Genius of Play , livre ebook

Hawthorn Press - Sally Jenkinson

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137 pages

English

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Children move like quick fire from the fantastic to the everyday, when free to express the genius of play. The Genius of Play addresses what play is, why it matters, and how modern life endangers children''s play. Here is an outspoken Children''s Play Charter for parents and teachers, which celebrates the playful spirit of childhood.

Sujets

Sociologie, société et politique

Informations

Publié par	Hawthorn Press
Date de parution	01 janvier 0001
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781907359675
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0416€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

The Genius of Play
Celebrating the Spirit of Childhood
Sally Jenkinson
The Genius of Play © Copyright 2001 Sally Jenkinson
Sally Jenkinson is hereby identified as author of this work in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act, 1988. She asserts and gives notice of her moral right under this Act.
Published by Hawthorn Press, Hawthorn House, 1 Lansdown Lane, Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 1BJ, UK Tel: (01453) 757040 Fax: (01453) 751138 info@hawthornpress.com www.hawthornpress.com
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means (electronic or mechanical, through reprography, digital transmission, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Cover photograph by Charlie Bryan and Lucy Craven Cover design by Hawthorn Press Typesetting by Hawthorn Press, Stroud, Glos. Reprinted 2004, 2008, 2010, 2012 Printed in 2015 by Melita Press, Malta.
Grateful acknowledgment to: The Kunst historisches Museum, Vienna, Austria, for ‘Kinderspiele’ by Pieter Breugel. The Open University Press for colour photograph of boys playing with wood. Harper’s Weekly 11 Oct 1873, Massachusetts Historical Society for ‘Shipbuilding, Gloucester Harbour’ by Winslow Homer. The Winterthur Library: Printed Book and Periodical Collection for the drawing from ‘Children’s Delight: Bright Stories for Boys and Girls’, Boston, 1889. Emma Aylett for her photographs of the Steiner Waldorf Kindergarten, North London.
Every effort has been made to trace the ownership of all copyrighted material. If any omission has been made, please bring this to the publisher’s attention so that proper acknowledgment may be given in future editions.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data applied for
ISBN 978-1-903458-04-4 eISBN 978-1-907359-67-5
genius : attendant, tutelary spirit etc.
Oxford English Dictionary
Article 31 of The Convention on the Rights of the Child (adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations, November 20, 1989). states:
1.
Parties recognise the right of the child to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and the arts.
2.
Parties shall respect and promote the right of the child to participate fully in cultural and artistic life and shall encourage the provision of appropriate and equal opportunities for cultural, artistic, recreational and leisure activity.
The Genius of Play is a well-researched book that makes a valuable contribution to the worldwide debate about childhood. Play lies at the heart of childhood and this book deepens our understanding and appreciation of the crucial benefits of play. Herein lie the roots of our capacity to act socially, exercise our imaginations, develop emotional literacy and face new intellectual challenges. The author also shows how play deprivation, from which many of our children suffer now, is a threat to our well being. For all those who are seriously concerned about our children this is essential reading.
Christopher Clouder, Alliance for Childhood
Sally has a genius for perceiving the essence of childhood. Her examples of children at play are charming but also profound, for they show us the depths of play and the tremendous significance of play in human life. She balances anecdotes with the insights of major educators, psychologists and child advocates revealing a rich world of literature and organizations devoted to the importance of children’s play. In a time when childhood is endangered and play is a dying art this book serves children well and offers much help to adults struggling to understand the power of play.
Joan Almon
This is a book which many who work with play will find useful and challenging. Sally Jenkinson forays into play ‘times past’ and in so doing raises concerns about play ‘times present’. The recollections of play provide an important historical lens through which to reflect upon opportunities and accomplishments of children’s play today. Sally’s deep commitment to the integrity of play will also provide fuel to the debate about 21st century ‘technologically prescribed’ play as an inhibitor of children’s freedom to construct the world for themselves.
The Genius of Play encourages educators to attend to children’s intentions as they watch them play, to try to understand what it is that children are working out. It encourages us to allow the spirit of play to come through in the way we provide space (in all its dimensions) for children to play with freedom.
This is an important addition to the growing collection of books which address the theme of play today. Sally Jenkinson encourages us to attend to play in the whole of children’s lives, as well as in their early preschool and school experiences. It deserves to be widely read and will generate lively debate amongst early childhood educators.
Dr. Cathy Nutbrown The University of Sheffield, School of Education
Contents List of Illustrations Foreword by Mary Jane Drummond Introduction 1. Beginnings 2. Let’s Play: The Social Value of Play 3. Teaching the Heart: The Emotional Value of Play 4. The Truth of the Imagination 5. Play, Language, and the Arts 6. Whence the Playful Spirit of Childhood? 7. A Toy Story 8. Charter for Children’s Play 9. Children Need People Who Will Sanction Play Footnotes Bibliography Appendix 1: IPA Declaration of the Child’s Right to Play Appendix 2: Television as a Public Health Issue Appendix 3: Television Statistics Appendix 4: Break Free of TV Appendix 5: Resources and Contacts
List of Illustrations
‘Kinderspiele’ (Childrens’ Games), Pieter Breugel, 1560
Hyderabad, India
Feeding time
Trains
Boats
Planes
Sand
Sand
Low structure materials
Low structure materials
Rough and tumble
Outside play
House cleaning
Thanks
Thanks to the three children of the past, Lesley Gray, John Arnold and Brian Agg, who will recognise themselves in the following chapters, and to all the other children whose words, deeds and images live between the covers of this book.
Thanks to all my colleagues and friends and to my husband Angus and my three children, Derwin, Hamish and Emily.
Foreword
by Mary Jane Drummond
What kind of a book is this? An invitation to remember one’s own childhood and play; a scholarly and multi-disciplinary review of relevant research; a powerful argument for the significance of play in human development; a treasury of attentive observations of children’s play, past and present; a passport to the realm of the subjunctive, where might and could, perhaps and ‘what if?’ take precedence over the present indicative; a survival guide for the adult who is committed to the cause of childhood; a set of unforgettable snapshots of children’s lives – The Genius of Play takes all these parts, and more, many more.
Sally Jenkinson makes an early move in establishing the grand theme of the book; in her opening pages she introduces the reader to the metaphor of journey as a way of understanding what it is that children do, in their passage through time, from the here-and-now immediacy of their play with dens, dolls and dressing up clothes, on the way to their undefined and unpredictable futures. But it is not a simple route map that she offers; this book is in no sense a set of directions for swiftly moving from A to B, from young to old, from little to big, from incapable to competent, from illiterate to literate, from child to adult. There are multiple pathways through the world of children’s play: the chapter headings indicate some of the important milestones that readers will pass as they trace the footsteps of the child, of all children, who are uncomplicatedly committed to their journey, without knowing in the least where it will lead them. It is Sally Jenkinson’s particular talent that she never loses sight of the complexities of play; she trounces the benevolent educator’s attempt to kidnap the spontaneity of play for a pre-specified learning objective, and spurns the triviality of what she categories as ‘wrap-around play,’ a contemptuous phrase for the kind of play that is shaped and defined by official directives.
From a mainstream educator’s perspective, this book is a most welcome and long overdue antidote to the many recent publications that attempt to justify the place of children’s play in educational settings in terms of early academic success. Sally Jenkinson presents a multi-dimensional rationale: she delineates the moral purposes of play, invoking the child’s ‘moral imagination’, another telling phrase. She demonstrates both the emotional and social value of play, the child’s work in the domains of empathy and solidarity; she documents the creativity and aesthetic of play. She generously illustrates the interpenetration of play and spoken language, in all its forms; she gives proper prominence to children as symbolists and surrealists, using the materials of the workaday world to represent the extraordinary conceptions of their imagination.
The expert witnesses she summons to defend her case are as multivarious as her arguments; her educational authorities include Erich Fromm, Kieran Egan, Margaret Lowenfeld, Tina Bruce, Janusz Korczak, Bruno Bettelheim, Vivien Gussin Paley, Iona and Peter Opie. But there are other more divergent voices willing to testify in the cause of children’s play, and Sally Jenkinson skilfully weaves their thoughts into her text, to sustain and enrich her advocacy; the reader will meet George Eliot, John Keats, Einstein, Coleridge, R. L. Stevenson and Rainer Maria Rilke.
This multiplicity of authority, reference point and argument is reflected in the illustrative examples of children’s play that stud the pages of this book, like cloves in a sweet-smelling orange. Very few hundred words go by without a vivid glimpse of a real child, doing real play, from the reckless charioteer, steer