"Be Good, Be Careful, and Have Fun . . . In That Order"

Much of my work as an educator is informed by my memories of childhood. I grew up in neighborhoods in which I was free to roam, with or without other children, largely unsupervised by adults. That's how I remember it. My mother confirms the essence of my memories although not always the specifics. 

For instance, I have a clear memory of her regularly, in the tone of a joke, saying to me as I walked out the door, "Be good, be careful, and have fun . . . In that order." She insists she never said it, but it's such a strong memory for me that I adopted it as a sort of mantra for my own parenting. Who's right? Probably her. Does my memory count as a "false memory." Maybe.

"You have to begin to lose your memory," writes philosopher John Locke, "if only in bits and pieces, to realize that memory is what makes our lives. Life without memory is no life at all . . . Our memory is our coherence, our reason, our feeling, even our action. Without it we are nothing." But what is memory exactly? Today, we know a lot more about how memory works. We know, through experiment, that each time we recall a memory we alter it and that the things we recall most often are the memories that differ the most from actual events. We are, in fact, more creative storytellers than journalists when it comes to memory.

I've discussed this phenomenon with many people, all of whom agree that it must be true . . . For other people. They then tell me of a cherished memory that they know is entirely factual, but that a loved one denies ever happening, their point being that their loved one is misremembering. 

I've come to the opposite conclusion, however. I believe that my mother never said, "Be good, be careful, and have fun . . . In that order" even as I continue to remember her saying it. It makes sense from the perspective of the science. I've thought about those "moments" over and over. I've shared those "moments" with others. I've changed my opinion about what those moments meant to me. Those "moments" even shape my current life. And those moments likely never happened. I've thought about it a lot. It's me, not my mother, who has been actively recalling, and therefore, altering what really happened. For whatever reason, I've manufactured a memory.

I recently had a similar thing happen when I had lunch with an old girlfriend who I'd not seen in decades. Some of our memories matched, but the things I remember most clearly, the things I've thought about the most, never happened . . . At least as she remembers it. 

Yet even if our memories are unreliable and unstable, there is a basic truth in Locke's assertion. When we think of our lives, we are thinking of all those things that lead up to, and include, this day. 

"You can't change the past," we say, but obviously we can and do. The fact that we all do it, tells me it's an adaptive trait. As cognitive psychologist Donald Hoffman points out in his book The Case Against Reality, we've evolved not to commune with the "truth," but rather to perceive the world in ways that support our survival. In fact, Hoffman takes it a bit further, stating that it is a near mathematical certainty that the things we perceive do not exist as we perceive them, but rather we perceive things in way that support our survival. Nicolas Malebranche, a contemporary of Locke's, wrote, "The mind does not pay equal attention to everything it perceives. For it applies itself infinitely more to those things that affect it, that modify it, and that penetrate it, than to those that are present to it but do not affect it." This, of course, explains "selective memory," but it also, I think provides insight into why our memories are ultimately so unreliable. And why we must become creative storytellers in order to make sense of ourselves and our lives.

One of the reasons I like working with young children is that they do not possess decades of conscious memories. They are much more who they are, rather than who they were. And I, as an important adult in their lives will be part of the memories that will eventually become the raw material for the story they will weave about themselves. I take that responsibility very seriously, which is why I strive to first love them, then, secondly, get out of their way. Even if my mother never said those words, "Be good, be careful, and have fun . . . In that order," the story I've created about them embodies her love for me, the love that gave me confidence, that made me feel secure enough, to venture out into the world without her in order to, as she jokingly commanded me, have fun. 

I will never be able to replicate my own past, but I do what I can to create that feeling of love and independence for the children in my care.

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Even the most thriving play-based environments can grow stale at times. I've created this collection of my favorite free (or nearly free) resources for educators, parents, and others who work with young children. It's my gift to you! Click here to download your own copy and never run out of ideas again!

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!

All the Way Down

The famous scientist has given a lecture on the nature of the universe. Afterwords, an elderly woman comes up to him and says, "Young man, you seem well intended, but you've got it all wrong. The earth is a flat plate."

Humoring her, the scientist asks, "But then, madam, upon what does this flat plate rest?"

She replies, "On the back of a turtle."

Smiling condescendingly, he responds, "If that's so, then on what does the turtle stand?"

She shakes her head as if explaining something that ought to be obvious, "Young man, it's turtles all the way down."

This story has been around in a variety of versions for a long time. Philosophers, physicists, and theologians use the story as a way to highlight what they call "the problem infinite regression," which is to say that any foundational explanation for anything requires further explanation. In other words, it is futile to try to seek the ultimate foundation for the universe. There will always remain the unknown. I know that this idea is unsettling for some, but I find it exciting and even comforting to know that we will never lack for something to wonder about.

It wasn't really until the 17th century that we began to believe that human consciousness was a product of the brain. Others had, of course, speculated about it, but René Descartes was the one who popularized the idea, one that underpinned much of the so-called European Enlightenment. It's an aspect of colonialism, of racial superiority, and modern schooling. It's one of the turtle's backs on which rests our standardized classrooms: indoors, seats in chairs, bodies still, eyes and ears focused on a teacher delivering direct instruction. After all, if our minds are contained exclusively within our brains, the rest must be superfluous, or at least secondary, to learning, so we must subdue the body in order to reach the mind.

By the middle of the 20th century, however, scientists had begun to doubt this notion. Pioneering neurosurgeon and mapper of the human brain Wilder Penfield wrote: "(A)fter years of striving to explain the mind on the basis of brain-action alone, I have come to the conclusion that it is simpler (and far easier to be logical) if one adopts the hypothesis that our being does not consist of two fundamental elements . . . (T)here is no good evidence, in spite of new methods, such as the employment of stimulating electrodes, the study of conscious patients and the analysis of epileptic attacks, that the brain along can carry out the work that the mind does."

In a rational world, this kind of insight would have completely transformed the way we do education. If the brain alone cannot carry out the work of the mind, then that leaves us to consider that it is a function of the rest of our body as well. If we were rational, our schools would have become places in which movement was the norm, in which all the senses are engaged, in which we embrace the notion that learning is a full-body, immersive experience. You know, like life itself.

Many of today's leading researchers are now coming to consider that the operations of our minds extend beyond our bodies into the world around us, including other people, and even inanimate objects. Indeed, some leading thinkers like neuroscientist Guilio Tononi are exploring the idea that everything in the universe, every atom, every subatomic particle, contains some degree of consciousness and that so-called higher consciences, like ours, are built upon the backs of ever more simple consciousnesses . . . all the way down.

It's tempting to say that our schools, at one time, did reflect the latest science about how humans learn and now need to catch up, but the truth is that our schools have never been based on scientific evidence. They are based instead on the practices of industry and the military, human projects that rely upon discipline, order, and predictability, not science. There was a time, of course, when our leading thinkers were convinced that our minds, our brains, functioned like machinery, like clockworks or assembly lines, but modern schooling emerged far after these notions were abandoned by scientists. No, modern schooling is based not on the science of how minds work and learn, but rather on how people are controlled and goods are most efficiently processed. This isn't to say that individual teachers don't strive to make learning happen, but it's within a system that isn't designed around how the human mind actually works and learns.

The wonder and frustration of the scientific method is that there is always another turtle, all the way down. So what we "know" today about human learning will be just another turtle in an infinite regression of turtles. This is why I choose play. Play is how Mother Nature has designed us to educate ourselves. It accounts for every unknown because it is driven by the unknown. It requires no theories or systems other than curiosity and the freedom to pursue it.

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Even the most thriving play-based environments can grow stale at times. I've created this collection of my favorite free (or nearly free) resources for educators, parents, and others who work with young children. It's my gift to you! Click here to download your own copy and never run out of ideas again!

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!

Being a Cause

Growing up all of us kids knew that we were supposed to play with our food. So when I rolled up my white bread into a little doughy ball, I kept it to myself. I don't know why I rolled bread into little balls, but I recall feeling gratified by being the sole cause of a process that transformed one thing into another: from bread to a perfect round ball. I strived for perfectly round and when I achieved it I was done.

German psychologist Karl Groos, in his 1896 book Play and Man asserts that humans find pleasure in simply being a cause. "How many of us," he writes want to scribble or whittle or do something with our hands all the time, to break a twig and chew it while we walk, to strike the snow off the walls as we pass, to kick a pebble before us, to step on all the acorns on the pavement, to drum on the windowpane, to hit the wineglasses together, to roll up little balls of bread . . ."

Being a cause is fun. Whenever I've taken young children to a beach, then invariably begin throwing pebbles into the water, delighting in the splashes they've caused. Children shout in high ceilinged rooms, they dig holes, they knock over towers of blocks . . . 

We often see these behaviors as trail-and-error science, and perhaps it is at first. The first time we form bread into a little ball, we may be driven by curiosity (or boredom, curiosity's less glamorous cousin). But when we repeat it over and over, we aren't proving our experiment. We already know that when we throw that pebble into the lake, it will splash and create ripples that spread outward in all directions. We throw those pebbles, we form those bread balls, because it brings us pleasure to be a cause. 

Evolutionary science tells us that behaviors persist because they improve chances of survival and reproduction. Deriving pleasure from being a cause serves that in some way or another. We can assume that educating ourselves is part of it. But no one forms bread balls because they are seeking to improve their evolutionary fitness. The immediate reason we do it is to have fun.

As adults we tend to channel the urge to be a cause into our work, but I don't think that's inevitable. I reckon that's more a function of the kind of society in which we live. There are still adults who shout to cause echoes or kick pebbles or form bread balls, but most of us have internalized lessons like "don't play with your food." We've bought into the so-called pragmatism that dictates that we be confident of the "effect" before we act as a cause. We don't want to be seen as "wasting time." 

And we all too often turn this self-judgement onto the children in our lives. Too many adults resent that young children do nothing but waste time unless we drive them toward a "purpose." They play with their food, they shout, they run into a flock of pigeons, they scribble on page after page after page. We stop them. We divert and detour them. We try to "scaffold" something that we think will be educational. And when we do, we rob them of the sheer pleasure of being a cause.

We are at our best, I think, when we instead join them, when we learn from them. When we also throw pebbles in the water. When we chew a blade of grass. When we form bread into balls. Just for fun.

******

Even the most thriving play-based environments can grow stale at times. I've created this collection of my favorite free (or nearly free) resources for educators, parents, and others who work with young children. It's my gift to you! Click here to download your own copy and never run out of ideas again!

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!

Play Has No Plan or Purpose

The children who have discovered the power of saying, "Let's play!" are invariably the most popular playmates in preschool. 

Not that everyone accepts their invitations. After all, play is a self-actualizing activity, one that can really only be undertaken once the foundational levels of their Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs are met. Not every child is feeling safe or together enough to engage in play at any given moment. But those that are, know that the response to "Let's Play" is to enter into negotiations.

In our wider society, the word negotiation carries with it a connotation of butting heads, but really it's just another word for collaboration. The response to "Let's play!" is to agree upon a starting point. 

"Let's dig a hole."

"Let's go to the swings."

"Let's play princess."

From there, the game can go anywhere, one "I have an idea" at a time. In fact, that's the point of play: it's pointless and unpredictable. No one knows where it will lead and what, if anything, will be learned. And that's what motivates children, or any of us, to continue playing, this quest for novelty. The opportunity to discover and interact with something new under the sun. Some play theorists assert that one of the primary reasons that play exists at all is that it is how we prepare ourselves for dealing with the unexpected, which, after all is one of the principle features of life.

As the old Yiddish saying puts it, "Man plans and god laughs."

I was recently meeting with early childhood educators in Connecticut, a place that has persuaded state legislators to codify "play" as the primary pedagogical mechanism for leaning in preschool and kindergarten, with further support play up through elementary school. Indeed, the host organization of the event at which I was speaking, the Connecticut Education Association, has been instrumental in making the legislation happen and several of the women to whom I was speaking were key players in the effort.

But they recognize that getting the legislation passed was only a beginning. Their work, in many ways, still lies ahead of them. They told me, for instance, that some veteran teachers, in their efforts to adopt a more play-centric approach, were requiring the children to "make a plan" for their play which the teacher has to approve before allowing them to proceed. That's not play. Play doesn't have a purpose or plan. 

Those of us who are familiar with play based, or self-directed, learning understand this, but it's an alien concept to educators who have bought into the notion that children need adults to take charge of their learning. Requiring children to "plan" renders it another adult directed activity.

In a famous study, researchers showed groups of children a set of pictures of children engaged in a variety of activities. They then asked them if what they saw was "play" or not. The researchers found that the primary indicator that any given activity was play is the absence of adults. When adults were present, the children tended to label the activity, whatever it was, as "work" or "learning."

The educators of Connecticut have their work cut out for them because play is a notoriously difficult thing to define. I've read countless studies on play and rarely do any two define play in the same way. This is what makes play difficult to research. It's like love in this way. Or art. Or morality. Or even life itself. Perhaps the great truth is that the most important things are impossible to define, even if we know it when we experience it. 

In his book The Kingdom of Play, author David Toomey, draws parallels between culture and play. Neither play nor culture "enable survival or reproduction in any immediate way." Neither starts with a plan. "(T)hey cease playing only when they are injured, exhausted, or simply become interested in something else. So it is with culture. 'No work of art is ever finish,' says the aphorism. 'It is only abandoned.' . . . (T)he more open-ended a cultural practice is, the more play-like it is."

"Let's play" is an invitation to create something together. It has no plan or purpose beyond, perhaps, fun. That novelty is discovered or created, that human's are connected, that learning results, is all a happy accident. As adults, we are responsible for helping them satisfy their physiological, safety, emotional and esteem needs, but but as far as the children are concerned, self-actualization can only happen, play can only happen, when the adults are out of the picture.

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If you want to transform your own space into a full-capacity learning environment that gives children the freedom to self-actualize through play, please join the 2026 cohort for my course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. Group discounts are available. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! Registration closes soon. To learn more and register, click here.

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!

Blaming Everything But Standardized Schooling

"Students are not where they need to be or where we want them to be." This is a quote from the commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics regarding the National Assessment of Educational Progress report released about a year ago.

"Generation Alpha" is what we're calling children born since 2010, which covers everyone from 0-16, the group that is currently being "schooled." I've been in education long enough now to know that this concern about students not being "where they need to be" is an alarm that's sounded with each generation. The problem, of course, is that their needs have nothing to do with it. They really never have when it comes to the core mission of standard schools. This talk of children's needs is just school-ish lip service. The important part of the commissioner's quote, the true part, is that students aren't where the testing regime (the "we" in this quote) "want them to be." 

Here are a few other quotes from standard school education types included in a Newsweek article hyping the Generation Alpha fears:

"There's a noticeable shift in student engagement and accountability."

"Many students today appear apathetic and disconnected from their own learning."

There has been "a noticeable change in student focus and engagement in school."

In other words, our youth are reacting to schooling the way they have reacted since the beginning compulsory mass schooling, which is, let's face it, about adults telling them "where they need to be" without bothering to consult them. It's the same tired, old story of curmudgeonly "school marms" humbugging over the youth of today. 

In this article, the "experts" quoted (all of whom are, not incidentally, major TikTok creators) are mostly blaming Covid, a lack of "consequences" and "accountability" (e.g., punishment), and technology. No one directly blames the parents, although there is some grumbling about kids using technology at home for "entertainment" after spending "their entire learning day" on screens. (I hope this is some kind of exaggeration because if young children are spending their entire "learning day" on iPads, that is gross malpractice.) Likewise, no one quoted in this article specifically blames the children themselves, although it's just beneath the surface.

"When students learn that minimal effort still yields promotion and that they can be chronically absent without consequence, they stop seeing the value in showing up -- mentally or physically." This is the school-ish mindset in a nutshell: learning is hard; the point of school isn't learning, but rather earning the grades and posting the scores that lead to "promotion"; and the only way to get kids to jump through our hoops, to get where they "need to be," is through carrots and sticks. 

I blame the schools. 

I blame these TikTok teachers. I blame the commissioner and her tests and data collection and standardization. The closest anyone in this Newsweek article comes to suggesting that maybe, in some way, school itself is to blame for the apathy and lack of engagement is to say, "It's not about abandoning tradition -- it's about adapting it." 

No, it is about abandoning it, at least if we are going to do something about the centuries long problem with lack of student engagement. There has never been a golden age of children enthusiastically loving standard schools. It has always been a bore. And there is nothing "traditional" about schooling, which is why I use the term "standard" when discussing what they do. For most of human history "school" was life itself and that doesn't bore anyone. It has, however, become a "tradition" to sit children in desks and inflict our "wants" on them with little concern about their wants or needs, then complain when they aren't interested in living the first two decades of their lives in a state of forced labor, obedience, and irrelevance. It's an entire system built on the adage, "I'm doing this for your own good." And as we've all learned, when someone threatens us with our "own good" we're well advised to run like the wind.

There is so much ignorance and lack of insight in articles like this that pop up in a cycle as predictable as the sunrise. One of these TikTok educators complains about screens while at the same time noting that his school has given every student an iPad. What the hell? He throws up his hands, "I do not think we were ready for the negative impact . . ." Who knew, right?

Students have never been enthusiastic about standardized top-down curricula and testing. No human has ever thrived in an environment of constant judgment and assessment.

I have never experienced the problems these educators are reporting. I have always, generation after generation, taught children who were enthusiastic about what they were learning, who worked hard, and who easily set their screens aside because what they got to do in school was even more engaging. That's because they get to play, especially outdoors, and to take charge of their own learning, which is how Mother Nature has designed us to learn, a fact that standard schools refuse to acknowledge, except perhaps by inflicting more adult-directed crap like "movement breaks" or worksheets featuring cartoon characters. 

In an environment of self-directed learning, learning is its own reward. It is always relevant and motivating because it is derived from life itself.

"Many students struggle to find value in traditional subjects," says one TikTok educator, "unless there's a direct, tangible payoff. If they can't see how reading or writing will translate into a paycheck or immediate benefit, they're often uninterested. Intrinsic motivation -- the kind that keeps you learning even when something gets hard -- is fading." 

The ignorance in this statement is astounding. She cannot see beyond the framework of rewards and punishments, of carrots and sticks. She obviously doesn't even know what "intrinsic motivation" means. She seems to be complaining that Generation Alpha isn't responding to her punishments and rewards -- Skinnerian external motivators. And clearly, she has no idea what might actually be relevant to a child. It certainly isn't a paycheck.

If you missed this article, don't worry. I picked this one at random. Another one just like it, full of the same handwringing will be coming around soon enough, blaming everything but standard schooling itself. After all, Newsweek is in the business of eyeballs, as are TikTok creators, and complaining about "kids today" has a proven track record that goes back at least to the Ancient Greeks.

"With the way social media algorithms work, students are being fed nonstop content that's not only entertaining but also specifically tailored to their interests," complains another scold. That is exactly what play-based or self-directed learning does as well, albeit without the necessity for screens or media corporations. This is where intrinsic motivation comes from. It's the way real, deep, relevant learning has always happened, since long before standard schools came along and replaced it with tedium, carrots, and sticks.

Let the TikTok-ers humbug. The rest of us will go out and play.

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If you want to transform your own space into a full-capacity learning environment that gives children permission to play, please join the 2026 cohort for my course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. Group discounts are available. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

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!

If We are Not Focused on the Happiness and Well-Being of Children, Then What are We?

Not long ago I traveled to Vietnam to speak at an education conference that focused on happiness. I've taken part in countless education events, but this is the only time where the entire focus was on the emotional well-being of children. I'm not saying that some of the speakers at other conferences don't touch on happiness, but it's almost always in service of some adult-defined goal: test scores, behavioral management, kindergarten readiness. We talk about play, of course, but too often it's spoken of as a tool, a trick even, to get kids to achieve some measurable, adult-defined goal.

That said, I have no doubt that the people at every conference I've ever been to, both presenters and participants, love children. We are their champions, after all. We are there when the rest of the world is not. We are there for them on their best days and their worst. We lose sleep over them. We cry for them. We know them not as children, but as fully formed human beings with both rights and responsibilities. When we look into their eyes, we are profoundly moved to uplift and protect them. To paraphrase Alison Gopnick, the principle project of every civilization is to care for the children and that is what we do.

Yesterday, I made myself focus on the news. And I specifically forced myself to attend to the release of some of the FBI files related to a man who is certainly one of history's most vicious monsters. I didn't sleep last night. I saw photos of the world's most powerful men looking into the eyes of children and I can't bear to even consider what was going on in their minds. It is something beyond hatred. Even more sickening is that thousands of powerful men from government, banking, technology, the arts, and academia have either participated or known this was happening, many of them in a position to stop it, and they did nothing. Indeed, they seem to have closed class ranks.

Their excuses and apologies strike me as attempts at yet more psychopathic manipulation. It's impossible to even consider any of these men as human. I know I must, for my own humanity, but right now, I very much wish we would reclassify being a billionaire as evidence of an incurable and dangerous mental illness. I want them locked away and their hoarded billions to be used for the explicit purpose of uplifting and protecting children. And if there was any justice, it would be us, early childhood educators, in charge of its distribution. Imagine the world we could create from the depths of this hell.

I know, of course, that labeling all billionaires as evil is an act of bigotry on my part. Of course there must be some "good" billionaires, although nearly every billionaire of which I'm aware is connected to this monster, most of whom continued to remain in his circle even after he was convicted of crimes against children (then let go with a slap on the wrist). They knew. They all knew. There is nothing more insulting to our intelligence than a titan of industry or politics playing innocent.

I can't help but see this as the ugly fruit of a society that, deep down, hates children. Look how immigration authorities are treating young children, taking them from their parents, stashing them in concentration camps with armed guards as their "caretakers," feeding them garbage food, and mixing baby formula with toxic water. Look at how everything designed to "support" children is chronically underfunded. Look at how we've made our world so unsafe for children that we can't let them alone outdoors to simply play. And even on the personal level, we all know people who casually admit that they won't dine in restaurants that allow children. Try saying that about any other category of human and you'll find yourself ostracized as a bigot.

At least one billionaire, Melinda Gates, the former wife of Bill Gates (a prominent name in the FBI's files), has pledged to spend her billions to support women and children. I hope that's what happens, but the Gates Foundation has, at best, a mixed track-record. The so-called Common Core standardized school curriculum with its focus on testing and competition is a notable example of the sort of casual hatred, or at least disregard, of children that threads throughout our society. Billionaires have a very poor track record in our world. I hope that this becomes an exception that proves the rule, but I'm not holding my breath. My greatest wish is that Melinda Gates reads this post and takes it as a challenge to do better . . . And if you are reading this Melinda, I long ago issued a standing challenge to debate your former husband, anytime, anywhere, on education. In the same spirit, I will sit down with you, anytime, anywhere, to discuss what you could do with your billions to genuinely support children and their families.

I love children. You love children. When I was in Vietnam, a self-described communist nation, I was surrounded by people who love children, so much so that they held a major conference, flying people in from around the world, to discuss what we can do to promote and foster the happiness of children. I have no doubt that Vietnam also has its problems. Indeed, I know they have many, especially when it comes to children. And I'm certainly not declaring myself a communist. But everywhere I went in Hanoi -- hotels, restaurants, and on the streets -- I found myself amidst children being children. It was a notable difference from my experiences in the US.

If we are not focused on the happiness and well-being of children, then what are we? From the depths of despair, I can only hope that this becomes a turning point moment. If we cannot, as a society, learn to love our children, then all is lost. This is a moment to hold our children, to listen to them, and do everything in our power to do right by them. Let's allow them to be happy. I know you're with me.

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If you want to transform your own space into this kind of loose parts learning environment, please join the 2026 cohort for my course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. Group discounts are available. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

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!

Even Our Words Can Be "Loose Parts"

"No climbing to the top!"

When our daughter was in kindergarten, her school installed an amazing rope-and-steel climbing structure. The kindergartners were forbidden from climbing to the very top, which meant that adults were always hovering around the thing, "reminding" the children when they got too high. 

One day, I asked her if she was loving the new climber. She replied, "It's kind of in the way. No one plays on it." When I asked her why, she just shrugged, "It's just not fun."

I recently posted some thoughts on The Theory of Loose Parts. Appropriately, it is an idea that has emerged from the field of architecture about how the best learning environments are those in which we have permission to shape and manipulate our surroundings, and the things found within our surroundings, to suit our needs, ideas and curiosity.

It's a theory that's generally thought of in terms of the physical environment, but no matter how loose the parts, no matter how flexible the space, if the environment does not grant permission to engage freely, then the children, as loose parts theorist Simon Nicholson puts it, will still be cheated.

That's what happened at our daughter's school. The adults, in their concern about safety (or perhaps liability), had sucked the joy out of it. They would have been better off not installing the thing at all. Or installing a shorter one. Or, the way we did it at Woodland Park, not have a climbing structure at all, but rather provide the materials -- scraps of wood, shipping pallets, car tires, ropes -- from which the children could build their own "climbers."

And at our school, that's what the children did. None so high as the one on our daughter's kindergarten playground, of course, but always just the right height for the children creating it. Not only that, these impromptu structures were never in the way because the moment the kids were done with it, the parts were on the move, being put to other uses. 

But this didn't happen just because we provided the parts. It wasn't even just because they were "loose." This kind of self-motivated loose play can only happen when children know they have permission to follow their curiosity.

At our daughter's school, the adults specifically forbade a certain type of exploration, but much of the time we let children know they don't have permission in more subtle ways. 

For instance, if you listen to the things adults are saying to children at play -- "Come here!" "Slow down!" "Be careful!" -- we hear mostly commands. Research finds that 80 percent of the sentences adults speak to young children are commands. And an environment full of commands is not an environment of permission.

We also hear a lot of school-ish questions, "What color is that?" "How many marbles do I have in my hand?" "Do you know what letter that is?" Implied in these types of questions is the idea that the adults know better than the children what to think about. But even more open-ended questions like, "What do you think will happen if you put one more block on your tower?" tend to steer children into adult approved "places" in which the parts are no longer loose. When we ask questions, we compel children to divert from their own course and onto the one we've chosen for them.

There are times for commands and questions, but if our goal is to create the kind of loose parts environments that allow children to learn at full-capacity, then we are well served to consider even our words as loose parts. When we strive to replace our commands and questions with informational statements -- "That color is red," "I have marbles in my hand," "This is the letter R" -- we are offering children information, facts, that they, like with any loose part, can use or not use.

Instead of the command "Get in the car," we might state the fact, "It's time to go" and let them do their own thinking. Instead of the command "Be careful!" we might say, "The ground below you is concrete and it will hurt if you fall on it." Instead of school-ish questions to which we already know the answers we might instead simply speculate aloud, "I wonder why the sky is blue," leaving it there for the children to consider . . . or not. 

Of course, we might also choose to just not say anything at all which is when our "third teacher," the environment, often does her best work.

We will be discussing this and much more in my course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning, a deep dive for educators, parents, and other caregivers who want to transform their classrooms, homes, and playgrounds into the kinds of "third teachers" that give children the permission to engage with the world through their curiosity, to experience the joy of self-motivated learning, and to become critical thinkers. Registration is now open for the 2024 cohort, click here to learn more. I'd love to see you there!

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If you want to transform your own space into this kind of loose parts learning environment, please join the 2026 cohort for my course, Creating a Natural Habitat for Learning. This is a  deep dive into transforming your classroom, home, or playground into the kind of learning environment in which young children thrive; in which novelty and self-motivation stand at the center of learning. In my decades as an early childhood educator, I've found that nothing improves my teaching and the children's learning experience more than a supportive classroom, both indoors and out. This course is for educators, parents, and directors. Group discounts are available. You don't want to miss this chance to make your "third teacher" (the learning environment) the best it can be. I hope you join me! To learn more and register, click here.

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