‘Those forces that prevent children in poverty and the working class from benefiting fully from play deserve full, even urgent, attention…’ (Ginsberg, 2007).
‘…many of our children do not have access to the natural play experiences we experienced as children. They don't walk in the park collecting leaves, throw stones in the water to see the ever-expanding ripples, play racing-of-the-sticks under the bridge, build muddy castles on the banks of a cold stream, or create a frontier fort with their buddies. They don't scramble up gnarled trees, skip across meadows full of flowers, pick nuts from low branches, use a fallen tree as a natural balance beam, or sit on an old tractor imagining that they are leading a convoy of explorers across the Sahara Desert.’ (Wardle)
Ginsberg, K. (2007). The importance of play in promoting healthy development and maintaining strong parent-child bonds. Pediatrics, 119(1), 182–191. Retrieved from http://www.aap.org/pressroom/playfinal.pdf.
Wardle, F. (n.d.). Play as curriculum. Retrieved August 1, 2010, from http://www.earlychildhoodnews.com/earlychildhood/article_view.aspx?ArticleID=127
I was about 10 years old here in these pictures (I'm in the middle on the first picture). We imagined that our neighbors sandy area in their back yard was the beach. Every now and then their mother would come through with a big wave (water hose). The youngest child pictured is about 5 years old.
I chose this picture because of my Dad. Although he was gone most of the summer running revivals all over the country, he made sure that we had balls and bats. That’s why our yard was always full of other children. We made up home plate and trees or tree stumps were bases. Because of the natural environment we made up rules for fouls and home runs. Because of the made-up rules, we became precision hitters when we began playing organized ball.
It was 7 of us, my parents, me, and 4 siblings. My father had a good paying job that would have placed us in middle class when he felt the call to fulltime ministry. We were a low income family, but we were more fortunate than many of our childhood friends. There were a couple of homes a block away from us that did not have running water inside. In the early 70’s one of our baby sitters had a pump in the back yard for water. However, in these surroundings we had a rich play environment. We made toys from household equipment. We used our long driveway as a skating rink in the winter. We used the rear of our yard as the ‘woods’, where my siblings often contracted the poison ivy itch. We were free to play in the street and get a neighborhood game of kickball going or double dutch with someone’s laundry rope. I cannot forget our made-up games of racquetball and volley ball off the garage door. The game depended on if we had a real ball or not.
Play as I knew it as I child, I don’t see when traveling through neighborhoods; whether in low income areas, middle income, or affluent ones. Parents do not encourage children to get outside to play for many reasons. In some areas, the danger in the neighborhood overshadows the play environment even on the child’s home property. More and more parents are satisfied with enrolling children in organized sports through charitable organizations to give the children some kind of physical release after school and during the summer. However, these are places where adults make all the rules; no imagination or collaboration between playmates is made in order to play the games. I also remember that we instituted hilarious ways to choose members for teammates to play.
