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Key points
- Unstructured play has been declining in recent years.
- The COVID-19 pandemic has led to an increase in free, unstructured play.
- As a result of this recent increase, parents, teachers, and children are noticing the benefits of free play.
Research shows that free, unstructured play has been declining, despite its benefits
Around the world, an emphasis on the importance of structured play and resumé-building has resulted in lower levels of free, spontaneous, unstructured play in children. Communities place a high value on organized extracurricular activities, such as sports, clubs, and music or language lessons. Parents who engage with social media platforms find that they are highly encouraged to be involved in their children’s after-school activities and discouraged from allowing them to have unsupervised play.
And yet, research has shown that unstructured, open-ended play results in multiple benefits for children. For example, parents who played freely for just 5 minutes with their toddlers in a room filled with open-ended toys (e.g., balls, blocks, dramatic play materials) but without instructions showed differences from when they were instructed to engage in structured play (e.g., with a puzzle or shape-sorter). During free play, parents interacted more favorably with their children, used more cognitive scaffolding, and displayed less negativity. Their children, in turn, were more engaged and attentive and demonstrated more complex language during free play than during structured play.
Additional research has shown how unstructured play enhances creativity in children. For example, children who played with open-ended materials, such as salt-dough or blocks, as opposed to more restrictive activities, such as putting together puzzles or copying text, subsequently made more creative projects (e.g., collages, dioramas).
Unstructured play may be rising again as a result of COVID-19
Parents and teachers may actually be rediscovering some of the benefits of unstructured play as a result of the recent COVID-19 pandemic. My students and I* recently surveyed 67 parents of 79 children between the ages of 3 and 10 and interviewed 37 of those children about how their play has been impacted by the pandemic. Both parents and children reported the cancellation of about two structured activities (e.g., sports/lessons) per child. Each child in the study began taking part in an average of one online/virtual structured activity (e.g., online dance lessons, music lessons, or art classes).
However, they also took up an average of 2.75 new activities. Most of those new activities involved the outdoors and were less structured—e.g., walking, hiking, and biking. Less than half of parents (41.8 percent) felt that COVID-19 had led to a decrease in a structured activity that negatively impacted their children. Several parents (65.8 percent) acknowledged that COVID-19 had resulted in them experiencing less stress since they did not have to be in so many places at particular times.
In addition to changes in their structured activities, parents and children also reported differences in the amount of time that children engaged in unstructured play. Prior to the pandemic, parents estimated that their children spent about 12.47 hours per week in unstructured play. During quarantine, the average number of hours was 16.32 per week, a statistically significant increase. The number remained significantly higher in the fall of 2020 than it was prior to the onset of COVID-19—at an average of 13.77 hours per week. While numbers in the fall were lower than those during quarantine, this likely resulted from a return to schooling.
Notably, when children were asked about structured vs. unstructured activities, 56.8 percent reported a preference for unstructured play over structured play (and 5.4 percent had no preference). We also asked children to rate their enjoyment of various structured and unstructured activities using a scale of 1 (depicted as a red frowning face) to 5 (green smiling face). There was no difference in children’s reported enjoyment of structured versus unstructured activities.
Most parents (55.7 percent) reported the increase in unstructured play as one of the positive outcomes from COVID-19. Similarly, many parents (43 percent) believed that COVID-19 had led to children being more creative in the way they play. Some parents (35.4 percent) even acknowledged that more time playing alone was a beneficial outcome of the pandemic for their children.
Firsthand experience with unstructured play
Some organizations are joining in a movement to encourage free, less supervised play. For example, play:groundNYC is a playground in New York where no parents are allowed in the play space. This article talks about the benefits of playing in a space like this for child development, including, but not limited to, an increase in productive risk-taking, creativity, emotional regulation, decision-making, and problem-solving. For a visual of what play in this playground looks like, check out this video from NBC News.
Play in less-structured play spaces—those without fixed playground equipment—is not only good for child development, but it is also becoming more common for schools this academic year since many have roped off their playgrounds in accordance with COVID-19 protocols. A recent interview with a second-grade teacher confirmed that during recess at her school,
“The children haven’t been able to use playground equipment, colored chalk, balls, jump ropes... They have an open field to run, that’s it… Children must entertain themselves, which requires creativity. The children are also paying more attention to nature, looking at clouds, finding things on a tree or in the grass. Many of these things went unnoticed when the children had equipment. In the age of computers, social media, and an abundance of athletic teams and hobbies, the more opportunity for children to use their imagination, the better.”
When I asked her to describe some of the benefits that this type of play during COVID-19 will have for her students, she replied,
“[Unstructured play] is great because children have more opportunity to communicate authentically. When unstructured, students share their own ideas, problem-solving strategies, gain confidence and independence, and model social behavior. They also use higher-level thinking skills when explaining ideas to their peers… Children learn how to assert themselves/speak up, take turns being the leader and group member, handle disappointment when they don’t get their way in a group, and share. They also learn how to communicate using nonverbal cues (body language/tone of voice).”
Not only did this teacher believe that such play was beneficial for her students during recess, but she also believed that more engagement in this type of play would benefit them academically. She said, “...After sharing creative ideas while playing, students have experiences to draw from. This is especially beneficial for writing/reading activities.”
Perhaps the impact of COVID-19 might lead parents and teachers to observe some of these benefits from all the additional free play that their children are engaging in. In doing so, maybe they will be more confident in relaxing some of their restrictions on and constant monitoring of their children’s play and instead encouraging more independent, child-directed free play.
*A special thanks to Jessica Kardasz and Dominique White for their invaluable contributions to the collection and analysis of data for this study.
