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What's Going On In There? How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life
- By Lise Eliot, Ph.D

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Creative Play: Stimulate Your Child's Natural Talents

By Andrew Loh

A critical aspect of your child's early childhood learning and brain development is to engage in creative play. Everyone knows that children learn by playing and mimicking things around them. This is the nature's way that allows them to learn, discover and master about so many things around them, in their house and school. A major part of the learning process in a child involves adapting to a number of learning situations and choosing the exact process to master those varying situations. Play is a state of child's mind. It is safe, pro-active, emotional, probing, inquisitive and learning in its nature. It also exists in the moment and during active hours of day.

While play is an important part of your child's life, the overall quality of play is an important issue in child's brain development. Ordinary and mundane play may not really help your child to develop his or her brain. Rather, it is the active and creative play that helps your child develop and uplift his or her brain development. Play can be entirely positive or even negative depending on the given situation. What you need to develop and encourage is the creative type of playing situations that can help you child develop a number of traits and characters.

Why do children play? Children simply love playing and making merry! Children also love the excitement and thrill of playful moments. There are so many reasons that compel your child to play, learn and enjoy.

Your children may play:

1. To learn things around them

2. To create their own situations, interact with them and later learn from those situations

3. To feel challenged to work on some situations

4. To spend some time on productive activities

5. To clam themselves to soothe the troubled mind

6. To win against others

7. To have some fun and thrill

8. To enjoy every moment of their childhood

9. To compete against others

10. To feel elated and complete

Most parents feel that playing is an unproductive activity and thus they try to curb their children from playing excessively. Parents also try to think that playing and thinking do not have any connection and relation. It is also common to see that parents creating a list of tasks depending on how productive a particular activity are. But, conventional wisdom is slowly giving away to advanced thinking that suggests that getting your children involved in creative play will help them develop a series of beneficial characters and traits.

Creative play provides your children lifelong benefits of fun, laughter, thrill, enjoyment and a comprehensive learning process. Creative play can also help your child develop and streamline the following characters and traits:

• Social skills: Regular creative plays will help your child learn the noble characters of empathy, compassion and the capacity for exhibiting intimacy. Emotional intelligence is another factor that is also developed through creative play. Social skills and acumen are learned in the process of creative play.

• Personal strengths: The innate ability of your child to take on responsibility and challenges, find rue meaning in life, and later discover our personal peace and achievement needs a fair amount of creative play. Creative play also develops adaptability and flexibility in your child's outlook, which are necessary to positive and encouraging behavior.

• Learning process: Playful discovery and adventure is the recognized pathways to creative learning. Creative play helps your child in problem solving and adaptive characters by encouraging imagination and vision. Play can help arouse curiosity, which ultimately leads to the development of creativity.

• Connection and affinity: Creative play enhances openness and affection towards others. It also becomes very easy for your child to set and create connections with other people especially, fellow children in the school.

• Joy and happiness: Creative play is sheer fun and thrilling! It is also a moment to cherish all the goodness of life. Play is special state of being happy and contended.

• Involvement: Creative playtime helps your child develop focus, concentration and dedication which are all mandatory for your child's future success.

• Clarity: Creative play enhances clarity in thinking, a lucid mind, and an ability to understand the true meaning of life.

• Timeliness: Creative play develops proper understanding of time and it also makes your child learn timeliness and discipline.

• Confidence: Creative play is a time to develop confidence and courage. It will also cajole your child to achieve difficult tasks. With creative play, your child may never get bored.

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