[Open-Ended Play Series, Part 6] I love play silks!!! They are right up there with blocks and, to date, have not resulted in bruises or bloodshed… So maybe that alone, would place them above blocks. And actually now that we’ve owned ours for several years and are getting a bit further into our homeschool journey, I’m […]
Power of Play
Block Play: Building a Child’s Mind
What are you able to build with your blocks? Castles and palaces, temples and docks. Rain may keep raining, and others go roam, But I can be happy building at home. Let the sofa be mountains, the carpet be sea, There I’ll establish a city for me… …Now I have done with it, down let […]
Open-Ended Play: Keep It Simple
[Open-Ended Play Series, Part 4] PART 1 PART 2 PART 3 Wooden stick horses and hockey sticks (aka Revolutionary War musket) see endless hours of play here at our home… And finally, we wrap up how we can help facilitate and protect free-play: 1. protect free-time 2. don’t micro-manage 3. keep it simple In our […]
Micro-Managing No More
[Open-Ended Play Series, Part 3] PART 1 PART 2 {This is not an ordinary basket, but a space suit helmet, aiding Xander in his pursuit of outer space travel.} As I mentioned earlier, protecting free-time is an important aspect in encouraging open-ended play. Another way we can facilitate and protect this kind of play is […]
Sounds Easy Enough…
[Open-Ended Play Series-Part 2] Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 {My little ‘minute men’ spontaneously re-enacting in anticipation Independence Day while I made dinner!} So, just letting our children play and explore the world around us sounds easy enough, right?!?!? Although it sounds simple, our culture of consumerism, hectic schedules and competition all compete to […]
The Power of Play
“You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.” ~ Plato There is something magical about 3 year old imaginations… They are alive, fresh and new! I remember clearly delighting in each of my children’s imaginations during this year and Treyton is no different. We are […]