Rough Play

by Amy LemieuxStarting in infancy, children use their bodies to learn; rolling, kicking, waving arms, sitting, crawling, standing and walking. Physically is often a child’s favorite way to interact with others; hugging, spinning, chasing, fleeing, and wrestling. Youngsters of all mammals, larger-brained birds, and even some reptiles engage in roughhousing!Why do adults have such a hard time with rough play? Why do most adults, including school personnel, overreact to what has been considered normal child play for thousands of years? Children’s play often mimics, but does not involve, real fighting. Fighting is symbolic, without intention to hurt. Teachers and parents often mistake play for real fighting that could result in injuries, so it is prohibited altogether, often to ridiculous extremes. A kindergartener gets recess detention for picking dandelions. Why? Because after a sand-throwing incident, the children were all banned from picking up anything off the ground. A third grader gets suspended for DRAWING a soldier holding a gun. You can see the giant leaps now being made between innocuous behaviors and predicting dire outcomes. In reality, studies show that roughhousing turns into real fighting less than 1% of the time!It may sound obvious, but it is necessary to educate adults about the difference between rough play and real fighting. Rough play involves willing participants who laugh, run, jump, chase, wrestle, make noise and return for more. Real aggression is usually directed at one person, an unwilling participant, and no one is smiling.Wouldn’t it be better to ban rough play altogether, just to be safe? No! The benefits of rough play truly outweigh the disadvantages of rough play. What are the benefits of rough play? It requires children to read social signals like facial expressions and body language; it meets deep sensory needs; it releases energy when children are too young to follow the complex directions needed for playing sports; it allows boys to express affection for playmates; it promotes complex social interactions; it requires role-changing and turn-taking (I’ll chase you, then you chase me); it builds confidence and resilience; it reduces fear and anxiety; it releases a chemical into the brain that stimulates neuron growth in the cortex and hippocampus which are responsible for memory, language and logic. And, of course, children love it because it adds joy to their lives.