Reading bloggers whom you respect can often be like a treasure hunt – playing detective through a series of blogs. Here is what I found yesterday:
One of the things about Jane Kise, executive coach and passionate educator is her point of view when blogging. In her recent post Yes, Play is Crucial! she led me to Linda Stone’s blog A More Resilient Species about how self-directed play stirs creativity , develops resilience, resourcefulness and independence. It is not play directed by adults but play that is experiential, voluntary, and guided by one’s curiosity. Such as my grandson and me when he was really little making Cake Box Cookies (see below)
Jane goes on to talk about how research is showing that creative play is critical for the future of America and the world by developing creative problem-solvers, scientists, inventors, and many more involved in innovation and spreading ideas. She referred us to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) for more information, including the impact on lower-income families where there may not be the same kind of parental involvement due to the stress of making ends meet. Her question of what to do?
- Stop classifying physical education, the arts, recess, and student self-directed learning as “nonacademic”
- Help children learn to play
- Find time for children to develop their own interests
- Model playing
- Hand that study from the AAP to anyone who objects to children spending time at play!!!
She described suddenly being confronted with 70 urban 8th graders in a room and they didn’t know what to do to entertain themselves without exchanging insults and wishing for video games. Jane and her colleague taught simple paper-and-pencil games such as Dots and Boxes, team monster drawing (adding a body part to a body you haven’t seen before), tag team stories, and other non-tech pastimes.
I will be seeing Jane at the Association for Psychological Type International (APTi) XX Conference in Miami July 10-14 and I plan to see if she will play some of those games while we are there – they sound like fun.
What this reminded me of was my favorite gift for ages 2-7, a cookie sheet, a box of cake mix, and favorite kinds of cookie decorations and add-ins.
Grandma Charlie’s CAKE BOX COOKIES
1 box cake mix, any flavor
½ cup salad oil
2 eggs
Assorted add-ins such as chocolate chips, nuts, anything you know the child likes
Assorted decorations such as sprinkles, raw sugar, frosting (in tubes or cans)
Stir cake mix, salad oil, and eggs together. If doing add-ins, add in ¼ to ½ cup of one
Drop by spoonful on cookie sheet about one inch apart
Bake 8-10 minutes (look for browning around the edges and sniff for a nice baked cookie smell (chocolate cookies are hard to tell about the edge-browning.) If there seems to be a slight scorched smell snatch quickly from oven. Slide quickly onto a wire rack and let cool. Then eat or decorate and eat happily.
Do you have a favorite game or activity you play now as an adult or with younger ones in your life?
