Between my husband and I, he is definitely better at playing with children than I am. I always thought that children were more interesting to spend time with when they are older and more able to focus and pay attention. Becoming a stay at home mom threw me into the deep end and I had to learn how to play with my children. But I didn’t just want to pass time, I wanted playtime to be memorable and educational too. The truth is, creating fun and memorable learning opportunities for my children was not as hard as I thought it would be. In this post, I share with you 5 activities where I didn’t need to pretend to be engaged because I was actually having fun with my kids.
- Experience learning together
I found that my role as a parent is not to teach (or find 101 ways of drumming knowledge into my child) but to prepare an environment that invites and engages my child to learn. Looking back, the most memorable learning moments for me are those I experienced. Creating an experience involves making abstract ideas come to life in concrete forms that can be felt by our senses and emotions. The emotions felt during an experience is not be limited to positive emotions. Important lessons such as empathy, grit and persistence are also learned from negative experiences.
Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.” Benjamin Franklin
For a young toddlers, just being allowed to roam in a room with beautiful things that stimulate their senses is an exhilarating experience for them. Pre-schoolers will find it more interesting to be able to touch the alphabet or base 10 blocks as opposed to being taught with a worksheet. Learning the basic ideas of hot and cold, loud and soft, heavy and light would all be much easier when experienced rather than explained. Older children will benefit from meddling with science experiments, acting out history, replicating their favorite piece of art, visiting museum exhibits, traveling (where the budget permits), going on field trips, putting on a theatrical play, playing an instrument in a recital, volunteering or even working on a suitable internship. It could also be as simple as taking public transport to your destination instead of jumping into your car.
Finally, to complete the learning experience, you can encourage your child to reflect on their experience and cement the concepts learned by writing or drawing your reflections in a journal together. Reflecting on the experience with your child is important as the process of reflection is key to making meaning of the experience. It is through reflection that we are consciously drawn to our observations and made to think about them. It is during this reflection process that both you and your child can decide what knowledge you have gained from the experience and what to do with it.
- Build together
Confession: I am a cardboard hoarder. Our family’s favourite for takeout night is pizza and I never throw away the cardboard box. Between the pizza boxes and the occasional box from online shopping, I have a humble collection of cardboard boxes that become the building blocks for our building projects.
Like the time JJ asked for a carrier for her baby doll or when the kids asked for a Christmas tree. The Christmas tree took us a few hours over 3 Saturdays. These might be simple projects but the children gain an immense sense of achievement from working on these. The plus point is that they learn to consider making something they want at home before buying one from the store.
We are also fans of LEGO. When it comes to building blocks, it doesn’t end at LEGO, it could be Mega Blocks, Magnatiles or even 2D or 3D puzzles. The key thing is these blocks provide endless hours of open-ended play and our children learn to put their ideas into action, communicate and cooperate with others to build a final product.
I remember my father and my then teenage brother spending many Saturdays huddled over a metal box with screwdrivers and such. They were taking apart and re-building a CPU unit. I think those sessions were important in laying the foundation for my brother’s interest in computers which he made into his career today.
- Make together
I have always found it therapeutic to make something with my hands. Unfortunately, craftsmanship is a dying art and with it, so much of our culture and tradition. It might be cooking, baking, woodwork, weaving etc. Making something together is a way of passing down culture and tradition from one generation to another. It could also be a way of learning a new culture or exploring history. Craftsmanship is also a practical skill that requires imagination, concentration and precision.
One of my regrets is not spending much time in the kitchen with my grandmother. I often think of the dishes that I used to have as a child and try to recreate them in my kitchen now. I am not always successful and I wished I had spent time learning to cook those dishes with my grandmother.
Now, I try to involve JJ and DD in the kitchen whenever I can. It can be troublesome because they are still in pre-school (think BIG MESS) but I try not to let that stop me. JJ enjoys cooking breakfast with her dad and considers him her sous chef. DD and JJ also enjoy rolling out dough to make Indian flatbread or cutting out cookies.
Even if they don’t master the craft in the end, you would have created a modern day family heirloom that is beautiful and appreciated for a lifetime.
- Play Board Games together
We were on our honeymoon visiting a family friend when he invited his 5 year old son to join us for board games. We were skeptical initially, wondering if he would be able to grasp the strategy and tactics to play the games but he was remarkable. Since then, I have met countless other families who have regular board game sessions with their children.
Playing board games helps us (adults and children) to develop (just to name a few) critical thinking, decision making, problem solving and communication skills. These are important skills that promote the development of executive function, something our children need to survive as adults.
Not only that, if you pick the right games, the whole family can have hours of fun together. Recently, we bought a board game (Dixit) as a gift for a family friend and they brought it out when we visited. There were 4 adults and 3 children aged 9, 5 and 4 all playing together and it was clear that all of us were having fun. Our favorites for board game night right now are Race to the Treasure by Peaceable Kingdom and Pedzace Zolwie (Racing Turtles) by Egmont.
- Get outside together
The culture we live in today places so much emphasis on academic achievement and brain power that we often neglect the body. In his book, Growing up mindful, Christopher Willard argues that a brain-first culture fosters disconnection from the body and prevents a healthy mind-body integration. When we are out of touch with our bodies, we don’t get the information we need for our brain to function properly.
Going outdoors provides us with a multi-sensory learning experience that exploits the natural connections our body has with the our brain. Each sense stimulates a specific part of our brain, hence the stimulation of multiple senses at the same time actually uses a wider part of our brain. This collaborative effect of the senses creates stronger memories, thereby enhancing our learning experience. In short, going outdoors helps to restore that mind-body disconnect that Willard spoke about.
“First, the education of the senses, then the education of the intellect.” Maria Montessori
I know of a family who goes on biking holidays. They would travel from one town to another in the countryside by bike. Of course their travel plans don’t always go smoothly and through their adventures, they learnt how to communicate better with one another as a family unit. If you’re not willing to go all out trail biking or hiking just yet, why not start by taking a stroll in a local park. The museum, art gallery, animal farm, fruit orchard are all great places to start your outdoor adventures. Or it could be as simple as taking public transport to your destination instead of jumping into your car.
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