Robert Louis Stevenson’s wonderful verses often capture more than meets the eye.

When I was down beside the sea
A wooden spade they gave to me.
To dig the sandy shore.
A Child’s Garden of Verses

They – whoever ‘they’ were – clearly did this child a good turn. They brought him to a good place, and they gave him a good ‘toy’–if we call it a toy.

The best ‘play’ is a kind of first exercise in the deeper things of life: such as playing house, playing workman, or playing army. Or simply digging in the earth.

Children have a kind of natural fascination with many things, some of them good, some of them not. How they play, what they play and with whom they play will either grow or diminish these fascinations.

Current customs, particularly because of the technologies involved, can turn play into something less than it should be. Often, real play is replaced with entertainment. Real play might be entertaining, but it is not simply entertainment. Watching a screen, or even pushing buttons on a screen or board–though it be called a ‘game’–fall short of being real play. Such are not a first exercise or practice in real life.

Plato insisted that we must be attentive to what and how children play—indeed he thought it a key aspect of the formation of the young. Parents intuitively sense this. Yet our current technology-driven practices make it difficult to act on this intuition.

We can take a cue from the ‘they’ in the poem and give our children—or grandchildren, or any children we love—simple, age-appropriate ‘tools:’ such as a knife for whittling, good pencils and an attractive sketch book, a small hoe for the garden, or of course the ever-practical spade. Especially in the sand.

Yes, these might not immediately absorb or mesmerize the children. So these will demand a little more of us, calling for our closer presence and involvement. That might be a reason as a society we have let these slip away. It also points to the deeper gift of such ‘toys’ and such playing.

It is within our power at once to deepen relationships and cultivate children’s good natural inclinations. Summer recreation and summer vacation, as well as summer work, offer opportunity to minimize the technology, and to emphasize natural contexts for real play. They are often right at hand. Our children’s response might surprise us. And one day, they might thank us.

~ ~ ~

R.L Stevenson (1850-1894) is the great Scottish author of Treasure Island, Kidnapped, A Child’s Garden of Verses, and other classics. Image: Ruth Mary Hallock. (Note: this is a reworking of a post from a number of years ago.)

This week’s new video reflection, on the importance  on female friendships, below:

 

Join the Community.

Become a LifeCraft Member and gain access to our online courses and exclusive content. It's FREE of charge. Period.

If you join as a contributing member, you will help make this content available to an increasing audience and enable me to spend more time in this work. I thank you in advance.

Join the LifeCraft community today and get access to:

  • Man of the Household (Course)
  • Woman of the Household (Course)
  • Concepts Made Clear (Mini-course)
  • Dinner at Home (Mini-course)
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE:
Facing Discouragement: A Greek Insight

Facing Discouragement: A Greek Insight

Discouragement, or at least its temptation, regularly accompanies intentional living. Even if we do not formulate it explicitly we find ourselves feeling “why do the good things I want have to be so difficult?” It is a consolation to know this is not unique to our...

read more
Toxic Fatherhood?

Toxic Fatherhood?

There are important analogies between a father in a family and a ruler in a nation. This is perhaps especially clear in the consequences of their failure. Aquinas writes that “royal dignity is rendered hateful to many people on account of the wickedness of tyrants.”...

read more
Master of His Time

Master of His Time

“He had no ‘time of his own’ (except in his bed-cell), and yet he was becoming master of his time; he began to know just what he could do with it.” J.R.R. Tolkien, Leaf by Niggle Many of the greatest traps of our day appear in the guise of simple math. One of them...

read more

Pin It on Pinterest