Before We Colonize Their Brains With Literacy

Most of the two-year-olds I've ever met could already sing at least part of the Alphabet Song. I didn't teach it to them. It's something that parents sing to their children at home, probably because it's one of the first songs they themselves learned.

The tune comes from the mid-18th century and accompanied several nursery rhymes including Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and Baa Baa Black Sheep, while the A-B-C lyrics were first "copyrighted" a century later (can you copyright the alphabet?). The simple, memorable tune, which was employed by Mozart in his Twelve Variations, has become the primary way that we teach the alphabet in a variety of European languages. With few exceptions, every child I've ever known has had it down by the time they were three.

For most of human history, there was no alphabet. Up until relatively recently, there were still languages in the world, that is to say entire cultures, that did not translate into a phonetic alphabet. 

A phonetic alphabet is a way to communicate through language over space and time. In doing so, it greatly simplifies language, reducing it to 26 sounds, a few diphthongs, and some consonant blends, leaving out most of the sounds humans are capable of using to communicate. In other words, the alphabet tends to restrict and simplify. In fact, since the introduction of the Phoenician alphabet by the Greeks during the 8th century BC, it's asserted that human language has likely become less varied and nuanced than in pre-alphabet eras. This, in part, reflects concerns expressed by Socrates who was famously opposed to the use of the alphabet; we know this because his student Plato recorded his words using that same alphabet.

Most languages spoken in the world today have been translated alphabetically, usually employing the letters with which anyone reading here is familiar. As philosopher Marshall McLuhan wrote, "(A)ny society possessing the alphabet can translate any adjacent cultures into its alphabetic mode. But this is a one-way process. No non-alphabetic culture can take over an alphabetic one; because the alphabet cannot be assimilated; it can only liquidate or reduce." McLuhan suggests that it was the adoption of the alphabet that ultimately lead Western civilization down an inevitable the path to colonialism.

I often think of the culture of young children as a pre- or non-alphabetic culture. I mean, we tend to dismiss a baby's cry as a kind of "catch all" communication, leading frantic parents to "try" everything in the effort to respond to what they are trying to "tell" us. Sometimes they're telling us they're hungry. Sometimes we can't figure out what they're saying. And sometimes, perhaps more often than our alphabet shaped minds can understand, they're expressing something we are simply unable to comprehend. Looked at this way, one could argue that the alphabet song is a kind of colonial foray of adults into the world of childhood, forever liquidating and reducing it.

I'm of course not trying to make the case that we should stop singing that song, but it's also important, I think, as adults who work with young people, that we take a moment to consider that these minds not yet shaped like ours. We worry that today's technologies, like smartphones, are changing our brains, and they are, in the same way that the phonetic alphabet changes our brains. Indeed, any form of literacy -- be it technological, social-emotional, or good old fashioned reading -- changes our brains. 

McLuhan actually predicts (or at least speculates) that the phonetic alphabet, in the broader sweep of existence, may be on it's way out as technology allows us to increasingly communicate through space and time without resorting to the A-B-C's. Real world cases in point: people are sending me audio "text" messages; email is being replaced by Zoom; how-to guides have been supplanted by YouTube videos. In the future, will we even need the alphabet?

Our children's brains will change, that's what learning is, but I worry about what we lose, what we miss out on, and what harm we may be doing when we seek to rush children towards literacy. After all, long before the alphabet, the evolutionary process created human brains that were much more like our children's than the brains we carry around in our adult heads. It seems that we should respect our children as they are enough to allow them their time before we colonize their brains with literacy. Perhaps we should view these precious years as an opportunity to study what it means to think and feel and know without letters instead of, as we too often do, hurry to liquidate and reduce their experience to 26 letters.

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

The Antidote to the Mean World Syndrome

Keith Haring (Luna Luna)

I know several people who have been directly impacted by the ongoing firestorm in Los Angeles, four of whom have lost their homes. 

I've been on a strict news break for the past few months. I didn't learn about the disaster until people I know told me about it. The only stories I've heard are from the perspective of people who have experienced it. These people have all been fortunate enough to have not been physically harmed, to have escaped with their loved ones, their pets, and a handful of their most important keepsakes. They are sad, of course, but also, all of them, have expressed gratitude. "It's just stuff," they've said. They've talked more about the people who have it worse than they do than they have themselves, urging me to contribute to this or that effort to provide food, clothing, and shelter for those who need it. "We'll be okay," they've said from where they are living out of a suitcase. Even as they've lost their homes, they are expressing compassion for those who have lost even more or who were not as well prepared.

I don't know what people on the news are saying. I'm sure there have been interviews with people expressing sentiments similar to my friends, but I also have no doubt that fingers are being pointed, that ideologues have taken up microphones to blame other ideologues, that people from one state are gloating about what happened in another state. I know this because I've watched the news for most of my adult life.

George Gerbner, a professor, author, media critic, and founder of what's called cultivation theory, spent his career studying how the news, and particularly television news, impacts our perception of society. He coined the term "mean world syndrome," a phrase he used to describe the fact that people who watch large amounts of television are more likely to perceive the world as a dangerous and frightening place. They tend to be more cynical, more misanthropic, and more pessimistic than those who watch less. They believe that their fellow humans are more selfish and self-centered than they really are. They believe that individuals are helpless to better the world and are far more likely to be stressed and depressed. Is it any surprise that we've become so radically anti-social?

In just a few months of avoiding the news, I've seen a change in my own perceptions of the world. For one thing, I'm a much better listener. My mind still wants to know what's going on in the world, but without the news, I have to count on people I know. Yes, many of them know what they know through the news, but it comes to me filtered through the perspective of actual human beings in my life and that makes a difference. Actual humans, as opposed to the talking heads motivated by ratings, are more inclined to deliver "the news" with a catch in their throat, with tears in their eyes, and, like with my friends who have lost their homes, gratitude and compassion.

Gratitude and compassion are the antidotes to "mean world syndrome." When I reflect on my wonderful life amidst young humans, I can't tell you how often I've seen a child fall and another help them get back up. I'll never forget one boy who was having a difficult day who sat on a swing shouting "Help! Help!" His classmates swarmed to him, like anti-bodies to a wound. He wanted them to push him, but it was clear that he also wanted more than that, and the other children responded the way human beings always have, by helping him. I think of how excited and grateful a child can be over the smallest thing -- a special rock, a scent, a song.

This is who we are.

I hold a degree in journalism. "The news," by definition, is something out-of-the-ordinary. Dog biting man is not news. Man biting dog is. The "mean" things, the tragedies, the hate, the violence, the anger, these things are in the aberrations. We don't see much gratitude and compassion on the news because it's found everywhere the news is not. 

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

It's As If They Have Never Before Seen a Human Ready and Eager to Learn

Jean-Michel Basquiat (Luna Luna)

Over my decades as a play-based preschool teacher, I've never had to deal with a bored child. I've worked with sad and angry children, frightened and frustrated children, and even children who were experiencing emotions that our language cannot fully describe, but never a bored one . . . or at least not for long.

In our play-based program, children engage with an object or a game or a person of their choosing for a time. They are attracted by the novelty of whatever it is, drawn in by the questions they have about it. They put their hands on it, their minds to it. What is it? What can I do with it? What will it do with me? In other words, they play with it. Then, as their questions get answered, they start to lose interest and something like boredom creeps in, which is the brain's signal to move on to the next novelty. This is how humans have evolved to educate themselves.

From the perspective of neuroscience, the neural network that makes up our brain is, as most of us know by now, initially very plastic which allows it to absorb new information, but over time, and as the information becomes repetitive, it starts to solidify. We can actually feel this happening: we start with the thrill of novelty, followed by the satisfaction of mastery, and then comes the restlessness, the boredom, that draws us into new challenges. And in a play-based program there is always a new challenge, which is why I've never had to deal with a bored child: in a varied and beautiful environment, free people are always learning.

For a long time, we believed that this plasticity naturally solidifies as we age, achieving its "final" form in young adulthood, but we now know that our brains can remain plastic throughout life if only we continue to find ourselves in the presence of novelty. This is one of the reasons I read books, both fiction and nonfiction, history, mysteries, science, politics, psychology, classic novels, and especially books written by people who are not middle-aged, middle-class, American males because, being one of those, I'm a bit bored by that singular perspective. My day-to-day life may not always present me with all the novelty I need, but books are entire worlds I can access from within my current life. Of course, I also seek novelty in travel, in trying new things, in meeting new people. It takes more effort than it did when I was a child and everything was new, but I'm committed to not aging into a calcified old man.

In recent years, it's become an expression of common wisdom to say something like, Let your children be bored; that's how they learn to be creative. The idea is that kids will naturally overcome the lethargy and discomfort of their boredom by finding something to do and, bingo, the boredom is over. This is of course true, as we see every day in play-based preschool. But increasingly our children feel trapped in a life in which they see little novelty and, perhaps more importantly, they have no permission to seek novelty.

As a boy, I recall experiencing boredom on days when I was stuck at home. Mom was busy, my brother irritating, and the toys were all played out. In other words, I'd mastered what there was to master, draining my self-contained world of novelty. I'd have watched TV, but back then, there was very little to interest children outside of Saturday mornings. If I complained, mom suggested chores. I would typically solve the problem by picking up a book, picking a fight with my brother, or going outside. In other words, I would escape to where the novelty was.

Today's children still have the escapes of books and bickering, although the habit of reading is on the wane and adults usually don't tolerate bickering. The sure fire option of going outside has pretty much been replaced by video games and an internet that provides 24/7 children's programming. However, we adults have, rightly or wrongly, determined that screen-based activities must be restricted in the name of health and safety, so we cut off that escape route. We buy them more toys than ever before, but the novelty of manufactured toys is, by design, always short-lived. We sign them up for classes and sports teams and whatnot. Sometimes that works, especially if a child discovers an art or pursuit or activity that inspires them, but since most of these types of things are offered on a schedule and at a remote location, they aren't options for long afternoons during which "There's nothing to do." They require boredom to happen on a schedule.

Standard schooling is even worse than being at home. Children are literally confined to rooms, to desks, to mandated curricula. They are made to memorize material in which they have no interest and learn skills for which they see no applicability. When they try to connect with the other children, they are told "no socializing." When novelty accidentally occurs -- a flooded playground, new toilets being installed, a raccoon family wanders past -- the children are shooed away. In many standard schools novelty is so rare that on those days in which it is consciously introduced -- an assembly, a visit from firefighters, a pizza party -- the adults are frightened by the children's excitement. It feels like things are on the verge of being out-of-control. 

It's as if they have never before seen a human ready and eager to learn.

And here's the point, boredom is meant to be a short-lived thing, fixed by going outside or reading a book or engaging with friends. The kind of chronic boredom that characterizes standard schooling is not a benign thing. Extended periods of boredom damage the mind (see what happens to prisoners in isolation). It affects mental health. It leads to rage, depression, and worse. This is why I worry every time an adult dismisses a child's boredom as "a good thing." A little bit is necessary. A lot, however, is deadly.

Our brains cannot tolerate ongoing, inescapable boredom, but it needs those small doses that let it know it's time to move on. We have evolved to keep ourselves, as science journalist George Musser puts it, "on the cusp between frustration and boredom," in that wonder-filled space between What is this and what can I do with it? and I'm ready for something new. This is what we see when children are uncaged, when they know they have permission to play in a varied and beautiful environment.

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

The Anti-Social Century?

Salvador Dalí (Luna Luna)

My biggest "vice," one I thankfully share with my wife, is that we like to go out to dinner. If I die broke, that's where the money went.

It's not necessarily the food. I'm not bad in the kitchen and, after 40 years of cooking for my wife, I'm confident I can please our pallets better than most restaurants. No, the reason we go "out" is to be out, to be among people, noise, action, laughter, and to bop along to music, even crappy background music, with others. At least once a week we invite friends into our home for dinner for the same reason. Likewise for going out dancing: we could dance in our living room, but the point is socializing. We currently live in a place in which we know most of our neighbors. I often sit on my front porch with a book and always wind up chatting with passers by. We walk the dog twice a day, and not only for the physical exercise, but because our neighbors are also out walking their dogs. On a typical day, it can take an hour chat our way through a mile.

We have consciously chosen this lifestyle because we've seen too many people in America age into isolation and loneliness. But, it can feel like swimming up stream. The world seems to want us isolated. I could easily while away an hour scrolling through vaguely interesting things on my smartphone. It takes extra effort to go outside and engage, but I'm always happy I did. I feel more alive in contrast to the aftermath of scrolling when I feel, without exaggerating, a little more dead.

When we were young, this is how everyone we know lived: face-to-face. Today, many of the restaurants we frequent are half empty, but have bags of take out orders piled up around the cash register. I'm happy they're able to stay in business, but the steady stream of blank-faced customers who come through the door and grab their food to eat in front of Netflix is depressing. They hardly even say "hello" or "thank you." Grocery stores are full of professional shoppers, loading up carts for delivery. The movie theaters are virtually empty, even for blockbuster movies as people stay home, streaming their entertainment. And, of course, working remotely is no longer a trend, but rather a way of life. I recently saw a survey in which 80 percent of the respondents who had been with their partner for five or fewer years met through an online app. Even togetherness is accessed through solitude. There is a current Google ad being run for its new AI product that portrays young people having social-style conversations with a damned robot instead of, you know, a person.

Isolation is no longer just a problem of the elderly.

According to The Atlantic's latest cover story -- The Anti-Social Century (sorry, the story might be behind a paywall):

Eroding companionship can be seen in numerous odd and depressing facts of American life today. Men who watch television now spend seven hours in front of the TV for every hour they spend hanging out with somebody outside their home. The typical female pet owner spends more time actively engaged with her pet than she spends in face-to-face contact with friends of her own species. Since the early 2000s, the amount of time that Americans say they spend helping or caring for people outside their nuclear family has declined by more than a third.

My wife and I recently returned from a trip to Hanoi, Vietnam, where we participated the International Conference for Happiness and Well-being in Education hosted by TH School. The conference was wonderful, I came home with a lot to think about, but for the past couple months, the stories we've been telling are about our impressions of the social lives of the Vietnamese people. 

Hanoi is a city of 8.5 million, roughly the size of New York City. And like New York, which we visited over the holidays, you feel the massive population every time you go outside. The difference is that in NY most people are simply rushing from place-to-place, eyes forward (or down), earbuds installed, phone screens lit. It feels like you're perpetually in someone's way and they are perpetually in yours. In Hanoi, however, the crowds tend to be gathered together, in cafes, coffee houses and garden patches. I can't tell you how many times we rounded a corner to find dozens of people boisterously eating pho together, enjoying one another's company, not a smartphone in sight. 

The people of Hanoi seem to spend their days out on the sidewalk, pruning plants, washing dishes, preparing dinner, exercising, and, you know, living. The sounds of traffic are similar to everywhere else, but above it all, under it all, is the steady human sound, the talking and laughter of togetherness. Even in the biggest crowds, I was never once made to feel I was in someone else's way.

It's tempting to blame the pandemic, but the Vietnamese went through it as well. According to The Atlantic, this American trend toward isolation, toward an anti-social lifestyle, has been ongoing for decades, although it was obviously accelerated by Covid. It's tempting to joke that this is a boon to introverts, but as an introvert myself, there is a difference between choosing to  stay home with a good book and doing it day-after-day, year-after-year. Even introverts need a social life.

As an early childhood educator, I'm worried about how this is impacting our children. We know that a socially stunted childhood leads to a socially stunted adulthood. Anxiety and depression are currently spiking, not just among teenagers, but right down to our three-year-olds. Psychologists know that this is, at least in part, a direct result of a lack of a social life. Our play-based preschools provide the right kind of social environment for young humans, but more and more of our youngest citizens spend their days in increasingly academic settings in which socializing is intentionally kept to a minimum. 

This isn't about deep and abiding friendships, although that too is important, rather this is about simple daily social interactions.

Yesterday, the young man in front of me at the supermarket was attempting to purchase a canned beverage. His debit card wasn't working. The effort to talk with the cashier (a man about my age) was clearly a struggle for him as he tried to explain what was going on. After a couple minutes during which I could see his face reddening, I offered to buy his drink for him. He seemed stunned that I'd spoken to him, blank. The cashier clarified, "This man is kindly offering to buy your drink for you." Finally, suspiciously, the young man relented and let me pay. Only then, almost as an afterthought, he smiled at me. I took it as an unvoiced thank you. I could tell his anxiety was overwhelming him. As the kid walked away, I joked to the cashier, waving toward the racks of snacks, "I paid out of self-defense. If I'd had to wait one more minute, I'd have grabbed one of these impulse items." We then bantered back and forth about whether or not I should have a candy bar as he rung up my purchases. It was exactly the kind of stupid, social banter for which young people mock older people, but I walked out of there slightly more alive than I'd gone in.

The emergence of this phenomenon is insidious. It has snuck up on us slowly, and then suddenly, which is a blessing because we might have otherwise missed it until it's too late. The Atlantic article asserts that this is a uniquely American problem, and our experience in Hanoi suggests that this might be true, but if history is a guide, it won't be long before we've exported it, like we do most things, for better or worse . . . In this case, worse.

I love convenience as much as the next guy, but we need to come to grips with the high price we're paying for this world in which everyone can live as a "secular monk." I know that it's unhealthy for young children, not just socially, but emotionally and intellectually as well. Day-to-day socializing is an aspect of play that we don't often consider, but in many ways it stands at the center of why play is so important for human development. And this goes for all of us, not just the kids. 

So you know, in spirit of play, how about going outside today and say "Hi" to someone? You have nothing to lose but your isolation. It will make you feel a little more alive.

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Humans Thinking at Full Capacity

As you step onto a preschool playground or a play-based classroom, the first thing visitors are struck by is the never-ending swirl of bodies in motion. Adult visitors to Woodland Park have always stopped at the gate or doorway seemingly afraid to get in the way as children move from one thing to the next, leap, skip, swing, crawl, jump, jiggle, bend, and reach. Even when children stop to greet the newcomers, they are in motion: kicking a leg for no apparent reason, clapping their hands, bouncing up and down. Sure, some of the children might remain relatively still for a few minutes at a time, but even the ones curled up with a book are bouncing a foot. Even the ones pretending to be a baby under a blanket are wiggling.

"Sit as little as possible," wrote the influential philosopher and notorious nature trail hiker Friedrich Nietzsche, "do not believe any idea that was not born in the open air and of free movement."

A mountain of studies back up Nietzsche's assertion. When we move our bodies our visual sense is sharpened, our ability to concentrate is enhanced, comprehension is boosted, information retention is increased, and self-regulation improves. Cognitive scientist Sain Beilock even asserts that "(m)oving the body can alter the mind by unconsciously putting ideas in our heads before we are able to consciously contemplate them on our own time." (Italics are mine.) In other words, our bodies can know stuff through movement for which our brains aren't yet ready. And it doesn't necessarily have to be robust movement either: one study found that when people doodle while listening to a lecture, they retain nearly 30 percent more of the information. By now, most of us know that our brains alone don't do our thinking, but rather our whole bodies, other people, and even things are involved, not just intellectually, but emotionally as well. 

Another great 20th century philosopher and psychologist, William James once observed that one of the best ways to overcome mild depression or ennui is to stand up straight, pull our shoulders back, hold our head high, and move confidently. More contemporarily, Katherine Isbister, a professor and researcher at the University of California Santa Cruz, talks of what she calls embodied self-regulation. "Changing what the body does," she writes, "can change our feelings, perceptions, and thoughts. 

(If you are interested in digging deeper into any of this, I highly recommend Annie Murphy Paul's book The Extended Mind.)

One of the foundational myths of schooling is that we must somehow get the kids to stop moving around in order to focus, but the exact opposite is true. Some schools have even gone so far as to cut back on recess in elementary school in favor of more "seat time." The evidence, however, tells us that the more children move, the more clearly they think. This evidence is so clear and so compelling (and by now, so widely known) that the fact that our schools persist in forcing even preschoolers to spend large chunks of their days sitting quietly is outright malpractice.

What visitors see as they stand in the doorway of standard classrooms are humans whose minds are torn between obeying the adults by sitting still and their natural urge to actually think and learn through movement. 

What visitors to a play-based classroom are witnessing are humans in motion, thinking and learning at full capacity. 

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Clearing the Deck for that Next First Step

A baby's first step is a moment that thrills us. We seen them, their entire body focused on this previously impossible task. That it's something they will spend their rest of their life doing without thought or special effort, isn't relevant. This is the moment we video tape if we can, but the truth is that young children spend their days routinely engaged in similar firsts: grasping an object, drinking from a cup, clapping. These are all things that we, as adults, do on automatic pilot, so to speak, but for a young child, they are things they are in the process of learning so it takes a coordinated and concentrated effort by both mind and body to make them happen.

As adults, most of our movements and actions throughout the day are accomplished with minimal conscious thought. When we were learning to drive, for instance, we at first had to think about every single thing we did. Our brain sends a signal to our foot to press the brake pedal, then the tiniest fraction of a second later our foot makes that idea come true, simultaneously sending the signal that it has done so back to the brain, which in turn confirms that yes, this is what I was hoping for. Turning the key, releasing the emergency brake, putting the car in gear, depressing the accelerator, gently at first, then with a little more oomph, all of it was once something that required our full attention. Now it's all handled in the background by our brain and body, freeing our conscious mind to do other things, like worrying about that upcoming meeting or re-litigating the argument we just had with our spouse.

Soon that baby will be running on autopilot while clapping as their conscious mind can concentrate on their part in the game at hand. This is what we have evolved to do: relegate as much habitual movement as possible to the background in order to free our attention for more pressing matters. Meditation and mindfulness practices seek to temporarily override this phenomenon, to refocus us on our routine movements, but it can't last for long because we've evolved for automating what we can and focusing on what we can't.

Our brains are often referred to as "prediction machines," and it makes sense. After all, there is a tiny lag time (something like 100 milliseconds) between the moment we see, say, a tiger about to pounce and our brain receiving that information. This means that we are always living ever so slightly in the past. Some believe that our conscious minds have evolved, at least in part, for the purpose of trying to correct for this by forever predicting the future, giving us a better chance of escaping that tiger.

Of course, most of the time, we aren't faced with tigers, but rather less pressing things like taking our first step. As neuroscientist Karl Friston puts it, "Actions are making your predictions come true . . . The way that we move -- the intention to move, the willed actions that we enjoy -- are actually prior fantasies that I am going to do this. The body -- the reflexes, the muscles -- realizes those fantasies" As science journalist George Musser puts it in his new brain-bending book Putting Ourselves Back in the Equation: "According to Friston's way of thinking, which he calls active inference, the brain is not the body's helmsman or puppeteer, but its dreamer. Brain and body are bound up in a mutual project to predict the world successfully."

No wonder our brain-bodies are so eager to automate as much as possible. Indeed, we are even more marvelous than that. If our brains make predictions that prove correct, our sensory inputs  typically don't rise to the level of conscious awareness. Even when the prediction proves wrong, if it's an easy error to correct, our conscious mind doesn't get involved. Only when our predictions are way off and challenging to fix does our conscious mind get fully involved. In other words, as Musser puts it, "In short, we are only aware of thwarted expectations. And there is a lot thwarting. Nothing in the real world is ideal, nothing ever goes according to plan, so the brain is always erring and calibrating. If not for these continual imperfections, we'd have no need to be conscious."

And this isn't even the most brain-bending concept in Musser's book.

This has direct application for those of us who work with young children. For one thing, it means that we are, at best, wasting our time when we try to "teach" children anything if they haven't already shifted the prerequisite movements into autopilot. If a child is still using their conscious mind to manipulate a pencil, for instance, there is no way they can be taught to write letters. If a child must still make a conscious effort to sit still or be quiet, there's no way we can expect them to learn much of anything else while sitting still and being quiet. 

But more to the point, we are designed to learn by attempting to make our dreams reality through embodiment. This is why we must be free to move. Research indicates that all of us think more clearly and creatively while in motion. Our brains need the give-and-take with our bodies, and specifically our senses, in order to do much of anything.

This, at least in part, helps explain why play is a better teacher than any kind of adult-directed instruction. Direct instruction requires educators to attempt to somehow wrangle children's attention toward pre-determined "learning objectives." That so many teachers attempt to do this while simultaneously insisting on stillness and silence, is irrational given what we know about learning. It's like trying to push water up a hill, which is why punishments and rewards are so often the real focus of much of what we call schooling. When you essentially disable self-motivation, that's what you're left with.

Play, or self-directed learning, frees our conscious mind to choose what it is ready, right now, to focus on, what it needs to focus on, what it is self-motivated to focus on. It frees children to do what they are best at, dream and move, be thwarted and try again until that combination of thought and movement has been mastered, clearing the deck for that next first step.

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 15 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Learning to Resolve Conflict Among Peers

"Teacher Tom, Arthur is calling us 'finger binger'."

"Are you finger binger?"

"No!"

"Then I guess he's wrong."

Most of the time, the children don't need us to get involved in their every day conflicts.

"Teacher Tom, those guys won't let us in their factory."

"How does that make you feel?"

"Bad."

"Did you tell them it makes you feel bad."

"No."

"If I were you I'd tell them it makes me feel bad when they don't let me in their factory."

Sometimes, of course, they do need us, especially when emotions are running high, but most kids, most of the time, are fully competent. They just might need a different perspective.

"Teacher Tom, she took the hula hoops and we were using them."

"Oh no, what did you say to her?"

"Nothing."

"Maybe she doesn't know you were using them."

I don't want to call it tattling, because that word is full of judgement. I like to think of it as kids taking a moment to talk through their options with me. Children who are new to our school often arrive with the expectation that the adult will simply "fix" the problem through the blunt instrument of force that is ours simply by virtue of being an adult in a space for children. But resolving conflicts is a life skill that can't be learned through other people exercising police power.

"Teacher Tom, Erin hit me!"

"Oh no, we all agreed to not hit each other. What did you do?"

"I came over here to tell you."

"Now I know. What are you going to say to Erin?"

"I'm going to tell her to stop hitting me and that I don't like it!"

"That sounds like a good idea."

Sometimes they want me to come with them, to stand nearby. If I sense they're asking for moral support, then I go with them. If I think they just want to use me as muscle or an implied threat, then I ask them to report back.

"Teacher Tom, none of the kids will give me a turn on the swings."

"And you want a turn."

"Yes."

"Did you tell them you want a turn?"

"Yes, and they still keep swinging."

"Maybe they didn't hear you."

"They heard me. I said it really loud."

"What did you say?"

"I said I'm going to tell you that they were being mean."

"And what did they say about that?"

"They said they weren't being mean."

"Maybe they weren't being mean. Maybe they just aren't finished with their turn. Maybe they think you're being mean."

"I'm not mean!"

"I know, but maybe they think you are."

"I know! I'll say please!"

Most often it's the last I hear of the conflict. Other times they get stuck and need me to mediate, which doesn't mean "solve." Usually, I just listen, occasionally repeating or reframing key points.

"Don't call us finger binger!"

If he doesn't respond, I might say, "They don't want you to call them finger binger."

"I didn't call them finger binger."

If they don't respond, I might say, "He says he didn't call you finger binger."

"He did too."

"They say you did."

"I called them finger inger!"

"He says he called you finger inger, not finger binger."

"Well, we don't like that either."

. . . This can take a long time without anyone having more inherent power than anyone else. Learning to resolve conflicts among peers is, necessarily, an inefficient process. And it goes on throughout life. 

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