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Children`s play and the value of fun

This article explores the importance of play in a child's life and how it is often undervalued. It discusses the benefits of play, the importance of fun, and the lack of recognition of children's rights to play. Various play theories are also examined.

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Children`s play and the value of fun

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  1. Children`s play and the value of fun Maria Øksnes

  2. The right of the child… …to rest, leisure, play, recreational activities and free and full participation in cultural and artistic life (Article 31).

  3. UN: Children`s right to play is treathened poor recognition of their [rights of the child] significance in the lives of children results in lack of investment in appropriate provision, weak or non-existent protective legislation and invisibility of children in national and local planning. In general where investment is made, it is in the provision of structured and organised activities (UN, 2013, p. 3).

  4. The age of pedagogy In many parts of the world, play is perceived as ‘deficit’ time spent in frivolous or unproductive activity of no intrinsic worth. Parents, caregivers and public administrators commonly place a higher priority on studying or economic work, while play is often seen as noisy, dirty, disruptive and intrusive. Moreover, adults often lack the confidence, skill or understanding to enable them to support children’s play and interact with them in a playful way. Both the right of children to engage in play and recreation, and its fundamental importance for their wellbeing, health and development, are poorly understood and undervalued (UN 2013, s. 11).

  5. Play is about enjoyment, pleasure, fun, uncertainty and children’s well-being.

  6. (…) children play simply “because they enjoy playing” (Huizinga, 1950, p. 8).

  7. Play Theory 1) Instrumental Play Outcome, benefits Order, rationality Organizing of play Progress rhetoric (learning and development) Smilansky, Lillemyr, Pramling, Samuelsson & Carson 2) Fun Play The intrinsicworthof play Chaos, irrationality Free, spontaneous play The Ambiguityof Play Froebel, Sutton-Smith, Gopnik, Burghardt

  8. We still do not know how much play reflects atavistic remnants of instinctive behavior, how play is guided by specific internal (emotional and motivational) and environmental factors, and what kinds of playlike behavior are based on specific processes in the brain. We do not know how much play, or what kind of play, is useful, even essential, for proper development and maintenance of behavioral and psychological processes in the brain (Burghardt, 2005, p. 381).

  9. Play genetically refreshes or fructifies our other, more general, being. Contrasting play with sex is telling. Sex, like play, may be pleasurable for its own sake, but it nevertheless serves an evolutionary purpose through childbirth. Play is also a pleasure for its own sake, but its genetic gift is perhaps the sense that life, temporarily at least, is worth living (Sutton-Smith, 2008, p. 97).

  10. Having fun means doing something that is amusing, enjoyable and pleasurable. Having fun is an evolved adaption and is motivationally important in the way that it helps to keep “an action or activity in an individual’s behavioural repertoire” (Bekoff, 2015, p. R5).

  11. Pellis & Pellis(2009) Hoppende aper https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiiidKMEmcA

  12. ”What do you do when you play?” Nora (6): “I just feel like playing – I just do it!” Martine: “I just play.” Tuva (5): “We just do funny things.” Martine: “You know something, we use to play funny games; look!” Martine grabs Nora’s hands and they whirl each other around and around and suddenly they let go and fall on the floor. Both laugh loudly. They repeat the same routine over and over again, screaming and laughing. Then suddenly they run after each other. After a while they return to me: “Do you know what this game is called?” “No”, I answer. “It is called tullbaill (nonsense)”, they both exclaim.

  13. References • Bateson, P. (2005) The Role of Play in the Evolution of Great Apes and Humans, in: Pellegrini, A.D & P.K Smith (eds.): The Nature of Play. Great Apes and Humans. New York: The Guillford Press, 13-26 • Bekoff, M (2006) Animal Passions and Beastly Virtues. Philadelphia. Temple University Press • Bekoff, M. (2015) Playful fun in dogs. Current Biology, Vol. 25, No 1 • Buck, T (2014) International Child Law (3rd edition). London & New York: Routledge • Burghardt, G. (2005) The genesis of animal play. Cambridge: MIT Press • Burghardt, G. (2010) The Comparative Reach of Play and Brain Perspective, Evidence, and Implications, American Journal of Play, 2, 3, 338-356 • Burghardt, G. (2015) Play in fishes, frogs, and reptiles. Current Biology, Vol. 25, No 1 • Byers, J. & Walker, C. (1995) Refining the motor training hypothesis for the evolution of play, The American Naturalist, Vol. 146, No. 1, 25 – 40 • Byrne, R. W. (2015) The what as well as the why of animal fun. Current Biology, Vol. 25, No. 1 • Caro, T. M. (1995) Short-term costs and correlates of play in cheetahs. Animal Behaviour, 49, 333 – 345 • Donaldson, T., Newberry, R., Spinka, M, and Cloutier, S. (2002) Effects of early play experience on play behaviour of piglets after weaning, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 79, 221 – 231 • Gopnik, A. (2012) Why preschool shouldn`t be like school. http://blog.mathatplay.org/2012/12/16/why-preschool-shouldnt-be-like-school/. Downloaded: 09.01.15 • Huizinga, J. (1950) Homo Ludens. A study of the play element of culture, Boston, Beacon Press • Pellis, S. & Pellis, V. (2009) The playful brain. Oxford: Oneworld publications • Popper, K. (1959) The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London: Hutchinson

  14. Pramling Samuelsson, I. & Carlsson, M.A. (2008) The Playing Learning Child: Toward a Pedagogy of Early Childhood, Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research. 52, 6 623-641 • Ramberg, B. (2005) Børdyr ha sjel [Should animals have souls?], in: Arr. Idehistorisktidsskrift Arr. History of Ideas Periodical]. Oslo • Silk, J.B. (2002) Using the ´F`-word in primatology, in Behaviour 139, 421-446 • Smith, P.K. (2005) Social and Pretend Play in Children, in: Pellegrini, A.D & P.K Smith (eds.): The Nature of Play. Great Apes and Humans. New York: The Guillford Press, 173-209 • Spariosu, M. I. (1989) Dionysus Reborn. Cornell University Press, Ithaca • Spinka, M., Newberry, R. and Bekoff, M. (2001) Mammalian Play: training for the unexpected. The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 76, No 2. p. 141 – 168 • Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, (2014) Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Value, web: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/value-intrinsic-extrinsic/ Downloaded 10.02.2015 • Sundsdal, E. (2013) Et størrefellesskapavsjeler [A larger community of souls], in: Utbildningochdemokrati [Education and Democracy], 22, 2, 139-144 • Sutton-Smith, B. (1997) The Ambiguity of Play. Harvard University Press, Cambridge • Sutton-Smith, B. (2008) Play Theory: A Personal Journey and New Thought, in: American Journal of Play, 1, 1, 80 – 123 • United Nations (2013) General comment No. 17 on the right of the child to rest, leisure, play, recreational activities, cultural life and the arts (art. 31) Convention on the Rights of the Child. • Øksnes, M. (2010) Lekens flertydighet. Om barns lek i en institusjonalisert barndom [The manyfacesof play. About children’s play in an institutionalised childhood]. Oslo: CappelenDammAkademisk.

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