The Joys of Toys - Or Not?

For two kids who are both boys born into the same family within a span of less than two years, my children could not have more different play styles. My oldest has never really had much use for "traditional" toys, preferring instead to inspect and disassemble an assortment of electronics ranging from DVD/VCR players to Dustbusters and vacuums to keyboards/computers to cameras of all kinds (digital, disposable, and video). In the absence of an electronic, he prefers mostly to loll about on the floor, sucking his thumb and staring into space waiting for Clown Mom to suggest the next exciting and engaging (and preferably art or electronic-related) activity.

My second child needs only a few dozen matchbox cars and some sort of container (lunchbox, Ziploc bag, backpack, even an old coffee can will work in a pinch) with which to carry around said cars EVERYWHERE he goes.

Yet in an effort to stimulate, engage, and educate them, we have two entire bedrooms (and their respective closets) filled with train sets (and a train table to play them on), Little People playsets, Playmobil, Legos, board games, puzzles, oversized cars and trucks for outdoor play, a rocket ship playhouse, and a Little Tykes kitchen. That's not including two complete bookshelves filled with children's books and an entire linen closet devoted to art supplies. We have more educational toys than most school districts, yet "cars" and "wandering aimlessly in search of electronics" are the favorite games in our household.

I was a bit worried, until a friend whose children have similar play habits forwarded me this recent NPR article. The basic premise is that by forcing commercialized and structured play (read: toys and structured activities) on our children, we are compromising something critical to our children's emotional and cognitive development: imaginative play. The argument is that more forced and structured play leads to a decrease in self-regulation and private speech (telling oneself what one is doing) - both critical to healthy development.

I always used to wonder about the parenting skills of my grandmother, God bless her, who had four children in 26 months (a set of twins in the midst). My mother claims that when she was a child, if it wasn't a school day where she was walking both ways uphill in the snow, then she was home and her mom would throw all four children out into the woods to play, allowing them to come in only for meals and then bath and bed. My mother doesn't recall Tonka trucks, a sandbox, a water table, or the Pottery Barn rocket ship playhouse being a part of the outdoor playscape (nor was there a video surveillance camera to fend off child molesters and kidnappers, but it was a different time, I guess). It was simply the four children and what the woods had to offer. That's the way it was, and they liked it (anyone ever seen that Saturday Night Live skit about the Grumpy Old Man - if not, I guess I am older than I think I am!)

In fact, imaginative play has been around for eons - longer than toys, for sure! Back in the day, children made their own toys instead of ignoring the million dollar mini-toy stores their parents dutifully stocked in their bedrooms. And they sat still in school. And there were less behavior problems in school and less crime after school. And probably less kids on medication for ADD.

Now don't get me wrong - I love a great toy as much as the next guy. And no, I can't back up the claims made in the paragraph above because I am too tired to chase down the research and it may not even exist, but it is extrapolated from other research mentioned in the article.

But what this article did for me was make me re-think the way I approach my children's playtime. Maybe they don't have to be engaged in structured activities every second. Maybe left to their own devices on the kitchen floor, they will come up with something even better than the art classes I have to offer - like "Monster", which I caught them playing the other day (chasing each other with outstretched arms and roaring). So my new goal is to chill out a bit and see where a little bit of free time leads them. As long as it isn't into the dangerous, unfenced, unsupervised woods behind my house...at least not until elementary school.