Play

“Play is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.”

– Joseph Chilton Pearce, author of Magical Child

Play is one of the nine components of our Evolved Nest, our millions year-old, evolutionary pathway to wellbeing.

What everyone needs to thrive and reach their potential

A dearth of play in US childhoods, including kindergartens (Miller & Almon, 2009), has been linked to increase childhood stress and impaired achievement (Sahlberg & Doyle, 2019). In fact, the best schooling system in the world—with the highest achievement scores—are Finnish schools which routinely incorporate active play throughout the day and into high school (ibid).

How Does Self-Directed Social Play Help Children Grow?

Humans are social mammals. Young social mammals’ lives are filled with social play as part of self-development and self-organizing around well-functioning social relationships (Burghardt, 2005).

Self-directed social play is play that children organize and manage themselves, including rule making.