Getting Started with Homeschooling
Practical Considerations for Parents of School-Aged Children
© Beverley Paine
Index
Homeschool
Australia
Associating children and play is natural and obvious for most people, but few really understand the many benefits, both educational and developmental, play has for children. Play is universal and essential for healthy human growth, and does not stop as the child emerges into adulthood. It merely changes form, becomes abstract and subtle, and in the eyes of many adults more valuable! The primary function of play has been described as ‘active mastery’ of various skills, capabilities and experiences.
For children play serves as an environment for increasing social growth by providing unstructured opportunities for children to make social connections with other children and adults. It also provides a place for children to practice many of the language and social skills they have learned, thus assisting to create a fluency in their use of language.
Play has many psychological benefits for children as they use play to work through many issues related to self-concept and self-esteem. It can alleviate accumulated stress, and turn tedious activities into pleasant and creative ones.
Playfulness has been characterised by freedom, spontaneity, joy, and exploratory actions, with motives and processes involved in play similar to those attributed to the creative process. Research has linked playfulness and creative potential and divergent thinking skills. Parents actively becoming involved in children’s play has been demonstrated to lead to gains in mental age, lateral thinking and intelligence.
Involvement in play is not easy for most adults, especially once their children pass the toddler years, and it takes a conscious effort. Involvement means a direct and deliberate participation in all facets of play by parents. These facets naturally change as the children grow and develop. Little children exalt in physical games which stretch their rapidly developing bodies, and dramatic pretend games, which stretch their parent’s imagination! Older children love creating with their hands, or playing clever card or board games. Even children who love to busy themselves continually with computer games will enjoy and thrive more if their parents take an active and playful interest.
Research has shown that conditions which inhibit playful play, and hence the potential for creative development, stem directly from the attitudes, rules and controls of adults, and from limitations of the physical environment itself. In order to foster and nurture creativity in children, effective parental and environmental factors need to be considered and practiced. Parents who foster creativity within their children tend to:
Be more conceptually abstract in their thinking.
often adopt for toys and games.
The nature of the play environment can enhance or diminish creative potential in children, with a less restrictive environment increasing the range of the children’s potential responses. This consequently affects their later motivation to respond to novelty, and encourages the building of imagination and creativity, both traits essential to not only the arts, but also in the disciplines of science and mathematics.
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Excerpt from Getting Started with Homeschooling, Practical Considerations
© Beverley Paine, 1997
