Quote
Paul P.
More free play is needed. Not adult -organized structured play. In school, and in other settings where adults are in charge, they make decisions for children and solve children’s problems. In play, children make their own decisions and solve their own problems. In adult-directed settings, children are weak and vulnerable. In play, they are strong and powerful. The play world is the child’s practice world for being an adult. We think of play as childish, but to the child, play is the experience of being like an adult: being self-controlled and responsible. To the degree that we take away play, we deprive children of the ability to practice adulthood, and we create people who will go through life with a sense of dependence and victimization, a sense that there is some authority out there who is supposed to tell them what to do and solve their problems. That is not a healthy way to live.