Play is the Overlooked Ingredient in Preparing our Children for Success

During a lunchtime conversation between three mothers, one mother mentioned that she needed to find an activity for her child for the only weekday afternoon when he was not already scheduled for sports, music, and afterschool activities. The Urban Child Institute staffer who happened to overhear this exchange could not help but notice the irony that within walking distance of the restaurant, children are growing up without opportunities for enriching activities because of the poverty of their families.

It’s a good example of the contrast between poor children’s lives and middle class children’s lives in Memphis. But in this case, both groups of children may be at a disadvantage—overscheduled children as well as children with too little access to enriching experiences.

Regardless of socioeconomic status, many families fail to recognize that there is no activity with more value and impact than simple play, and that no investment pays richer dividends for children than time spent with their parents in play. It builds strong bonds between parents and children, it teaches new skills, it allows children to co-create games and activities with their parents, and it instills an appreciation for the positive impacts of exercise.

Touch Talk Read Play

In Memphis, many children are being overscheduled and over-programmed while others are deprived of activities because their parents don’t have the means to get their children to community centers and libraries, are consumed by dealing with the day-to-day challenges related to their lives of poverty, or feel their neighborhoods and parks aren’t safe.

As a result, we should not be surprised that the American Psychological Association claims that reported stress level for American teens now tops the stress level for adults. There are of course the stresses of homework and social life in the teenage years, but we can’t help but wonder if too few have been taught as small children how to take time to play, unwind, and recharge.

That’s why our mantra, TTRP – Touch, Talk, Read, Play, is an easy way to remember what should be every parent’s priorities. Some have assumed that since play is last in TTRP, it means it is the least important but that is not the case. All four share equal status, and together they become the best gift parents can give their children: the building blocks for social and emotional development.

The Right To Play

Unfortunately, in recent years, recess and other physical outlets have been reduced as more time was shifted to formal classroom teaching, resulting in less time to let children reap the benefits of free play—learning to share, negotiate, and resolve conflicts, just to name a few.

Since play is instrumental to social and emotional development, the lack of it in poor families can deepen the disparities in the achievement gap between children in low-income families and those in middle-income families. That’s because play is not just about a child’s physical condition. Play also conditions the brain, because it’s helpful in problem-solving skills, cooperation and sharing, and learning readiness, and it also may increase a child’s ability to store new information.

But one of the most important benefits of play is that it provides a different quality of interaction between parents and their children. When they play together, parents see the world through their children’s eyes and gain more understanding of their abilities and needs. Most of all, the undivided attention and interaction tells the child that he is important and valued. This sturdy bond in turn can become the backbone for the kind of nurturing parenting that matters most.

It’s Child’s Play

The need for safe places for families and children to play needs to be a priority for elected officials, school leaders, physicians, faith-based institutions, and businesspeople who have the power to elevate the importance of play in the lives of our children, to advocate for safe play places, and to motivate change to make them become a reality in every Memphis neighborhood.

In other words, if we are serious as a community to improve educational and health outcomes, we have to also be serious about play, and to make sure it is available regardless of where a child lives or how much her parents earn.

While it can be said that improving the social, emotional, and cognitive development for our youngest children is essentially child’s play, it is also a strong play for the future of Memphis because children who are physically, socially, and emotionally healthy grow into productive, contributing citizens.