One giant playdate

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This article was published 14/02/2023 (937 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

School desks became scaffolding for blanket forts and a hallway was transformed into a hockey rink when hundreds of learners at École Dieppe participated in a building-wide playdate on Tuesday.

Principal Bronwen Davies welcomed the chaos — in fact, she invited it by requesting families send their children to school with toys and games for a local celebration of Global School Play Day on Feb. 14.

“There were two years where everyone was at their own tables and you got your little Ziplock bag of toys that only you were allowed to play with, so this is so nice to see,” said Davies, who oversees the education of about 400 K-4 students who attend the Charleswood school.

Concerned that adults and technology were both “encroaching on playtime,” a group of California teachers created Global School Play Day in February 2015.

The now-annual event was inspired by U.S. psychologist Peter Gray and his research on the dramatic decline of children self-directing their own entertainment over the last half-century. Gray’s work highlights a steady rise in student mental health concerns, and the benefits of unstructured play for healthy social and emotional development.

To date, more than 1.5 million students from 75 countries have participated in the movement that promotes and celebrates free play.

Grade 4 student Kyllie Hipolito is among them, and part-way through her first international day of play at École Dieppe, she said no student should be spared from the experience.

“Sometimes, students can be stressed and they need a break,” said Kyllie, 9.

“You can learn by also having fun and you can also learn by your mistakes,” she added, during a brief interview before rejoining a group of peers who were playing with a toy dentistry kit equipped with a replica set of teeth, various tools and a retainer case.

Teachers took on facilitator roles Tuesday and refrained from guiding activities, instead they encouraged children to explore new games and meet new friends. While learners spent the morning doing free play in their respective classrooms, they had the opportunity to visit any room of their choice in the afternoon.

“There’s so many screens and so much structured play, organized sports, organized classes, which are amazing, but kids are losing unstructured time where they can experiment and try things out,” said teacher Serenity Sul.

Given there are no devices involved, the educator said learners are forced to grapple with boredom and discover creative ways to address it.

Sul added dedicating an entire day to free play allows students to apply the skills they often learn about in school via structured lessons — including collaboration, critical thinking and creativity — to real-world scenarios.

“Amazing,” “fun,” “and “fantastic” were the most popular adjectives students of all levels used to describe the activities they participated throughout the event. Many of them were eager to talk about how exciting it was to bring their favourite stuffed animals and board games to school.

The only rule was that toys were not allowed to require batteries or electricity.

J.D. Bello hauled Pokemon cards, Uno, Guess Who and a Squishmallow, a popular plush toy, to school. The Grade 3 student said he could hardly sleep leading up to the free play day.

“I just love today… I want the world to know, ‘come to this school, it’s the best,’” he declared.

While the University of Winnipeg’s director of developmental studies acknowledged there have been societal concerns surrounding lost class time due to COVID-19, Sheri-Lynn Skwarchuk said unstructured play is incredibly important for young students.

“There’s actually a lot of learning going on when children play,” the education professor said.

Free play encourages students to problem-solve, strategize, co-operate, make decisions, learn to share and figure out what they are interested in, she said.

Skwarchuk noted board and card games — such as Monopoly, which requires users to count and read — help students practise a range of numeracy and literacy skills.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @macintoshmaggie