What's In A Game?

By Elizabeth W. Gonzalez, Parents' Source, May 20, 2003.

"This little piggy went to market" is the beginning of the first game my mother played with me. Recently I asked her, "Why did you play games with me?" expecting a detailed developmental explanation. Her answer was immediate: "because it was fun!" I then asked some kids, "Why do you play games?" The kids answers confirmed my mother's response. What was I thinking? Of course, we play games because it is fun.

One of the first tasks a parent can be faced with is getting his child to eat something he does not want. All of a sudden the feeding spoon becomes an airplane that needs to enter the hangar. The task becomes a game and the child has eaten without a struggle. The task turned into something fun.

What about those horrible and embarrassing temper tantrums? Part of that behavior is your child's developmental stage. Children younger than age three can comply but they are not truly able to cooperate, to work with someone. You will not be able to handle all situations as they occur through fun and games. However, many anticipated situations can be toned down or avoided by helping your child practice for them.

Role Play is an excellent method for practicing what to do and how to act. This method is in essence a "mini play" about a difficult situation. You create the play with your child. The play can be impromptu and simple, such as playing grocery store, or more complex, with a written script and costumes. You can include role reversal in your script. Kids love playing the adult and you will see the skills that your child already knows. Your child not only learns to cooperate by practicing cooperation skills "written" into the play, but also learns about teamwork by being part of your creative team. Cooperation through fun!

A primary building block of cooperation and teamwork is tolerance for rules, losing and disappointment. Games are useful tools that help your child build tolerance skills, Start with simple games such as Go Fish and Old Maid. These card games are inexpensive and easy to carry around. Begin by playing one on one with your child so you can concentrate on helping your child without distraction. Our guidance, modeling and monitoring behavior, as well as acknowledgment of the negative and positive feelings that arise, are essential in helping your child build confidence and tolerance levels. As these levels increase, you can increase the challenge by adding more players and using more complicated games.

Organized team sports are obvious choices in encouraging cooperation and teamwork in your child. The elements of cooperation and teamwork are built into the sport's rules, expectations and goals. Sounds perfect, but organized team sports do not work for all children or all developmental stages. If a child does not have confidence or athletic ability, if he gets teased, feels inferior and/or is blamed for keeping the team from winning, the experience can result in anger, depression, defiance and low self-esteem, as well as cheating and lying. Not exactly what you were trying to achieve. What can you do?

Team games are alternatives to team sports that will help you prepare your child to build team skills. Packaged games such as Pictionary, Guesstures, Outburst, and Scattergories have the same elements that organized sports have. The advantage to using a team game for building skills is the control you have over some of these elements. Practicing game playing (do not keep score) will reduce pressure and allow your children to experiment and build confidence. You can also point out that each person on a team does not have to have equal skills, but it is the equality of the overall team that "levels the playing field".

All this learning is going on under the disguise of play. What an idea: play as a technique to connect, communicate, and teach children! Well, not really. Most of us play with children without thinking. It is almost instinctual. It is what parents and caretakers do. Do you think a book including game and play recipes would be useful? Playful Parenting, by Denise Chapman Weston, MSW and Mark S. Weston, MSW (Tarcher/Putman, 1993) is just such a book. The play and game methods described are creative, yet easy to follow. Good luck and have FUN!

Elizabeth W. Gonzalez is a Registered Play Therapist at FairView Counseling, Reading, PA. For more information, please call 610-396-9091.

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