Play and interaction in early development are well-documented in studies of humans and other mammals.

Play is fascinating because it includes role-play, risk-taking, competition and combat. The importance of play is that it prepares us for adversity and builds resilience, social skills, physical coordination, as well as complex responses, involving rules and strategies.

Play is like a rehearsal for life and we spend much of our time engaged in activities that are playful without realising it. Engaging in social media is a form of play. Cultural activities from diplomacy to piano practice are also forms of play, requiring well-planned and executed sequences. When are we not playing?

The diversity of play

At school, there’s spontaneous play, such as chasing games, racing games and imaginative play. There’s also children’s clapping games. These are a global phenomenon and show emotional contagion in action in a school playground. Clapping and chanting patterns rippling out from one corner inspire other children to add the sounds of their own clapping games. The power of the precision of play is translated into sound like joyful semaphore.

Children have their own preferred style of play. Some are more comfortable playing in isolation, others as a pair, whereas others like playing as part of a bigger group. The fascinating part of this is that rhythm works differently in each context. Free-flowing unstructured rhythm swirls through solo play. Interaction might take place inside the play - for example creating scenarios involving characters, but this happens at the child’s own pace. Playing as a pair requires delicate rhythmic alignment from the duo. Interaction in a well-matched pair might flow well or if less successful, falter or fail. The frustration and fallout can be intense.

In groups, the shared rhythm is established by the most dominant personalities in the group and they set the pace. If the pace fits, they attract others into their group. There is a ‘goldilocks zone’ - not too fast and not too slow. The pace must be sustained and consistent as well, and hold space for swift exchanges of banter, ideas, put-downs and most importantly, laughter. Laughter signals playfulness and the potential for play. Keeping-up is what gives this form of play a competitive edge.

Rhythm in Play: Balls, songs and games

Walk into any park on any weekend, and watch an adult and child playing with a ball. There’s real tension. It’s not just about play, but also about the development of skill. A young child’s hand-eye coordination and foot coordination signal how they will fare in the competitive games that humans play. If we zoom in closer, it’s really not so much about coordination as rhythm.

A slower delivery of the ball, a gentle pat towards the child and all is well. It’s returned. A faster-paced ball is often missed. For most children, the skill builds over time and they are able to return faster-paced balls with practice. Some children's defensive response to an approaching ball never fades. They continue to flinch and pull back, even after they've learned, over and over, that it's safe. The same pattern shows up wherever a game asks a child to keep time with others: a singing game, a board game, simply keeping pace with playmates who are running across a field.

There’s natural diversity in the rhythm of play, the rhythm of interaction and the way we experience the playfulness of one another.

The same sensitivity in play and in reading

Many definitions of play exist. As an affective state that we humans share with other mammals, PLAY was defined by Panksepp (1998) as one of seven complex emotional systems, one that children and young mammals engage in to learn. Play is essential for developing physical control and strength, as well as rehearsing certain sequences of movement that are important for attacking prey and defending themselves from an attack. These types of playful physical activities include wrestling, chasing and also running for sheer joy.

We know that intensity of emotion, when combined with repetition leads to learning (in positive and negative situations). Play involves repetition and is one of the most powerful forms of learning in childhood. How often do we hear children insisting that it’s their turn, when they are playing? The repetition of play is compulsive and the positive emotions, eliciting laughter and smiles reinforce the friendliness and the fun, as well as the learning. These social and emotional signals change when frustration enters play. The situation can even be perceived as threatening, if play becomes aggressive.

Play tends to fall apart, and begin again many times over. The social skills needed to sustain play are learned through practice. In the school holidays as children spend more time playing, most children become more skilled, whereas others may need guidance and to an extent, this is related to rhythm-related blocks.

Children who play well together are relaxed and easy going when playing. They are able to anticipate what is coming up next in their game and are able to enjoy the experience of interacting and belonging together, as they bond through play. They enter a state that brings flowing spontaneity to their play and allows them to create more and more variety and challenge to their games. Children lacking this relaxed, flowing playful spontaneity are not deficient, but they may hang back from sharing and trusting, anticipating they'll be too slow or unable to keep pace with others.

Our muscles work in pairs. As one contracts, its counterpart relaxes. They are coordinated by a fast relay through the spinal cord, timed with such precision that one lets go the instant the other takes hold. The constant that allows for this precision isn't the pace, but the ratio between the muscles. They respond to the same proportional pattern, whether the movement is fast or slow. However, the flowing qualities of movement can be hindered when a child feels on edge rather than at ease. It's when children feel safe enough to stop bracing that they start to play alongside others with natural spontaneity.

When children communicate using language in play, there are interactions that require anticipation and flow. A child with a rhythm block may be left to lag behind their playmates, wondering where they are running to and why they are running at all. Trying to keep up and find out what’s happening is their playing style.

This is also what happens in their reading. Children with rhythm-related blocks in reading are not able to anticipate the meaning of the text or to assimilate or monitor the meaning as they read. They wonder what is really happening, and why it is that everyone else understands what’s going on in the text. They are always left wondering why they are ‘out of the loop’ again, until they just accept that this is how they are. They feel 'different', as if ‘something’ is missing.

Play is not performance

In the school holidays the range of play widens and there’s more scope for vulnerability. There’s more freedom in terms of places to play, including streets, rivers, lakes, and beaches. It’s appropriate that we keep every child safe while they play, but too much supervision can smother the vibrant qualities of playfulness. Where the freedom to play is more constrained, play can become performative.

Today’s post was not an invitation to observe children for coordinated ease and playful social cues. Play is supposed to be messy, unstructured and carried out with full commitment. Play can be passionate but when it’s performed, it's rarely imbued with the qualities that make it playful — time flying, ideas in abundance, plenty of focus, flow and laughter. Watch from a distance and enjoy the opportunities to allow children to play this summer.

Reference

Panksepp J. (1998) Affective Neuroscience: The foundations of human and animal emotions. New York, NY: OUP.