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Endless Possibilities! - Our introduction to open ended play.



Starting our journey with understanding, building an open ended play environment!




Well, it all started when I felt like kids are meant to explore, be curious and NOT necessarily just follow instructions. Most of the toys today are very instructions based, match the shapes, color within borders, follow the path etc etc. 

I saw that my toddler was getting good at following instructions and doing exactly what it said! Shouldn't this be like a win! I actually started feeling like I was taking away the creativity, making more instruction following kid. I am not in any way saying kids shouldn't follow instructions, they absolutely should learn too. And in many things they should, but while they play, do things, maybe NOT. 


That's when I started exploring what would it be like if we weren't into these toys and having kids follow instructions to create things/play only in a certain way. The first thing I noticed was these battery operated toys. They are like the worst enemies you can have. Then it was the lack of open spaces :( 

As I started reading more, I was introduced to this concept of open-ended-play. And as I read more and more about it, it started making so much more sense. I am going to share my experience as we, go through transforming into being an open-ended play based family. I say family and YES family, because I feel its not just your kid changing something. It's a lot more about how you change your perspective, how you change your expectations, how you change how you interact with them. 

Open Ended Play is all about :

  • No pressure : Some say less pressure, I like to believe its NO pressure. There are no prescribed outcomes. That eases off any pressure on achievement. Kids are inspired by inner inspiration and creativity. Let's them be who they are!

  • Explore ideas and concepts : There are NO errors. Kids are exploring so if they built something upside down, well thats their imagination. Let them! They are introduced to various physics, science concept themselves when they explore new things.

  • Problem solving : As kids explore new things, new ideas they define a problem for themselves and work towards solving that. There isn't a better way for them to learn how they resolve issues as they go along.

Follow our journey as we explore our way into and through open-ended-play!








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