• Create a piece of writing that shares your thoughts or feeling about the importance of play as outlined by Dr. Peter Gray. 

Did you know that 5-8x of children have depression now compared to the children in the 1950s? As we all know, the 1950s was a terrible time to be alive because of the economic depression and terrible post-war effects from World War 2. If children now are 5-8x more unhappy than the kids in those times, there must be something absolutely wrong happening in the 20th century. With stress levels rising in children and teenagers, I believe the main cause of this is due to the fact that there is little to no play incorporated into classrooms or everyday life. Play develops problem solving skills, empathy, creativity, and so much more. 

Schools and parents making education the major focus in their lives early on is a big contributing factor to these negative behaviors. Constant pressure from parents and teachers creates the strive for perfection in most students. With these parents already wanting to set their kids up for “success,” they neglect play. When kids don’t get the time to play, they can’t develop problem solving skills, and most of these kids are ultimately set up for anxiety and depression due to the lack of control that they have. It is also scientifically proven that stricter parents create sneaky and more stressed kids. Since play has become so neglected, so have the playgrounds in local parks. Kids don’t go outside as much as they used to because there is nobody to play with anymore.

Play is so beneficial and essential for developing children. If play was not incorporated in a child’s everyday life, they would lack so many skills that are needed to succeed in life. Kids wouldn’t know what it would be like to take risks and to figure out what steps to take in order to solve a problem. Their creativity levels would sink, which in turn would create a boring and lackluster future. Kids would most importantly, not know how to work with others, if they didn’t before on the playground. With this, empathy would not be practiced, and consequently, narcissism would be more prevalent in the youth. Play has so many more benefits than consequences.