The award for best line ever in a medical report: “Play is not frivolous.”
It’s not new, the idea that free play helps children develop in remarkable ways. Multiple studies have found that play builds social skills and creativity and develops the ability to solve problems and to collaborate.
What is new is that a clinical report published in August by the American Academy of Pediatrics specifically calls on pediatricians and family doctors to start taking play, well, seriously – in fact to prescribe it for their small patients.
Play “is an activity that is intrinsically motivated, entails active engagement, and results in joyful discovery. Play is voluntary and often has no extrinsic goals; it is fun and often spontaneous,” the pediatrics report says, before veering back into reminders that it helps prepare children for kindergarten.
To read more of Karin Klein's article, visit: https://www.sacbee.com/opinion...g&_hsmi=65755187
Comments (0)