11 Ways Play Helps Kids Relax
by Janine Halloran View Bio
Janine Halloran is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor who has been working with children, adolescents, and their families for 20 years. She has been helping children and teens build their social skills using play throughout her career in a variety of settings, including schools, social skills groups, and summer programs. She is the Founder of Encourage Play, LLC, and is the author of Social Skills for Kids: Over 75 Fun Games & Activities for Building Better Relationships, Problem Solving ∓ Improving Communication. Her work has been featured in the Boston Globe, Huffington Post, and The Skimm® Newsletter. She is also the author of the #1 Best Selling Coping Skills for Kids Workbook, and the host of the Calm & Connected podcast. Janine lives in Massachusetts with her husband and two children.
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Learning social skills can be tricky, however, play is what works best! A child’s natural way of connecting and relating is through play. Play allows for real-world experiences and teachable moments to happen. These experiences and moments can be used to redirect less desirable skills and reinforce positive skills.
Playing with others can help benefit:
- Turn-taking
- Patience
- Compromise
- Winning and losing graciously
Play is terrific - it's the best way for children to learn, and it teaches them how to interact with each other and the world around them. One benefit of play that often gets overlooked is that it also helps children learn how to self-regulate and manage stress.
Play is enormously powerful in helping kids cope with their feelings. It's the way children work through stressful times, express their emotions and thoughts about situations, and process what's going on around them. Opportunities to play allow children to express their fears, worries, and concerns.
In recent years, we've seen an increase in mental health challenges in our young people. Dr. Peter Gray, author of Free to Learn, has made the connection between this increase in mental health concerns and the decrease in unstructured play over the last several decades. Encouraging more unstructured play may be a way to increase our children's ability to self-regulate and handle big feelings.
Doing something fun also allows a child’s brain to take a break, unwind and relax. Often, if kids get stressed or anxious, they can go into fight, flight, or freeze mode. To get out of that state, they need to take a break, and play can be a natural way to take that break. By doing something fun, like building a newspaper tower with tape, or drawing, or playing in the sand, or making something with their hands, they’re able to take a break and naturally relieve their stress.
The ability to cope with feelings is an essential skill that will serve children well as they mature into adults. There are going to be times when things are stressful and feel out of control. By making play a part of our daily lives, both children and adults can get the emotional benefit of taking breaks and having some fun.
Here are 11 fun ideas to help encourage play for kids who love:
- To imagine and pretend - they can play dress-up, set up a pretend vet office, or design their perfect treehouse.
- To create - they can get inspiration from your recycling bin, or paper cups, or old magazines. Use the materials you have and encourage kids to create with what's in front of them.
- To be competitive - introduce them to your favorite board games or card games that you played as a child.
- To play video games - offer up multiplayer games.
- To move - go on a bike ride or a hike together.
- To cook or bake - have them find a new recipe they want to try, then make it together.
- To be silly - try “fill in the blank” questions.
- To read - have them pick out a new book to listen to or read, and then invite them to tell you about it.
- To watch movies or tv shows – make a night of it and discuss what you liked and didn't like about it.
- To build - create a structure by offering materials you can build with, like cups, blocks.
- To be adventurous - plan something fun for the future. It could be an overnight camp out in your backyard or a day trip to a new place to walk and be outside.
Now more than ever, we can and should make time for opportunities for open-ended play. Encourage your child to play the way they want today and take a few moments to play too!