My Connection to Play....

Two Quotes

“Play is our brain's favorite way of learning.”

Diane Ackerman
Contemporary American author

“Play gives children a chance to practice what they are learning.”

Fred Rogers
American television personality
1928–2003

 

  

 

    Describe how people supported play when you were younger and/or the role of play in your childhood.

My mother was the greatest supporter of play in my life; she did this by playing board and card games with us. We would play for hours, especially on cold raining or snowy weekend nights in New York. She taught me how to play rummy five hundred, and even to this day, I usually don’t win.

 

    

       Write a brief entry on how you feel play today is similar or different from the play in which you engaged as a child and what your hope for young is now with regard to play.

     

What I view as play during my childhood, if not today. Board games which encouraged family time were the games of choice, today, children play video games which do not require another partner, and the video is the child’s competitor. Card games are only played in the casino, not at the kitchen table while the mother prepared dinner. Children are rarely seen outside, playing hop-scotch, or jumping rope as I remember playing as a child. I remember chasing and being chased, playing tag, and there was always a brief minute or two for patty cakes, or London bridges in the school yard during recess.

 

 

                                                                                       

                  

       Include your thoughts regarding the role of play throughout your life and/or the role of play throughout childhood and adulthood.

As I reminisce on my childhood days of play, I but hope that it was the same today. I rarely see children playing after school, riding bikes. No longer do I hear the happy shrills of little girls. Are all the games today so structured therefore leaving no time for laughter?