Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life
von Peter O. Gray
In vigorous outdoor play, children deliberately dose themselves with moderate amounts of fear—as they swing, slide, or twirl on playground equipment, climb on monkey bars or trees, or skateboard down banisters—and they thereby learn how to control not only their bodies, but also their fear. In social play children learn how to negotiate with others, how to please others, and how to modulate and overcome the anger that can arise from conflicts. Free play is also nature’s means of helping children discover what they love. In their play children try out many activities and discover where their talents and predilections lie. None of these lessons can be taught through verbal means; they can be learned only through experience, which free play provides. The predominant emotions of play are interest and joy. Research studies have shown repeatedly that adults who have a great deal of freedom as to how and when to do their work commonly experience that work as play, even—in fact, especially—when the work is difficult. In contrast, people who must follow others’ directions, with little creative input of their own, rarely experience their work as play.15 Moreover, dozens of research studies have shown that when people choose to perform some task, they perform it more fully and effectively than when they feel compelled by others to perform it.16 When compelled, they tend to do the minimum necessary to meet the requirements.
(1) play is self-chosen and self-directed; (2) play is activity in which means are more valued than ends; (3) play has structure or rules that are not dictated by physical necessity but emanate from the minds of the players; (4) play is imaginative, nonliteral, mentally removed in some way from “real” or “serious” life; and (5) play involves an active, alert, but non-stressed frame of mind.13
Just as younger children are inspired to engage in the advanced activities they see among older children, the older ones are inspired to engage in the creative and imaginative activities they see among younger ones. In our formal study at Sudbury Valley, we found that teenagers initiated a bit more than half of the interactions between teenagers and younger children,
Skinnerian psychology, works rather nicely for explaining how to get people (and rats) to do things they don’t want to do, but falls apart entirely as soon as we turn our attention to play. Since play, to some degree, infuses most of what we humans do, Skinnerian psychology and modern economic theory have limited utility for understanding human behavior.
The route to getting our kids outdoors is not to throw away the computer or the television set, no more than it is to throw away the books we have in our homes. These are all great sources of learning and enjoyment. Rather, the route is to make sure kids have real opportunities to play freely outdoors, with other kids, without interference from adults.
Children are designed, by nature, to play and explore on their own, independently of adults. They need freedom in order to develop; without it they suffer. The drive to play freely is a basic, biological drive. Lack of free play may not kill the physical body, as would lack of food, air, or water, but it kills the spirit and stunts mental growth.
"In vigorous outdoor play, children deliberately dose themselves with moderate amounts of fear—as they swing, slide, or twirl on playground equipment, climb on monkey bars or trees, or skateboard down banisters—and they thereby learn how to control not only their bodies, but also their fear. In social play children learn how to negotiate with others, how to please others, and how to modulate and overcome the anger that can arise from conflicts. Free play is also nature’s means of helping children discover what they love. In their play children try out many activities and discover where their talents and predilections lie. None of these lessons can be taught through verbal means; they can be learned only through experience, which free play provides. The predominant emotions of play are interest and joy."
"Research studies have shown repeatedly that adults who have a great deal of freedom as to how and when to do their work commonly experience that work as play, even—in fact, especially—when the work is difficult. In contrast, people who must follow others’ directions, with little creative input of their own, rarely experience their work as play.15 Moreover, dozens of research studies have shown that when people choose to perform some task, they perform it more fully and effectively than when they feel compelled by others to perform it.16 When compelled, they tend to do the minimum necessary to meet the requirements."
"Parents are now expected to be teachers’ aides. They’re supposed to keep track of all the homework and special projects assigned to their kids and to coax, nag, or bribe them to complete those assignments. When kids blow off their homework or perform poorly on it, parents are often made to feel guilty, as if they had failed. Parents no longer dare to schedule family vacations that will keep their child out of school for even a day or two, or allow their child to miss school for activities at home that might, in truth, produce more useful learning than what would have occurred during that time in school."
"There is reason to believe that this kind of inhibitory effect of teaching on curiosity occurs in schools all the time. A teacher shows students one way to solve an arithmetic problem, for example, and the students conclude that it must be the only way. They don’t explore alternative ways to solve the problem (even if they are allowed to, which they often are not), and they therefore fail to learn all the dimensions of the problem or the full power of arithmetic operations. Ultimately they are deprived of the joy of discovery in the realm of numbers and learn not to go beyond what was taught."
"In our culture today, parents and other adults overprotect children from possible dangers in play. We seriously underestimate children’s ability to take care of themselves and make good judgments. In this respect, we differ not just from hunter-gatherer cultures (as described in Chapter 2), but from all traditional cultures in which children played freely. Our underestimation becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy—by depriving children of freedom, we deprive them of the opportunities they need to learn how to take control of their own behavior and emotions."
"We are pushing the limits of children’s adaptability. We have pushed children into an abnormal environment, where they are expected to spend ever greater portions of their day under adult direction, sitting at desks, listening to and reading about things that don’t interest them, and answering questions that are not their own and are not, to them, real questions. We leave them ever less time and freedom to play, explore, and pursue their own interests."
"During the eighteenth century, the German feudal system, in which each lord controlled the peasants who were tied to his land, was breaking down. The peasants were becoming increasingly difficult to control, uprisings were common, and talk of revolution filled the air. German educational leaders promoted compulsory state-run schooling primarily as a means to turn the peasants into loyal, well-behaved German citizens."
- →Going beyond Groos, I would add that children are naturally motivated to play not just at the skills that are most prominent and valued among adults around them, but also, even more intensely, at new skills that lie at the culture’s cutting edge. Because of this, children typically learn to use new technology faster than do their parents.
- →Younger children don’t blindly mimic older ones. Rather, they watch, think about what they see, and incorporate what they learn into their own behavior in ways that make sense to them. Because of this, even the mistakes and unhealthy activities of older children can provide positive lessons for younger ones.
- →By the time they are eleven or twelve years old, most are realistically cynical about the idea that school is fundamentally a place for learning. They realize that much of what they are required to do is senseless and that they will forget most of what they are tested on shortly after the test.
- →Teachers often say that if you cheat in school you are only cheating yourself, because you are shortchanging your own education. But that argument holds water only if what you would have learned by not cheating outweighs the value of whatever you did with the time saved by cheating.
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