Okay, so even if you don’t have kids, you should read the article and listen to the NPR report linked below on good old-fashioned play. The kind you hopefully remember enjoying when you were a kid: In the backyard, with your neighbors, making your own rules, creating games the limits of which were as vast as your imaginations and townships.
Seems that, over time, our culture and our charge-like-a-bull mentality to give our kids everything — lessons, camps, toys, and … more toys — is really doing more harm than good. Although most of us sort of know it’s true, the article below beautifully confirms it.
You will, no doubt, also see the connection between what these researchers are finding and the advice we promote to couples: Play often. Create fun. Scientifically speaking, good old fashion creative play is good for all of us. And our relationships too.
Read on:
“Old-Fashioned Play Builds Serious Skills”
Alix Spiegel, NPR,
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=19212514