Sometimes it is easy to lose sight of how much local companies give back to their communities. Usually products and new technologies make the big headlines. However in the background, companies like the one I work for are giving back to the communities they share space with. BASF is a sponsor for the Marbles Kids Museum in Raleigh, NC and from this connection I was able to attend a recent luncheon. This luncheon was called the Marbles Big Idea Forum and the topic was on PLAY.
Here we are ready to learn about PLAY.
The topic of play is a perfect one to learn about at a museum devoted to letting kids have fun. My family has a yearly membership, so I can say with confidence that adults can have plenty of fun too in this museum. Yet sometimes we forget the importance of play and the talk we were about to listen to enphasized why play is so important no matter our age. Dr. Stuart Brown who is the founder of the National Institute for Play and even wrote a book on play gave the inspirational talk. This was a talk that I wish everyone could see, so I wanted to distill it down into a few points that I took away.
Humans (and animals) all are built to play.
It is interesting to know that we all have the wiring to play with each other even across species. Play is like a universal language. We of course play as humans and we have all seen kids on a playground having a great time. Animals are the same way as there is nothing cuter that watching two kittens play together. We also play across species as humans play with animals very fequently. Who is getting the most enjoyment out using a laser pointer to play with a cat. The cat or the human? Even animals can play across species. Dr. Brown shared a story about a polar bear encountering a sled dogs. He was a photographer for National Geographic and took pictures of the entire encounter. While the polar bear originally looked as though it was the predator looking for food, the dog went into a playful position. What happened next is amazing.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/c_a_bray/2069630876
The concept of a bear and dog playing together in the wild seem so unrealistic that I found the question of its validity on snopes. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/unusual-encounter/
You can also watch a description of the photos on youtube.
The other thing that caused a lot of reflection for me is that not only are we build to play, but we play throughout our lives. I loved the analogy of a lab and a wolf and their play habits compared with a human’s play habits. A wolf pup and a lab pup play very similarly with lots of rough housing and nipping tails. The wolf grows up and it is nothing but business and survival. The lab grows up and still plays ball till the day it dies. Humans are the same as the lab. We play as kids, but as we grow up we still play and have the capacity to play till the day we die. I remember my older grandparents being some of the funnest people I played with as a kid. I wonder if “we are all still kids at heart” came from this truth.
This concept of retaining juvenile features into adulthood is called neoteny. There is a great word of the day!
Humans and animals all play in different ways.
There is an amazing amount of research that has been done on play! Dr. Stuart breaks play into 7 types. All of this info and the pictues to help visulize the play types is taken straight from the National Institute of Play. If you find it interesting there is much more there! http://www.nifplay.org/science/pattern-play/
Attunement Play
Body Play and Movement
Object Play
Social Play
Imaginative and Pretend Play
Storytelling-Narrative Play
Creative Play
One note was that we sometimes see children being rough during social play. Just like anything this can get out of hand, but many times it may be stopped prematurely. However if two kids are pinning each other down but both smiling, this is a positive mode of play.
What is your play style? I thnk objects is mine. I love playing sports which use balls. I also still have fun playing with some legos when I get a chance! And if there are objects in business meeting, I will instinctivly grab it to play with.
There are consequences when we do not play
Play is fun, but what happens when we don’t play. Is play deprivation real? Dr. Stuart led an interesting career in he studied play along with murderers. He mentioned this very quickly in in his seminar, but I found an interview that delves into this topic further. The entire read is really good. http://www.journalofplay.org/sites/www.journalofplay.org/files/pdf-articles/1-4-interview-importance-ofplay-stuart-brown.pdf
Here Is just one excerpt from that article.
Surely these are extreme cases of what happens when someone is deprived of play their entire lives. However it can affect all of us. Here was one slide from the talk that summarizes the effect play deprivation can have on all of us including absence of empathy, rigidity, Interpersonal conflict, joylessness, addictions, diminished curiosity, and workaholism.
The summary of this seminar is quite easy to distill. We are meant to play and we all have our preferences on how we play. When we do not play it can have serious consequences to ourselves, to those around us and even society. I really buy into all of this. When we play we become engaged in a way that is non-threatening. Worries go away and we connect with those we are playing with. Applying the learnings is much more difficult. Someone at our lunch even asked how can you bring play into such serious business environment. The answer is that you still can, but you have to make an effort to do this and it needs to be supported within the company. The value it creates is sometimes hard to explain when effencicy and bottom line are goals. Yet I always believe that when employees are happy they are much more productive. I think something I will think about more is what is the play style of those around me instead of thinking that my style is the only one.
Dr. Stuart started off by saying Marbles kids museum is the Fort Knox of Raleigh. At first I did not truly understand what he was saying, but now I do. That museum will weather all the changes of future progress and still be standing in the end like just like a well built fort. It will still be standing because it is a human necessity to ensure play is encouraged so that we will all benefit.
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