Dr. Brown offered a wonderful definition: “Play is an ancient, voluntary, inherently pleasurable, apparently purposeless activity or process that is undertaken for its own sake and that strengthens our muscles and our social skills, fertilizes brain activity, tempers and deepens our emotions, takes us out of time, and enables a state of balance and poise.”7 He goes on to emphasize the importance of play being voluntary, suggesting that when an activity becomes compulsive—or an addiction—it can no longer be play because you are no longer really choosing it. “When play ceases to be voluntary, it ceases to be play.”
A Brief Tour of Play Theory
In the early 1900s, play theorists proposed the idea that children build up an excess of energy and that active play is required to work off that surplus. And although play theory has come to recognize a far greater complexity, this understanding is still very commonly held, especially in schools. Initially suggested by Friedrich von Schiller in the 18th century and expanded on by the psychologist Herbert Spencer in 1873, the idea is that our evolution from hunter‐gatherers has left us with excess energy that makes prolonged sitting a challenge.
For children's play, at least, Anthony Pellegrini and John Evans refuted this understanding in a 1997 article entitled “Surplus Energy Theory: An Enduring but Inadequate Justification for school Break‐Time.”8 Evans and Pellegrini note that the argument is physiologically unsound and points to children's willingness to play beyond exhaustion—after their “surplus energy” is spent—as well as children's willingness to opt to stay inside when given the choice of quiet sedentary activities—hinting toward a lack of “surplus energy”—as evidence. Further, as I have frequently witnessed in schools prior to Playworks programming, it is not uncommon for only a few children to engage in “moderate to vigorous” physical activity during free play. Clearly not all kids are bursting to release some energy.
Pellegrini and Evans argue that the root of children's restlessness in class after extended periods of sitting reflects not the surplus energy theory but the novelty theory. The novelty theory suggests that students become bored with the activities they are engaged with and become inattentive in anticipation of doing something different, such as getting to go outside. Playing represents the opportunity to do something new—something potentially self‐defined, active, and spontaneous. Pellegrini and Evans conclude the article with an emphatic endorsement of the importance of play, arguing that it is essential that we see play as more than just a break from work to prepare for more work. What is lost in reducing play to simply a way of releasing energy is the understanding of play as an opportunity for children to use their creativity while developing their imagination, dexterity, and physical, cognitive, and emotional strength.
Perhaps the biggest developments in play theory happened in the 1960s, when Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget looked at the connection between children's play and their stages of development, bucketing play into four different types: functional, constructive, symbolic/fantasy, and games with rules.9 Piaget and his followers were somewhat dismissive of the final category, games with rules because of their reliance on someone to be an arbitrator of the rules (often a grown‐up), and symbolic/fantasy play was held up as its highest form. Because every area of study needs conflict and drama, there was, and continues to be, debate about this. The aforementioned play theorist Brian Sutton‐Smith offered a critique of Piaget's theory and later wrote a book called The Ambiguity of Play, looking not only at the definition of play, but also at the “rhetoric” of play—essentially the ideologies that have been used to prioritize some forms of play over others.10
Time‐Out: Structured Versus Unstructured Play
The debate about the value of play—and more specifically the difference between play with rules and other forms of play—continues to this day, largely characterized as structured versus free play. Over the years, Playworks has been criticized for what was perceived as our emphasis on structured play. Although the free‐play folks haven't always been huge fans of Playworks, we generally feel quite warmly about free play. Peter Gray is a psychologist and professor at Boston College who has written extensively on the importance of “freedom to learn,” basically the idea that kids come into the world curious to learn and that this instinct drives them to play.11 The job of grown‐ups, in this framing, is to create environments that support children's innate curiosity and, as much as possible, to stay out of the way.
Professor Gray was originally introduced to Playworks by a reporter who was writing about our approach and looking for someone to offer a more critical, and ideally negative, analysis. When Playworks was described as a program that brought in recess coaches to coordinate student play at the break time, Peter was initially willing. It sounded, given the way that the reporter described it, like the ultimate infringement on students having choice and voice during the time in the school day that is often the last bastion of student control. When he actually learned more about our work with a visit to see our program in action at a school in Boston, however, it dramatically changed his understanding.
My view of Playworks was shaped by two observations. First, is the horrible observation that the recess length was only 15 minutes. This is a crime. It is not enough time for children to play. Given that, it seemed beneficial to have a young adult help get something started. I noticed that there was no requirement to participate and that the young Playworks person did a good job of stepping out and letting the kids take control once the game was started. I also learned from a friend (who was a math consultant visiting many schools in Boston) that the Playworks facilitator was typically the most popular person at school and was bringing a more playful attitude to everyone.
Watching Playworks coaches connect with students by creating a structure for play that the students could successfully navigate and ultimately control, emphasizing student volition, and ultimately protecting the time against school concerns about issues of safety, Peter came to see our work—although not his first choice—as nonetheless a necessary defense of play in schools.
UC Santa Cruz sociologist Rebecca London has spent much of the past 10 years studying recess, with a particular focus on Playworks. In her book, Rethinking Recess: Creating Safe and Inclusive Playtime for All Children in School, she offers that Playworks’ approach falls outside this debate by providing an alternative: organized play.
Recess, like any other time of the school day, requires some planning. My research findings demonstrate that schools can create a positive recess environment through planning and organization that is neither structured nor unstructured and that supports both physical activity and social and emotional growth. It is not a simple one‐size‐fits‐all approach, but rather a customized approach to recess planning and organization that requires firsthand knowledge of the school context and the students’ needs—information that all school administrators already have. Given the potential benefits and drawbacks of both structured and unstructured recess approaches, and the multiple ways that schools can support students to develop, this hybrid approach of organized recess makes the most sense and has been proven to be effective. 12
Play Science
Most mammals begin life—and their exploration of the world—through play. Stuart Brown looks closely at the connection between animal behavior and play in his work, with a particular focus on the detrimental impact of play deprivation. Brown compares the science of play to the science of sleep and argues compellingly that its implications for neuroscience
