The buzz…
Play - By Kate Howard
“Mum, can you play with me?” – “I have to do the dishes, I will soon.”
“Dad, can you play with me now?” – “I have to hang the washing out, I will soon.“
Family lives are becoming busier than ever, and unfortunately, this sometimes means the quality time we spend with our children is decreasing.
This is not an attempt to frustrate our little ones but just shows the difficulty we have as adults/parents to sometimes organise our time.
As my two little lovelies are getting older, I am finding myself saying, “In a minute”, more and more often. So I have set myself a challenge:
MAKE TIME FOR PLAY!
Research has shown that play is important to brain development. Play is crucial for your child’s social, emotional, physical and cognitive growth. As a child moves into toddler years their play will become more imaginative and complex. Through play they will exercise key skills and qualities such as independence, creativity, curiosity and problem-solving.
It is through play that children engage and interact in the world around them.
So I have set myself PLAY goals at home. This week I will be jumping on the trampoline, playing shops, doing a few puzzles and having a game of soccer.
I will achieve this by adding a few simple tasks in my day:
- Unplug- no iPad, phones or computers for a designated time
- Working together to achieve a few household chores (yes, I will let you help me wash up!!)
- And rather than saying, “I will in 10 minutes”, saying, “Ok, for 10 minutes”.
I am also incredibly lucky to be a Mini Maestros teacher as this allows me to actively encourage parents/carers to play at my work.
At Mini Maestros our philosophy first and foremost is about ‘Learning through Play’.
When it comes to learning, children learn best in an environment which allows them to explore, discover and play. Play allows children to use their creativity while developing their imagination, dexterity and physical, cognitive and emotional strengths.
The primary aim of Mini Maestros is to create self-reliant confident and well-rounded learners. All important skills that can be learnt through PLAY.
So I hope that you all have as much fun as I am going to, using play next week as a learning tool with my wonderful children at home and work.
"Since the beginning of time, children have not liked to study. They would much rather play and if you have their interests at heart, you will let them learn while they play; they will find that what they have mastered is child’s play" - Carl Orff, German composer and educator.
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