For Your Binder

Data was collected over a five year span.  Anyone wanna take any guesses? Yup! You guessed it! The adventure playground was statistically safer.  #adventureplaygrounds #playgrounds #play #risk #movement #recess #playwork #outside 

First off, regardless of your position on screen based tech please shelve it for this read as, seriously, the article is from 1996 and I am quite sure anyone currently involved in designing interactive media would laugh at how dated and old the language is ("the popular analogy of an office desktop to help a user understand the operation of a microcomputer")  

Also, I reread it a couple times before posting and I really think we can take the message, which might initially seem specific to gaming/interactive media, lift it up and take from it a reminder of the value and importance of play, discovery, intrinsic motivation & self-regulation.  #play #teaching #learning #technology #screens

Here is another article that emerged in response to the final results of the #Vanderbilt study which came out in early 2022. From the article: "By 6th grade, children in the #Tennessee state funded Pre-K program did worse than their peers (who didn't attend) in measures of academic achievement and behavior. In some pre-K programs, something is not better than nothing."   #play #DAP #teaching #learning #pushdown

Imaginative play has been identified as a vital component to a child's development. #play #DAP  #learning 

Part I in a series by Peter Gray.   He says his goal for the series is to examine teaching from the ground up. He starts here by defining teaching and presents evidence that teaching occurs in at least some non-human animals. An examination of teaching in other species may lead to insights that will be useful for understanding teaching in our species. #teaching #learning #DAP #play

Most of this essay is about defining the characteristics of play, but before listing them, author Peter Gray offers three general points that are worth keeping in mind.  #play #teaching #learning 

FUN FACT! Mother Nature installed the “play drive” for the same reason she installed that other drive – the drive to reproduce: BOTH are critical for the species to continue. (In fact, play makes you into the kind of person someone would want to reproduce WITH.)  #play #teaching #learning

This link will bring you to a Master's Thesis from a Bank Street student. In it she explores (the lack of) play as a social justice issue. "Helping low income kids" often gets translated into "eliminating play" and we know this flies smack in the face of what the research (which she does a fantastic job reviewing!) tells us should be happening for all children regardless of socio-economic status. The paper is informative; her references are invaluable.  #DAP #play #equity #teaching #learning

If you have not heard of him I encourage you to spend some time investigating his website for more resources, courses you can take, interviews, articles... #DAP #play #learning #teaching #relationships #care

Childhood should be a deep well, full of rich, individual perceptions and experience to which you can return for sustenance throughout life.  #play

The art of making a space for the playfulness and messiness of teaching requires courage and letting go! #learning #teaching #creativity #art

Exploring panopticon as a program of power as opposed to an architectural system.  #learning #environment #panopticon