The importance of play has long been known, yet it can be easy to lose sight of this when we discuss children’s education in terms of assessment and readiness.
Allowing children the space and time to explore their inner worlds through play expands imagination and unlocks creativity. Play can be a channel to experience joy, concentration and cooperation all while the child is deeply engaged in active learning.
Below are quotes by historical pillars in education and science who believe in the tremendous value of play.
“Play is the answer to the question, ‘How does anything new come about?'” – Jean Piaget
“We are fully human only while playing, and we play only when we are human in the truest sense of the word.” – Rudolf Steiner
“If a child has been able in his play to give up his whole loving being to the world around him, he will be able, in the serious tasks of later life, to devote himself with confidence and power to the service of the world.” – Rudolf Steiner
“A child’s greatest achievements are possible in play, achievements that tomorrow will become her basic level of real action.” – Lev Vygotsky
“Play also creates the zone of proximal development of the child. In play, the child is always behaving beyond his age, above his usual everyday behavior; in play, he is, as it were, a head above himself. Play contains in a concentrated form, as in the focus of a magnifying glass, all developmental tendencies; it is as if the child tries to jump above his usual level.” – Lev Vygotsky
“Play is the highest expression of human development in childhood, for it alone is the free expression of what is in a child’s soul.” – Friedrich Froebel
“Play is the work of the child.” – Maria Montessori
“Play is the highest form of research.” – Albert Einstein
“Without this playing with fantasy no creative work has ever yet come to birth. The debt we owe to the play of the imagination is incalculable.” – Carl Jung
“The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct.” – Carl Jung
“Almost all creativity involves purposeful play.” – Abraham Maslow
Photo by Charlotte Harrison on Unsplash
Learning to Create. 