Are Children Losing The Benefits Of Freeform Play?

If you have a chance to walk through your neighborhood during the summer months when school is out for the season, do you notice that there seems to be a lack of groups of children outside? In years past youngsters seemed to spend much more time exploring the outdoors in small groups developing games from their imagination. Now it seems they are tied to their video games which unfortunately may be shaping their imaginations.
Schools traditionally offered recess periods where young children could spend time with their playmates and develop interpersonal skills.
Some educators feel that this time is most productive if the children are allowed to choose their own games to play without any effort to direct them in a given game.
This type of play is called Freeform Play.
It seems that there are a number of distractions that are keeping today's children from having the advantage of this type of exercise.
Some parents are so concerned for the safety of their children that they encourage and sometimes demand that recess periods of freeform play is not allowed.
They favor a structured situation where the chance that a child might skin a knee or encounter a bully or some other stressful problem be avoided.
It is the lack of this free thinking and imaginative game playing plus the experience of dealing with social problems at a young age that educators feel is harming children and stifling their education.

Japanese schools use recesses between classes to allow the children to refresh themselves and be relieved of stresses from the previous class and be relaxed for the next class.
Another problem is the litigious society we live in now.

Some people are ready to launch a law suit over any minuscule mishap and this causes schools to try to insulate themselves by deleting recess programs and other activities where a child may be even slightly injured. This causes these youngsters to lose the natural benefits of free form play which is believed to be essential in humans as well as animals.
When offered correctly the use of educational toys sometimes called pretend play toys can help the child to develop their imagination.

They can mimic a parent preparing meals or cleaning house or doing carpenter skills and even learn language skills and hopefully ask questions as they play to help them understand how to deal with problems.

However to achieve the greatest benefit the child must not be directed to a particular toy or activity. They should be allowed to make their own choice from available toys as their individual imaginations should be directing the activity.