The Magic Circle of Play

"You have to go around that tree."

The boy was telling a friend how to run the obstacle course he and the other kids had created. After running around the tree, there were some stairs to climb, a clamber through the sand pit row boat, a scamper up and a slide down the concrete slide, a stop in the garden to pick a ripe berry ("or something else to eat"), a jump off of something, a balance across something else, and so on until you arrived back at the starting point. 

It was even more elaborate than my explanation and the boy being instructed listened with an intensity, asking for clarifications, obviously wanting to get it right. Then he was off as the others cheered him on. "You forgot to ring the bell!" "It's okay, I couldn't find any berries either!" "Hurry!"

He was flushed and panting by the time he'd completed the circuit. Now it was time for someone else: "Go!"

As the next child rounded the tree, the others cheered. The boy who had just joined the game, likewise joined in the cheering, naturally, because that too was part of the game, an unspoken, but nevertheless vital rule of this game of obstacle course running.

This was a game that emerged entirely from the children themselves. It was not urged upon them by an adult, although the physical space of our playground may have suggested it to them. Indeed, it was clearly a game that emerged from these children's interaction with our junkyard-like outdoor space. They had been coming here for some time. Ethologists tend to distinguish between "exploration" and "play," although I've always considered the two behaviors part-and-parcel because one so often leads to the other. Exploration is the evolutionarily functional process of answering the question of "What is this?" while play asks the open-ended question, "What can I/we do with this?" On this day, the thing they found to do, their play, was this game of taking turns running a course.

In his 1938 book Homo Ludens, Dutch historian and cultural theorist Johan Huizinga theorized that play is the primary and necessary condition for the creation of culture. He argued that while play is a self-selected activity, one that is entered into via an exercise of free-will, the space in which it takes place (in this case, our playground) becomes circumscribed by a "magic circle." Inside this circle, there are rules that exist by agreement of the players as long as the game continues. Those who violate those rules and refuse to mend their ways, are either expelled from the game or, if they persist, the game comes to an end. Everything that is outside this magic circle becomes irrelevant for the time.

There were no rule breakers in this game on this day, but had there been, had there been a conflict over the rules of this game, for instance, I might have felt compelled to step inside the circle which would have, in an instant, destroyed the magic. If the conflict turned violent, I would have had no choice but to intervene, but short of that, I try to allow conflict to play itself out. Often, beautifully, it results in some sort of compromise. Sometimes it leads to the formation of a second magic circle in which the rules are completely different. And sometimes it leads to, as Huizinga suggests, the exclusion of someone from the game.

This is the hard one for early childhood educators because, in the backs of our minds is the idea that no one be excluded. "You can't say you can't play." But what of the player who, say, refuses to start by going around the tree? What of the player who decides to spontaneously add tackling to the game? Certainly, they can suggest these changes, discuss them, negotiate, but if the rest of the kids are against it, it would be grossly unfair of me, the adult, to insist that the newcomer and their unilateral changes be included within the magic circle. In fact, to do so would, again, destroy the magic. I can suggest to the child who has been excluded that they create their own game, to attempt to circumscribe a new magic circle with it's own rules, but if the goal is to be part of the culture that has sprung up around the obstacle course game, then the only choice is to abide by those rules.

I like this idea that play is the source of culture, but it does require adults who see and understand the magic circle, who are able to treasure it from the outside, because like a soap bubble, the act of crossing the barrier usually makes it disappear. We can't, of course, always stay on the outside. And sometimes, on the best days, we're invited in.

"Teacher Tom, do you want to try it?"

As I ran around the tree, I heard the children cheering, but I knew it wasn't for me. It was for all of us. That's the magic conjured inside these circles -- the magic of us.

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