21/05/2020

To Play is the Thing

We’ve grown into our home school approach over the last few weeks. Like wearing a pair of shoes that we didn’t choose, they’ve now worn in and we’ve found a way to walk in them. 

And do you know what? We’ve realised that in the home we’re not the sticklers for routine and formal schooling we thought we might be as we’ve had the light bulb moment that any opportunity to lighten the mood is to be grabbed with both hands.  It started with the silly voices. Channelling a teacher we’ve never been in our own classrooms, we started to address our children with their full names using the diction of a BBC newsreader in 1940. We’ve role-played chefs having melt-downs whilst cooking fish fingers and our children thought the barber that visited our house (who used the same clippers as the dog groomer who had visited half an hour earlier) was quite a character. 

The kids have delighted in the boxes arriving to the house. There was extreme excitement at the appearance of a new washer dryer for the vessel alone. There are permanent dens to be made and tunnels to be excavated. One of our children goes to a box regularly to ‘read and think’. We are a bit jealous as right now, more than ever, we get the need to escape. 

The silver lining of us having a permanently messy house is that role-play is known to play an important part in improving language and listening skills. Pretend play can help promote problem solving and creative thinking. The power of ‘playing it out’ in someone else’s shoes feels like you can be brave when taking risks and try out scenarios that seem otherwise impossible. Selling tickets for a circus show when you are also the main act? Not a problem! Taking charge as a farmer of some unruly animals? Completely doable. Performing magic tricks to a grand theatre? The gig is ours. Likewise to playing our instruments in a grand stadium and flying to the moon daily - albeit it on our bellies in a cardboard box - so that we can have our lunch with fellow astronauts. We’ll take all these achievements right now and whilst we might all be suffering with a bit of ‘imposter syndrome’ of late with becoming home educators overnight, this is one form of pretence we can fully support. 

Posted in: Home Learning