For Your Binder

The updated statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics saying that play is crucial to a child's healthy development.  #play #teaching #learning #parenting #DAP

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

The first days of preschool can be stressful for everyone. In this short but helpful article, Lillian Katz offers a few ideas that might assist both parents and teachers.  #environment #learning #teaching #relationships #care 

It's impossible to define a fairy tale as a literary genre because it has become more of a cultural institution than anything else. #fairytales #stories #reading #books

The history of the playground is a story of control.  Read more about it in this article and BONUS! There is an embedded link to their podcast episode (40 min) of the same title!  #play #panopticon #playgrounds #outside 

We must have deep relationships with people and with ideas. #teaching #learning #theorists

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

Taking a cue from the bees! #DAP #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

Here is a link from the Play Scotland website to a graphic of all of the play types as identified by Bob Hughes! #play #playwork 

Short of cocooning our darlings in bubble wrap, nothing’s going to keep them completely safe. #play #outside #risk #movement #parenting #teaching #playgrounds

I've included this resource mainly for the image you'll see when you click the link (although it's not an off-base blog post by any means!) I wanted you to see Mitch Resnick's Creative Learning Spiral without (full disclosure: forgive me) all of the MIT tech speak, including descriptions of the technologies he's created, that usually fill the articles that contain the image.  I love this image.  I also believe when children are playing they tap into this cycle of creativity without needing to scratch any crickets.  #play #DAP #creativity