Why play is so important for kids - and how attitudes towards it seem to be changing

Today is national Play Day - a time to "celebrate children's right to play". But playing is something that children have been missing out on in recent years. There's been far more emphasis on tests, results and lots of scheduled activities, perhaps to the detriment of our children.

It probably won't surprise you that to mark the 2008 campaign, Play England have carried out a survey which reports that 21st century children are heavily restricted when it comes to play. Not allowed to climb trees, play conkers or often even tag, their freedoms are quite definitely being curtailed.

There seem to be endless reports suggesting that modern children are over-protected, and that we parents are too anti-risk. I think mothers and fathers do know that risky play can be good for their child's development, making them more resilient, independent and able to deal with challenges. The problem is that parents can't always bring themselves to actually let their children be. This is despite the kids' own desires. One of the saddest of Play England's statistics suggested that 77 percent of children aged 7-16 wanted more opportunities to play adventurously and take risks while playing.

Risk, say the people from the Playday Campaign, has little to do with danger. Our fears have become exaggerated as people from sociologist Frank Furedi to "worst mom in America" Lenore Skenazy have pointed out. Hara Estroff Marano's recent book "A Nation of Wimps" accused modern society of not letting children fully function, and heralded the onset of a "wholly sanitised childhood, without skinned knees or the occasional C in history!"

All this isn't new, but there is a sense that times may be changing. After all, it may not be coincidence that so many experts are demanding a kind of reformation. A hopeful Carl Honore, author of Under Pressure, says that he senses a kind of "backlash" against being so restrictive around children. Meanwhile the fears of organisations like the Open Eye campaign are being openly, and sympathetically discussed. Whether they will be more than noted when it comes to early years education is another point! Even the government has realised the need for more open spaces and places for children to play. They have recently invested £235m in exactly this area.

Play expert and author Tim Gill tells me that he feels there's real value in what he calls "benign neglect," and untying the apron strings. "Children need everyday challenges and adventures if they are to learn how to manage their own safety and sort out their problems for themselves," he adds. "Today, many pre-adolescent children don’t get those opportunities. How will they develop the skills they need to deal with the wider world?"

I hope that we are moving in a different direction. The problem is that it's not all up to parents. We also need some joined-up thinking elsewhere. If play is so important, it needs to be encouraged in our communities and our schools too, meaning less emphasis on tests and homework. We need to start truly thinking about the kind of children we want our children to turn out to be.

Read my post on whether we are making our children learn too much, too young.

Read School Gate:

Applying for primary school

13 things you need to know before your child starts reception

Does your child need lessons before school?

When should summer babies start school?

Comments

[diana]

Give an adult some excess income and a little time and what do many do .... play. Paintballing, computer gaming, kitesurfing, rally car driving, dinghy sailing, cycling, running, walking, dancing - and I've probably forgotten a few of my families, friends and neighbours pusuits. So, of course, children should play too!

[jane]

let them play!! don't spend too much time worrying about it. kids have amazing imaginations if allowed to use them and will create wonderful games and worlds if given that freedom. they need to play as they will never get that opportunity as adults.. or it will be to late for them. what an awful thought. my kids spend hours and hours playing, whether they're out in the garden,up a tree, in the cupboard under the stairs or in the back seat of the car.

[Saila]

I think its a shame that the media sensationalise the risks. I have heard of some people not even letting their kids play in the front gardens!!! Come on - most streets in the Uk are not that dangerous!

[Hannah]

In a world where children are even abducted from their own bedrooms at night or bathrooms in the middle of the day, I frankly don't feel comfortable letting my son out of sight for a single second. Granted, he is only a toddler and as a consequence we roam the parks and streets together (no garden, tiny flat)but I cannot see this changing until he is in his teens. He can climb, he can take risks, but I do need to be there to watch.

[Snuffy]

Why is everyone in the West so obsessed with play time? All our kids do is play! In China and Japan, all they do is work! Even our lessons are judged as poor, unless there are some games involved. So they play nearly ALL of the time...

All play and no work, makes Britain a very dull-minded country indeed.

[lisa j davies]

Here in Barnsley South yorkshire, our children play out doors in our rural fields and woods making dens, slides jumping in puddles and getting filthy my kids can climb trees, just has i did as a child, we do not fear for there safety,as a community we over see everyone child we all know of each other, and moden tecnology has given us mobile phones! we find our children are very sensiable, very happy and very much allowed to be children. Thats how it should be.

[Lenore Skenazy]

We are indeed about to experience a backlash. Just the fact that we even have to DISCUSS play -- that it's not simply a normal part of childhood engaged in without a whole huge debate -- shows us how unnatural our childrearing has become. It can't last. This too-safe, too-supervised era will be going the way of the corset soon, seen for the strange and constricting distortion that it is. Or at least... I hope so. -- Lenore "America's Worst Mom" Skenazy

[Parentsoutloud]

I agree many children are not allowed the freedom of the past could this be because we have housed them in high rise flats or new houses with tiny garden if any, is it because drug addicts and teenage gangs many with knives are allowed to roam the streets and play areas and if only there were trees left in many places for children to climb. It is always so easy to blame parents when the other solutions may cost money

[Amber]

As a teacher of 30 years, I have seen the value of play for children. In the U.S. over the last few years, young students are only allowed a short recess once a day with another structured period of play during their long school day. The result is a classroom of fidgity kids who cannot pay attention. The test scores are going down and the kids are being medicated. More play time could help so much.

[judyb]

I understand what you're saying, but think you don't understand many parents real fears of something happening to their children. I don't let mine out of my sight, and I'm not ashamed of that.