Nursery Games that Educate.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 17, 27 April 1907, Page 48

Nursery Games that Educate.

The child’s first five years are lived almost entirely in the realm of play. The infant begins to play in his cradle with his own toes and fingers. A healthy child is always playful, and he wants to j»lay itieesaantly except when he is hungry, sleepy, or otherw’ise uncomfortable. “ Play.” says Dr. Fowler-Schonen, of Brooklyn, “is Nature’s method of educating the child.” “Almo-t al! a mother’s talk to her child up to school age is in the nature of play. As she provides food for the child's body so in her play with him she furnishes food for his mind. It is sometimes asked if it is right to try to teach very young children anything. Positively no mother can help doing it. Consciously or unconsciously', she is teaching the child from earliest infancy by play. She is teaching him language as she talks to him. She is teaching him motion, form and direction as she dangles a bright, ball before his baby eyes.

“Games train the body and mind. In the ceaseless activity of the little child, no wearing to old persons, he is developing ev ry muscle. Tossing a ball is one of the host gymnastic exercises ever invented. In playing with building blocks a child gets no physical exercise, but he is getting the finest kind of mental training. He is developing taste, judgment, and ideas of architecture. The finished toy, which leaves nothing to the imagination, is bad for the little child. “Of all the toy inhabitants of the play world the doll is the most interesting. With her- doll the little girl acts out the whole drama of motherhood in the most innocent, and charming way. She endows the doll with life and acts out innumerable situations in life with it, and if you want to see how you appear to your daughter, listen to some of these little dramas which she acts out with her children and her vistors. They' will be enlightening at all times. “Split pictures are a regat delight to children, because they can constantly be taken apart and put together again. Split maps are splendid for older children who have begun to study geography. Children love to take to pieces and pit together again. It is for this reason they' love to build in sand and mould in clay. This is the reason they are thought destructive. In reality they are often surprised and grieved when they find they cannot put together what they have destroyed. The child gets the same devlopment of social intercourse in play which we get from society. If he plays alone he does not get his developin' nt.”