A Plea to Play: The Case for Play in Adult Learning Experiences
Haters May Hate, But Players Will Play
I admit it: I hate playing games. I hate board games, games of cards, games that invite us to sing and be silly and vulnerable and win and lose or just have plain, nonsensical fun. In fact, I don’t know if I ever loved playing games growing up. Whenever Monopoly or Sardines or Light as a Feather emerged as one of the slumber-party options, I wanted to duck out, like the stakes of winning and losing were too high, like the embarrassment quotient was too great a risk. Even as an adult, playing games among dear friends and close family is like my own personal hell.
And yet, I play anyway.
Why Play Matters
As an educator, I’ve learned to give myself over entirely to the world of play. I’ve seen the impact play can have on students from a range of backgrounds and experiences. I integrate play because in communities where I’m responsible for raising young people, I’m called to a bigger charge, to let go of my ego, to recognize neurological, social-emotional, and academic benefits of play: of laughing for laughter’s sake, of silliness as a way to foster social skills, of “gamifying” the classroom experience as a way to be more culturally responsive and to cement learning.
Just as our students need play, we adults do, too. We need play because the world is a heavy and difficult place where injustice rules the roost these days; under the burdens of racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, and all other forms of oppression, we need to counterbalance the hard work of resistance with opportunities to recharge. We need play because it fosters our resilience in times of great stress—and education is a stressful profession. We need play because it’s good for our health and well-being, and our students are looking to us as models for how to be in the world.
Playing With the Edges of Discomfort—and Liking It
One time at a professional learning session, the facilitator made us get up and have a dance party. My blood pressure skyrocketed. All my internal voices kicked in: People will think I look silly. There goes my credibility. What if I’m terrible at this? What if I do something embarrassing, like snort when I laugh or fall over, or who knows what else? And yet, I played and danced anyway. I laughed, felt awkward, like Elaine in Seinfeld, and ultimately, felt energized by the experience.
Playing by Example
Year after year I lead adult learning experiences with educators from across the K-12 spectrum. When I’m preparing these sessions (across a range of topics), I design learning that invites participants to learn by doing, reflecting, and—dare I say—playing. While many of my workshops involve digging deeply into content, I also encourage people to play when processing their learning.
In one of these professional learning experiences, I lead a session on lesson design, and participants are students in my mock high school class. While the content of the lesson is about the semi-colon and the culture of power, participants are asked to play in a range of ways: use “thumbometers” to gauge energy and understanding, draw emojis to express emotion, and mingle through movement.
As a school leader, whenever I designed professional development for any staff gathering, I always invited a level of play: from light-hearted check-in questions to ways to introduce new colleagues to making up dance moves to represent concepts. The more playful the activity, the more I got into it. And to the surprise of the adults in these sessions, they got into it, too.
A Plea to Play
You may be as averse to play as I am; you may be introverted and can imagine nothing worse than being asked to have dance parties or rekindle experiences of childhood through games.
And I urge you to play anyway.
The world needs more lightheartedness and laughter. Our brains need the opportunities for bonding, for energizing, and for learning to take hold. And our students need more open-minded, open-hearted, playful adults in their lives.
