Invitation for a fresh exploration on why children play and MAKE their own toys as per the situation.
Readymade toys are more dangerous than schools; playworkers more dangerous than teachers. And unfortunately, modern parenting has taken on both these roles and forgotten how to be a ‘natural’ parent
Children are BIOLOGICALLY equipped by nature/life to understand the REAL world through direct engagement- PLAYFUL exploration, manipulation of objects, an IMAGINATIVE re-creation of events- AUTONOMOUSLY.
We, adults, have replaced the REAL world with the printed word (now digitized information) autonomous learning with ‘depended’ teaching and taken out of their experiential world to imaginary one created by reading.
We thus fragmented the holistic activity into play, learning, art, and work and designating time, space, and value to each activity. Children have no distinction of this nature as every act that children do is to make sense of their context in which playfulness is the quality, turning every act into play and learning was the outcome of any activity. Even what we call work was play for children. Beauty was embedded in every act as beauty is the way things are done.
The very word toy was invented in the west around the 17th century and in none of the indigenous languages have any word for toy. Children were left totally alone to be with other children and to follow their instinct allowing the inner rules for their growth to function naturally.
With around 5000 videos and images of spontaneous activities done by children, documented over 25 years we have been able to understand the logic behind the PLAY that children do and TOYS that children create.
The 6-day course is intended to take you through the following topics.
Two main topics with its subdivisions
Natural, spontaneous play is one, and the second how modernity has destroyed play.
How children learn the real world, understanding the logic behind activities that children do, how children remake and recreate experiences, age-specific activities, How children explore the world through exploring the form, process, function, materiality, and structure by playful recreation of experience.
Damages of modern toys and play- How it fragmented integral activity into play, learning, art, and work, how learning became a boring activity for children which the adults had to make it interesting through buffoonery, created gender division, changed the real content, killed the natural cognitive process, etc
Why adults should not play with children and why the newly invented playworker is more dangerous than teachers.
