this- Play.
Continued on Page 2
Bubbles-a universal play experience (Location- Gurgaon) Imaginative Role Play- Mewat
PLAY PATTERNS ACROSS 3 DIVERSE SETTINGS From balloons to
Recently, I was in Leh for a ‘work visit’. Leh,
bubbles; from
the stark, beautiful region on India's northern
border with China and Tibet, has the dubious
pebbles to puddles -
claim of being the worst place in the world for some play props are
altitude sickness. I started my work there by as universal as
playing with local children, who humanity itself.
serendipitously appeared during my visit to
the Shanti Stupa.
Continued on Page 3
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2. PLAY IS WORK! PAGE 2
Do we really need ‘nappy curriculum’? Do labels help us in nurturing children?
PRESCHOOL- THE CULTURE OF TRIVIA (Head, Heart and Hand) that are foundational
to human development in the early years, with
During my sojourns to pre-primary and
over-emphasized 3 Rs?
primary schools in different places, I visited a
popular ‘play-based’ preschool. This When it come to honoring play as children's
coincided with the release of the revised work, many preschools need to match the
EYFS curriculum in London reducing the rhetoric with reality.
academic learning goals from 69 to 17 and
findings of the eight-decade long Longevity THE CULTURE OF DEFICITS
Project. Prof Howard Friedman, a psychologist
The natural rhythm of play among children
at the University of California, concluded his
longitudinal study of gifted children who develops cognitive, affective and motor “If we do not
competencies making play both a process and
started school in the US around 1920s with an
emphatic, “early school entry was found product of healthy childhood. Stuart Brown invest in play now,
and his over 6,000 play studies on everyone
associated with less educational attainment,
from serial killers to substance abusers to we will find
worse midlife adjustment and, most
career-driven CEOs, show strong correlation
importantly, increased mortality risk.”
between lack of opportunity/ability to play
ourselves
Some of our ‘play-based’ preschools could be and emotional imbalance. Among children, investing much
contributing to these patterns. ‘Play-based’ sometimes, this takes the form of labels
has become a marketing catchphrase while in describing their socio-emotional-pathological more in prisons
effect such schools thrive on the box approach state of being in play deprived times of
rather than the spectrum approach. If it is an curriculum overload. Some of these labels and hospitals!”
option, would it not be better to keep the such as ‘Callous and Unemotional
children out of such preschools where Psychopaths’, ‘Youthful Tendency Disorder’ - Joan Almon, Co-founder of
thinking is optional, and obedience are ridiculous at best. Is childhood, the best the Alliance for Childhood
paramount? Think about it, Greek words for stage of human existence for most, going to
education and play are paideia and paidia be defined by deficits /disorders?
respectively and if play is work that children
engage in to learn who they are and make UNDER-13 USING SOCIAL NETWORKING
sense of the world around them, then aren’t It’s all about making conscious choices. We
they better off outside the formal confines of learn how to make decisions by making
nappy curriculums and prescriptive seat time? decisions. If our perception of young children
Adult communication and rigidly structured is guided by deficits, we do not trust them to
routines in these schools send a clear message- make choices - simple, everyday decisions
learning is a linear and predictable process based on objective cause-effect. Additionally,
managed by the teacher Won’t the children be their playscape has shrunk. Put these together
more capable, communicative and competent and it explains why an increasing number of
learners outside such place? Are we not children under 13 years prefer to spend their
making a Faustian bargain by trading 3 Hs time socializing in the virtual world.
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3. PLAY IS WORK! PAGE 3
Universality of Play
PATTERNS OF PLAY FROM LADAKH TO LOMBOK
While advocates of play are clearly So a 5-year old in Mewat with a few to Jerusalem, Spanish Fly, Leapfrog and
passionate about learning and bottle caps, pieces of wood, yarn and Dima happen to universal play
development that play fosters, for zest for possibilities has a toy cart to experiences for children across Asia,
children across cultures and lands, play with. While in Lombok post-rain North America and Europe. When
play is just a way of life - something puddles and empty jars with some children in Korea play Kongki Noli ,
they are naturally and compulsively small sticks are enough to set ablaze their counterparts in India have an
wired to do just because they are the wonders of science within two Indian equivalent Gitte, as do their
alive. young children. While in Gurgaon, peers elsewhere playing Jacks.
after using up the contents of the
No matter how impoverished or commercially procured bubble This was a refreshing realization for a
privileged their socio - economic making liquid, two young boys makes mom and educator who plays Ice and
background, children will always find the bubble-inducing concoction in Water with her son and found herself
play props within their environment - their bathrooms using toothpaste to playing the same game at 3,500
from spools to sticks, from empty share the art of bubble-blowing with meters above sea level in the barren
bottles / bowls to blocks, from scrap their friends. Elsewhere in India, two but breath - taking environs of Leh
to sand. Whether in nuclear families primary grade students, play ‘scissor, with 6-10 year olds. Play was their
or big joint families, at home, in p a p e r, s t o n e ’ j u s t l i k e t h e i r language and, thanks to my son, I
school / daycare or anywhere in counterparts in Singapore and was adequately articulate to
between children will always find Canada, among other places. communicate and connect with
playmates - real or make-believe. And When the parks in Israel rock with humanity there.
of course, there is always plenty of Tock, Tock Tockeeya, echoes of it
that crucial ingredient - ‘time’ for reverberate across India as Ko Kalachi Play, it seems, is the universal
play. Paki and Fuul Ei in Switzerland. Going language of childhood.
Filing and emptying of jars are universal play experiences of childhood. Playmates at 3500 mts above sea level
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