Go Play! Part 1: Making Space for the Wonder of Childhood | Gennie Gorback, MS Ed
About This Episode
What if “play” is actually some of your child’s most important experiences? In Part 1 of our two-part conversation with the co-authors of Go Play: How Parents Can Empower Kids to Build Their Own Worlds, educator Gennie Gorback helps parents see play through a new lens: not as wasted time or something adults need to direct, but as a powerful, child-led path to learning, connection, confidence, and discovery.
Gennie explains what makes play truly play, why children benefit from time with peers of different ages, and how parents can support development without feeling pressured to entertain their kids all day. We talk about the difference between joining a child’s play and making space for it, the value of boredom and open-ended materials, how to honor a child’s individual interests, and why a child deeply absorbed in Legos, water play, drawing, building, or movement may be developing far more than we realize.
You’ll also hear practical ideas for building a more playful home culture—from “invitations to play” to protecting unstructured time—and compassionate guidance for navigating after-school activities, sibling play, organized sports, and the many parenting “shoulds” that can make play feel like one more thing to manage
If you want some fresh parenting tips grounded in play-based learning and real-world routines, press play. And listen to Part 2 next week with Gennie’s co-author Kate Allen Fox!
Subscribe, share this with a parent who needs less guilt and more clarity, and leave a review so more families can find the show.
About Gennie Gorback
Gennie is an early childhood educator with a Masters of Education and Teaching and a BA in Women’s Studies, both from UC Santa Barbara. She’s an education consultant, a curriculum writer for an early literacy program, and the president-elect of the California Kindergarten Association. And we’ve heard that she was also a toy designer. Gennie writes across kid lit genres, but all of her work comes from a deep understanding of child development. In her book, Go Play: How Parents Can Empower Kids to Build Their Own Worlds, Gennie and her co-author Kate Allen Fox inspire parents to think like educators and gain a comprehensive understanding of the myriad of ways play benefits their children. Ginny lives in San Francisco Bay Area with her college sweetheart, her two daughters, and their two cats. Find Gennie at https://www.genniegorback.com/ and on IG @gorbackpack.
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Read the transcript for this episode:
NOTE: This transcript was auto-generated by an AI assistant that thinks it’s smarter than we are. It’s not, but it has more free time than we do, so we gave it a low-stakes job. It probably spelled a few things wrong, but we’re okay with that. We’d rather spend our time interviewing cool guests!
Welcome And Guest Introduction
Dr. Amy Moore 0:01
Hi, smart moms and dads. Welcome to another episode of the Brainy Moms Podcast, brought to you today by Learning RX Brain Training Centers. I’m Dr. Amy Moore here with my co-host Sandy Zimalis. And Sandy and I would like to remind you that we have a free monthly newsletter. So just go to the Brainymoms.com, sign up for all kinds of cool information related to the things that we talk about on the show. So don’t miss out, theBrainymoms.com. And now, our guest today is Genevieve Jenny Gorbach. Let me tell you a little bit about her in case you don’t know her yet. Gennie is an early childhood educator with a Masters of Education and Teaching and a BA in Women’s Studies, both from UC Santa Barbara. She’s an education consultant, a curriculum writer for an early literacy program, and the president-elect of the California Kindergarten Association. And we’ve heard that she was also a toy designer. Gennie writes across kidlit genres, but all of her work comes from a deep understanding of child development. In her book, Go Play: How Parents Can Empower Kids to Build Their Own Worlds, Gennie and her co-author Kate Allen Fox inspire parents to think like educators and gain a comprehensive understanding of the myriad of ways play benefits their children. Gennie lives in San Francisco Bay Area with her college sweetheart, her two daughters, and their two cats.
Gennie Gorback 1:23
Welcome. Thank you.
Sandy Zamalis 1:25
So happy to be here. Yes, we’re excited. I love the I love this topic.
Dr. Amy Moore 1:30
So I do too. Apparently we’re going to talk about it all day because we have eight later today. We we rarely do two guests at a time because it is unmanageable with our sense of humor. And it’s hard with two hosts to have two guests at the same time because we’re talking over each other and making fun of people. And anyway, we did interview the dumb dads together though.
Sandy Zamalis 1:56
That was fun.
Dr. Amy Moore 1:58
Right.
Gennie Gorback 1:59
Yeah, you can’t separate them. Well, Kate and I are, we’ve already connected. And okay, for the listeners, my co-author and I are recording our podcast separately. So Kate and I have kind of like been like, okay, well, this is my point of view, and this is your point of view. And like we’ll probably overlap a lot, but we also will each talk like about how much we love and respect each other a lot, but we do that when we’re together too.
Dr. Amy Moore 2:23
So I love that. And I love your point of view. I love reading your stuff. Um, and so I love that you write about Regio Amelia. I’ve actually been there. I did a two-week study tour, immersed myself in their school system back in 1994-ish. Uh, it was amazing. And then my mom ran a Regio Inspired. I would love to see photos of that trip. Oh, just that’s been my dream. I I will find some photos. It was so funny. So, you know, it’s all based on emergent curriculum and the project approach. And so my mom, she’s 84. I hear her go, we should do a spider project. This was yesterday. And I said, What are you talking about? She’s like, Look, there’s a spider building a web in the window right here. We should do a spider project. Can’t tell you how many times they did a spider project, right? Um, because the spiders were always building webs in the windows and the kids were all over it. And anyway, but it was just so funny. I mean, she’s been retired for, you know, 30 years and she’s like, we could do a spider project.
Gennie Gorback 3:26
It never ends. It’s in your bones. The education, the wonder of the world. Like once you’re a person who sees the amazement all around you, you can’t turn that off, even if you’re just talking to adults. Once when my husband and I, we were new parents. We had uh, I think we only had our first, and we went wine tasting with friends. It was one of like the first times we ever went out. Um, my husband saw a lizard on the ground, and he goes, Hey, look, a lizard, everybody. And all of our, they were all of our like old, old friends from college, and they were just like, and none of them were parents. They were just like, Okay. Oh yeah, we forgot, like, you’re not seeing the wonder of the world, like the those of us who see it through the eyes of a child as much.
Dr. Amy Moore 4:14
So, how would our lives be different if we did?
Seeing Wonder Through A Child
Gennie Gorback 4:20
Ooh. It’d be a lot more fun.
Dr. Amy Moore 4:32
Well, talk a little bit about what you mean by that. What what do you mean by seeing the wonder of the world? And why we need to?
Gennie Gorback
I what I the picture that pops into my mind about seeing the wonder in the world is going on a little walk or like a small hike with children, uh, young children. And sometimes that means the child stops and crouches down real low to look at something on the ground. And if they’re with adults who see the wonder in the world, the adult’s gonna stop and ask questions, get down real low and look at what is on the ground that is that has caught the child’s attention. The adults who are no longer taking the time to notice the wonder of the world, they’re appreciating their walk, they’re appreciating nature, they’re enjoying the movement and activity, exercise, but they are not taking the time to be like, oh, there’s a cool rock or a cool ladybug or a slug or you know, whatever cool thing that’s on that path that stopped the child. It either takes your attention or it doesn’t. Um, so when we adults take the time to share in that wonder, so much learning happens and it’s not forced, it’s all child-directed and following the child’s interests, but it’s also reminding us as adults that this world is very, very interesting. The spider building its web in the window is interesting. We don’t know how it makes um many of us don’t know how that makes that spider web, you know, I couldn’t draw it. And it’s fascinating. And if we take the time to look at it, um the world feels a little bit more magical as an adult, but it also you it’s easier to connect with the children in your life as well.
Dr. Amy Moore 6:16
Yeah, I think that that’s a really telling point, right? That a lot of times there’s um this huge gap between the parent and the child. And it’s almost like we level the floor when we try to see the world in a similar way.
Sandy Zamalis 6:41
It’s always fascinating because when you let a child use their natural wonder to draw you in, there’s just so much cool stuff that can happen. And even in terms of a conversation, I remember I was on a plane flight one time, and um, this mom that was there with her, she had three little ones, all under the age of five. And the five-year-old was just talking the whole time. Mom, when we go up, is it gonna make my stomach hurt? And oh, look, mom, that cloud looks like a dragon. And they were just like on and on and on and on and on the whole time. And she just engaged in that conversation the whole time. And I um, because I love kids and I love development, like it for me, it was really cool to listen to the whole conversation because I just thought, wow, he has such a wide vocabulary. And look at all the stuff he’s just learning, and everyone else is zoned into their phones or the movie they’re watching on their laptop. But he’s just amazed that they’re they’re flying and there’s clouds. And look, mom, there’s a bird.
Gennie Gorback 7:43
Yeah, flying is amazing. It’s it’s unreal. I cannot fathom that we can fly and we just do it like people do it every day. And it’s just you get on the plane and you open your laptop and ignore the fact that there’s a miracle happening right below you. You know, exactly. Around you. Um, but kids still see that. So it’s really cool. One thing that I’ve been trying to do when I am around parents like that, that I’m like, wow, I really like how you’re speaking to this child. I’ve been trying to take a moment, if it feels appropriate, to tell them that. I’ve never once, as a parent, been upset that someone came over to compliment my parenting. And I I so I personally have been trying to go out of my way to tell parents, like, I really like the way you’re engaging with your child. And then I walk away. We don’t need to have a whole conversation about who I am or what my background is. It’s like that’s they’re just being the parent, but they’re doing a great job. And there’s so many things that we’re not sure about as parents, and there’s so many worries and concerns and and guilty feelings about different things. And I think we should try to compliment each other more when we see positive actions of other parents.
Dr. Amy Moore 8:54
I love that. I mean, because we don’t ever hesitate to go, those shoes are amazing, right? Or where do you get your hair done? It’s beautiful, right? But to compliment something that is one of the hardest things we will ever do as humans. I mean, parenting is hard work, right? And we screw it up all the time. And so to have somebody else recognize when maybe we got something right today, that’s pretty cool.
Dr. Amy Moore 9:23
But even that idea, we screw it up all the time.
Play Without Parent Guilt
Gennie Gorback 9:26
We probably don’t screw it up as much as we think we screw it up to. Um, we talk a lot about this in our book, um, Go Play. Um, one of our biggest goals was for the reader, the parent reader, to not feel judged or overcome with all these shoulds. You should be doing this, you should be doing that. And I think when people hear about the book being about play and the value of play, they get this vision in their mind that we’re going to tell them you need to play with your child. Your child needs to play more because this is how they benefit. Most people in today’s society do understand the value of play in general. Um, and that it has a myriad of positive effects, academic, social, emotional, all that stuff. But parents are busy and some of them have personalities. That means that they do not want to get down on the floor and build um with magnetiles or I talk a lot about um my least favorite thing to do with children is the train tracks just going back and forth and building on them. And I just find that not fun. So we want so we want parents to read the book and and first of all to like take the time to notice the wonder around them of all of the great ways their children are playing and they’re building space for that, even if they’re not the ones on the floor engaging their child. And honestly, from our research, that might not be what’s best for them, anyways. Really engaging with other children, mixed-age group children or same-age group, is way more beneficial because they’re going to be practicing a lot more social skills than when they boss their parent around and tell them which way to move the train on the tracks.
What True Play Really Means
Dr. Amy Moore 11:10
So talk to us a little bit about that. Like what is what does that healthy social skill development look like? Can it be with siblings? Does it need to be outside of the family with friends? Talk to us about that.
Gennie Gorback 11:22
So we base a lot of our um our theories based on the theorists that come before us. And we we have a whole chapter on play theory over over time, starting early as Plato and moving up to modern day play theorists. Um, our idol, Dr. Peter Gray, he uh kindly let me interview him, and I was like, let us interview him. And I was like, I had full body hives. I was like breathing into a bag. Like it was really because I’ve used his his work so much in my in my train when I train teachers and and talk to people about the value of play. I use his work as examples. I show videos of him. And so when he was talking to us and he said um a phrase that I had shown a video of, like probably a million times, like I like was like I was like breathing really hard. But anyways, so he a lot of his stuff is um the importance of play, yes, but what is true play and the five um aspects of what makes play true play? And let me, I marked it here because I don’t want to get it wrong. Peter Crate defines true play as number one, self-chosen and self-directed by the child. So yes, they can play doing a math game with dice, and that is valuable, but it’s not true play unless they grab the die, the dice, and decide what to do with it. Um, intrinsically motivated, meaning there’s no reward. I’m not saying if you go build with those magnetiles, you’re gonna get dessert tonight. They’re building with the magnetiles because it’s something that they want to do from the inside. They they have a mo they’re self-motivated. Um, structured. This one is hard for people because sometimes it doesn’t look structured. If a child is just rubbing their hands in a sandbox, it might not look structured to you, but in their brain, there is a structure there, there is something happening. Same with number four, imaginative. Even if they’re just letting water drip on their hands over and over again, things like that, there’s something going on there. We might not know. And I would argue that we don’t need to know always what’s going on in their brains, as long as they’re engaging in it and they’re enjoying it. And number five, conducted in an alert, active, but relatively non-stressed frame of mind. So I like that one because it doesn’t mean they’re laughing. And oftentimes, if you’re observing a child playing deeply, deeply concentrating on their play, they’re not laughing, they’re not giggling, they’re concentrating, they’re working, but it’s play. Um, so the reason I brought him up was because bringing it back to your question, is um who who plays with what’s the best way to play? Who’s who should children play with? And what Dr. Peter Gray said when we interviewed him was if parents want to play with their children, that’s fine. And I was like, what? Fine. I came in knowing, you know, play is so important. We need to drop everything and play with the kids when they want to play because they need to play. And how are they gonna play if I’m not the one playing with them, especially if, you know, siblings aren’t around or whatever. Um, and he said, No, it’s not true play if both people haven’t chosen it and negotiated it and are working together to do it. If both people aren’t enjoying it, it’s not true play. It might be true play for the child who’s really enjoying bossing their parent around, but if the parent is like, oh, I need to go do the dishes or whatever, that’s not true play. So it’s only true play if both people are enjoying it or all the parties involved are enjoying it. Um, Dr. Peter Gray really recommends mixed age group, like all the kids on a street, if they live on a safe street, playing together because you can learn from the older kids. The older kids learn from caring for the younger kids and teaching them things, and it’s really beneficial. Um, sibling play is very important, but not all siblings get along. And so what Dr. Peter Gray says about that is um give your children time and space to play together, but they get sick of each other. It’s better to incorporate other parents, other children um into the mix that they can get along with more and and um have a little bit more novelty when you have another child, and that’s a very important part of play, um, and that’s what keeps it fresh and and fun. Um, one of our interviewers, one of our interviewees was a play space designer. She designs like playgrounds and things like that. Her name is Erin Schultz, and she talked about this revolutionary idea to me that was so loose parts play is things that you can move and interact with. It can be as little as little buttons or big things like giant rocks, whatever. Um, but she said other children are the ultimate loose parts. And I thought that was so interesting. So to answer your question, everyone is good to play. There’s no right or wrong thing. And and we do have a lot in the book about finding your child’s play preferences. Everyone has their own. Some kids just want to climb and jump off things, and some kids just want to sit and draw quietly, and there’s no wrong way to play. Um, and and our job as playful parents, as play-based parents, is to give children the time and space to follow those interests and understand that they’re benefiting from the play that they choose.
Dr. Amy Moore 16:59
So my middle child um was what we would consider an easy child. And you could put him in front of a bucket of Legos, and two hours later, he was still engaged with the same bucket of Legos. And because our other two had, you know, overabounding energy, they required a lot more of our attention to keep them alive. And so it was um, we had to constantly remind ourselves, well, we better go check on Lawson, and he’d still be in the same spot with the same bucket of Legos if that’s where he started. And so we began to worry, well, should we be interacting more? Because, but he seemed so content and so engaged that we went ahead and just allowed it, right? Checked in with him, you know, asked him to, you know, share about whatever it was that he had built. Um, but he’s 25 and he’s an engineering tech. He builds million-dollar gravity meters for government contracts in a clean lab. He’s doing the same thing, right, that he was doing at two. So it seems that it turned out okay because of just the engagement and the imagination and um learning the physics of what it means to build.
Gennie Gorback 18:25
That’s what’s so beautiful about play. When the two-year-old is building over and over again and over again and spending time doing what they love, we don’t know what that’s going to lead to. That’s going to lead to a job possibly that we can’t even fathom at the time that we don’t even know exists. But by respecting them and their choices, you’re giving them a huge gift. You’re letting them build those parts of their brains and their interests and and um become the person that they’re probably destined to be, anyways. But if you imagine if you had stopped him and said, okay, it’s time to go, uh, I don’t know, something he wouldn’t like. Play basketball or I don’t know, you know, to pulling them away from their interests. And I see this in teachers a lot, actually, and it’s a discussion in a lot of my teachers’ spaces. It’s um when we have open-ended play, which we really encourage, especially I I I come from a background of preschool and pre-K. Um I have a kid who goes to the same center every single day, and and he’s not benefiting from all these other centers that I created. Well, he’s benefiting so much that he’s being attracted to one thing every day. Like that’s amazing. Maybe it’s what’s safe or what’s comfortable, but we don’t know really what’s going on in in their minds. But we can respect that that’s what they’re interested in and allow them to build on it, um, build on their interest. And it’s it’s that I think respect is such an important word here because they’re respecting the child and who they are at that moment, even though we know by giving them this time, we’re building the, we’re creating the foundation for future success in whatever they try to work on.
Why Play Keeps Getting Squeezed Out
Sandy Zamalis 20:06
So, why do you think we’ve kind of lost this idea of play? I mean, you’ve written a book on this, and it seems kind of like common sense. Um, I think generationally, um, I remember a time when we incorporated more play in our public education, and a lot of that has gone away. And so there’s like this resurgence to try to bring it back. Where where did if you have a second just to kind of share your thoughts, where do you think we’ve gone wrong with this? And what why why do we keep seesawing on this topic?
Gennie Gorback 20:41
Oh, okay. I can talk about this for about six hours. Um, but I’ll try to keep it much shorter than that than that. Um there are a lot of institutional reasons why we’ve gone further away from play. Um, I think there’s also a lot of safety reasons and and community reasons that have communities have shifted in a way that have made it so um if a kid’s playing out on the yard, sometimes a person across the street’s gonna call the police and say this child’s not being watched. Um there’s things like that, um, especially for brown and black children. It’s not as safe to be out and about running around because of situations like that. And I think that has been a huge detriment to children and their bet their growing independence and opportunities to play. Um so there’s that. There’s institutional reasons at school with high high-stakes testing and things like that. And I also just think we as a society, I’ve been reading like our generation of parents are spending more time with our children than previous generations. But we’re feeling very um pressured about what that time means and how much how like What it means to have a successful use of your child’s time and what our idea of success is has kind of shifted. Like I I believe my idea of success is a child who’s fulfilled, happy, communicative, um, can follow their dreams and believe in themselves and interact well with others. But other people might say, well, actually, success means making the most money. Well, how can we make sure that they make the most money? We want them to be good at the jobs that make the most money, and we have to start that earlier. And this worksheet is gonna do that. So I think it’s there’s just it’s a huge variety of things that have shoved down and and affected our brains as parents and our actions as as um as parents with our children and the institutions that our children are are involved in. So it’s it’s very complicated. And um, I think the biggest takeaway that people have been saying they get from our book is that they know it is intuitive. Like you said, we know that play is important and we know that it brings our children joy. And it’s just this little voice in the back of our head saying, oh, he should be doing math right now, or oh, he should be doing that, instead of saying, Oh, look, he’s building his understanding of physics right now. Or, you know, and and identifying the things that he’s choosing to do as the useful bit of practice, you know, in whatever, we don’t know what’s useful, but we know what children are choosing. And we and educators can kind of some sometimes see if we’re trained properly, oh, this is uh they’re working on fine motor skills. This is going to help them write long paragraphs later. They’re working on their understanding of conservation of mass or conservation of liquid. This is going to help their physics understanding later. You know, we can kind of see that, but as parents who aren’t educated in early childhood education or child development, they might not be able to pick apart those things. They just see a kid pouring a liquid back and forth into different cups and think, oh, well, there’s something better he could be doing with his time. But really, there’s not. That’s that’s what he’s choosing, and that’s so valuable, and he’s gaining so much from it. And we just have to recognize it and get out of the way and let the child play, get out of the way, play. Um, and and identify that and respect that the child is kind of following their interest and and doing what’s great for them and their development.
Building Independence Through Environment
Dr. Amy Moore 24:28
Do you have a recommendation on how that changes over ages and age groups?
Gennie Gorback 24:37
Um we actually have play over the age group. We have a section on play over different ages and um how to set up, let’s see. Oh, I have it right here, already bookmarked. Um, because I was thinking that that might be a good question. Um, so we talk about building play independence. So that parent who feels like my kid is not going to play, I’m not gonna, I can’t say go play, and they’ll just go pick up a bucket of Legos and play for two hours. You have to build the play independence um over time. And with infants, they’re they might play independently by looking at something interesting, but the world is interesting to them. Um, so the way to build play independence as a child grows up and and encourage more of a playful world or culture in in their what am I trying to say? Create a playful environment for your child to benefit from all these play opportunities is you have to manage environment, connection, and novelty through across the ages. So with babies, that’s easy. They’re they’re watching you do things. You can move them to tummy time, you can move them to outside on a blanket, you can have them sit and watch you while you’re doing things. Um, connection is faces and eye contact, and novelty, everything’s novel to babies. And then as they become toddlers, um new environments where they can run and and engage in their world a little bit more, um, and connections, new people, different adults, different children, children of different ages, new creatures, petting zoos type things like that, um, and novelty. Again, with toddlers, most things are novel, most things are new to them. Um, as kids get older, you have to think about these things a little bit more. What environments can you put your children into that will give them that opportunity to play? One thing that a lot of public school parents think about is where are they going after school and what how is that a good use of their time? So I hear a lot of parents saying they are feeling so guilty that their kids are in after school care. Um, and I would really like to shift that because if your kid is in after school care where they get to choose their activities and play with different varieties of kids and different variety of different items and teachers, um, but it’s not, you know, one-on-one teachers at after school care. It’s there’s five teachers for 50 kids, and the kids are kind of figuring out in a safe way, but feeling kind of independent. Um, it’s so beneficial. So, so that’s an environment where you’re kind of giving them a chance to be bored and a chance to engage with different friends and different people and and and spaces. Um, but you’re also giving them that freedom where it’s not you as a parent hovering and telling them what to do and how to play? You’re giving them that freedom. Um, so that’s novel too. So I just I want parents to not who do what their kids in after school care to kind of shift their thinking about that a little bit. Um, and then as kids get older. Can we stop there for just a minute?
Picking After School Care That Helps
Dr. Amy Moore 27:41
So, how important is um accreditation of after school programs? Like, is that a recommendation? Is if the public school runs it, is that good enough? Like, how does a parent choose an after-school program that’s going to have this benefit and be safe?
Gennie Gorback 28:01
That is such a good question. And in a lot of places, there’s not a lot of options. So if you’re lucky if you get into the one at the school and you’re not really kind of picking, it’s not like a preschool, at least where I live. It’s not like a preschool where you can tour a bunch of different ones and make sure their philosophy fits for you and all of this connections and things. In in elementary school, it’s often this is the one that’s at the school. And sometimes there’s not even enough space for every kid. So you get what you get. Um, so you have to weigh that. But if let’s let’s pretend there’s a bunch of different options. You know, some schools have ones that can can bust kids to like parks and rec programs, things like that.
Dr. Amy Moore 28:37
Um, exactly.
Gennie Gorback 28:40
I I think those are really nice. Uh um cost is often an important uh aspect of that, not even about you know taking away philosophy, like how much does it cost to send this kid to something? There’s different levels of that, what your family can do. Um, but play preferences is also really important when you’re talking about your kid. If your kid can sit with a bin of Legos for two hours, maybe go to a Lego after school camp, you know, like an after school program or something like that, or art or, you know, things like that. There’s sports ones, there’s there’s themed ones. Um there’s some just open-ended play ones where there’s there’s people watching like the one I was describing. Um and child temperament and child preferences really matters if you have the luxury of making those decisions. Not everyone does. Um, but in a perfect world, you have the luxury of making those decisions. Certain kids would be perfectly happy in this, like very kind of free-for-all, open-ended, on a playground, but with some, you know, guidance and and safety involved. Um, but other kids that might be very uncomfortable for them and they would prefer to sit in a library or you know, at a computer lab or things like that. So when making your decision for how to care for your children after school, think about what your child’s preferences are. Take some time to observe them, talk to them if they’re a little bit older and come up with what they would like to do. Often opportunities to be with friends or make new friends is really important as well. Um if you’re not able to take your child’s preferences into account, safety is most important. So go visit it if you can, look around, see cleanliness, see the educators. This is something that I tell people when they visit preschools a lot too. I like to watch how the teachers or educators or what what they call them at their after-school care are interacting with kids. Because if they’re just sitting on their phone, that person is not watching the children. But if they’re standing and scanning and a kid comes up and they’re, you know, get down on their knees and get down to their level and saying a little joke, but still scanning the rest of the play yard, then that’s kind of what I want in an after-school program, at least specifically, uh, because I want the kids to have the freedom to choose their activities, but I also want them to know where the adult is and be able to go to an adult if they need help. Um, but hopefully they can try to work out any social interactions on their own because that’s why we want them to play. We want them to be able to discuss their problems and work them out amongst themselves without punching or hitting or things like that. And they’re never going to learn how to do that if they don’t have the opportunity to try.
Sandy Zamalis 31:34
So I hear you saying that um there’s a little bit, we’re talking about it from a perspective of uh maybe a parent who’s got their kids in a public school setting or even a private school setting. Um we’re trying to, we need to be proactive in how we think about our kids’ free time and and be protective of it. Um, because I think in my head, like if my if my child was in school all day, um, I would want to be protective of that time after and want them, if a, if a I was able to have some unstructured time where they weren’t having to be at a an after-school uh event or you know, planning all of these things because that gets expensive after a while. Um, but like from a homeschool mom hat, because I was a homeschool mom, you know, there were lots of things that I had the same thing. I had to think through proactively because I wanted to create those novel experiences for my kids so that they had to interact with um other kids. And um, I got a break, I got to talk to other moms. It was super fun. But I remember doing things like gimberee, right? Where it would structured playtime or like a music center or you know, swimming lessons where they could be in a small group or those kinds of things, but also just park days, like just going to the park and letting the kids play and sitting on the bench and just watching at being the the base, right? Home base. Go play, come back. Here are snacks, yeah. Here are babies. Yeah, there you go. You need me, I’ll be right here. But just creating those opportunities just takes some proactive thinking as a parent because your kids do need that. They need those opportunities to try new things, to experience new things so that they’re able to practice, you know, all of those developmental skills in a, you know, their little petri dish of a world, right? Like, what do I do in this moment when someone steals my sandbox choice? How do I deal with that?
Gennie Gorback 33:37
Yes. And I think this is something that I’ve just as an educator, it made more sense to me than as a parent. And I was an educator before I was a parent for many years. Um, but as a parent, I wanted my kid to never struggle, to never have these hard feelings. Um, I’m my instincts, if someone’s taking her shovel, is to come over and say, oh, sorry, that was my kid’s shovel. And and I have to fight those instincts. I want to protect her all the time. And I want to, you know, I want to put her in a bubble, but she’s never going to learn how to do it herself if I’m doing it for her all the time. So I talk to teachers about the, you know, if you’re if you have a sandbox or sand table and you have every kid wants the green shovel, you don’t have to buy six green shovels. You can buy a red shovel and a blue shovel and an orange shovel and let them work it out themselves because that’s practicing for the bigger issues later. And they feel very big to I’m I’m talking about four-year-olds. They feel very big to four-year-olds right then. But if you solve that problem before giving them the opportunity to work it out themselves, you’re doing them a disservice. You’re not giving them the opportunity to grow and learn in a certain way, in in specifically in negotiating and interacting and communicating. Um, some kids need help and you can kind of guide them by giving them words to say or examples or talking about later when there’s not high emotions, or before when you know though there will be high emotions. If you know everyone wants the green shovel and you know that there’s only one green shovel, you can kind of predict that. As a parent, it’s a little bit harder because maybe you bring your favorite green shovel to this to the sandbox and someone takes it. Um, and depending on the child’s age, you can kind of guide them in how to interact with other kids without you, the parent, solving the problem for them, depending on the child’s age and abilities, of course. Yeah.
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Do Sports Count As Play
Dr. Amy Moore 37:46
So let’s go back to Dr. Gray’s five, you know, key characteristics of play. Would organized sports in childhood meet all of those criteria, or is there some some that’s missing?
Gennie Gorback 38:02
That is big I asked him that question. Okay. So he his answer was very interesting. Um the child choice. So there are kids who love organized sports. That could be it, and it depends on the child, right? So if a child loves soccer, let’s say, and that that’s all they want, please can I have soccer? Please can I have soccer? Sure, yes, you can. And then they have practice and they’re they’re so excited to go to practice. And then, you know, on on days that you’re tired or whatever, um, Dr. Gray said, You will know if it’s true play if the kid goes and gets their soccer cleats and their shin covers, whatever they’re called, shin guards, um, and says, Mom, it’s time to go. We it’s time to go to soccer. Um, that’s how you can tell it’s child choice and not parent choice. Um, sometimes the kid loves, and it can shift by day by day. If a kid’s feeling sick or tired and like, mom, I I really don’t want to go today, and you’re saying, I’m sorry, you know, we paid for this, whatever reason, you know, we we have to drive the other kids and and we have to do it today. The kid goes, oh, okay, and then they end up having fun. It’s still playful and it’s still fun, but because you kind of had to like be like, all right, here you go, go play. Um, it’s not quite a true play. But it’s still beneficial. There’s still very positive things of giving them that time and space to do something they’re interested in, even if at that moment they’re saying, I’d rather lay down on the couch. But there’s there’s still benefits to play, even if sometimes it’s not child choice at the moment.
Dr. Amy Moore 39:43
Well, and then can can parents completely come in and destroy the benefit of it from being over involved, especially as a sports mom or dad, um, can can that just erase all of the the benefit or what does that look like? Because I mean, I’ve seen sports parents just take over.
Gennie Gorback 40:09
Well, I think there’s still benefits, but if the child’s miserable, there it’s not beneficial. Um if the child is enjoying the challenge and they still want to keep doing it and they’re they’re engaging in what we call mastery play, which means trying to get better at something, um, and that’s something that they’re enjoying, and it’s internally motivated for them to continue to get better at, even if a parent is kind of being a little bit over aggressive about it. Um, it can there’s benefits. But if a child’s miserable, it’s not beneficial, of course. Um, and many children at a certain point will say, I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t like it. And at that point, it’s our job as parents to respect their wishes and find something that they do enjoy. Um, we don’t need to force children, especially into sports, if that’s not something they want to do. I think a lot of parents who played sports on their on their own, and I can’t speak to that because I I stopped volleyball after high school, but um uh they they see that as kind of a a a way to be successful, a way to learn discipline, a way to possibly get scholarships in the future. They’re really thinking about their child’s future. But if the child’s not enjoying it at the moment, it’s probably not as beneficial as the child who’s standing next to them ready to go, loving this, wanting to do it all day. And that’s the child who for this it’s true play because they are stoked on even if it’s a hot day, or you know, even if they’re not winning. They they feel down on themselves if they didn’t do something that they knew they could, but they’re motivated to keep trying, and that that’s more beneficial.
Hobbies Are Play For Life
Sandy Zamalis 41:51
You know, I keep thinking, I keep coming back to like, what’s the difference between a hobby and play? Because, like, in so in this conversation, we’re talking about it from a young kid’s perspective, right? Like, especially the little littles, and we’re developing, you know, so much uh brain power for them to take on academics and and everything that they need to learn going down the road. But I’m laughing to myself because I’m thinking, like, I still really like to play. Last night was my mahjong night. I love playing. Um, and defining those opportunities as an adult to play. Or I was thinking of, you know, my son was on a swim team for years, but the days I didn’t have to fight him to go to swim team were the days they played Ultimate Frisbee when they played Ultimate Frisbee before they went to swim practice. Not a problem at all. Because there was that, you know, camaraderie, and that was something he looked forward to. And I just think, you know, gosh, if we could think about it in terms of like letting your kids develop interests, like it’s like that laziness kind of thing, like where you were talking about where play has to look like laughter when it doesn’t. It’s just I’m really interested in this thing, and I all of my attention is going to understanding this thing. Um, we’re really developing hobbies, interests. Um, as Amy uh always points out, and I can never remember the doctor who does it, but islands of competence, right? Like we’re developing these things that they have been designed to have maybe a talent or an interest in that’s going to further them down the road. So, like we’re labeling it as play, but really we’re this is a lifelong thing that we’re trying to develop for our kids. Have interests, have hobbies, have things that give you joy. It’s Dr. Robert Brooks, by the way. Thank you.
Dr. Amy Moore 43:38
I always forget the credibility there. Yeah. Credit there.
Gennie Gorback 43:41
The happiest people you know. Why are they so happy? What do they do? What how do they spend their time? Um, and I’m speaking of adults. Um, and often it’s because they have a lot of interests and they make time for them. Sometimes it’s because they don’t have children um and they have time for that. Like I have friends. Who don’t have children who have a lot of hobbies. But if you have time to follow your interest, whatever it is, it’s valuable because it’s what brings you the joy. And again, like we say, we don’t even know for ourselves what how that benefits us. For example, my husband is very into chess and he started a local chess club, chess meetup twice a month. They have they meet up at different places and play chess. And he’s finding all these other people who play chess with him, and he’s finding friends, and it’s and it’s great socially, but it’s also he gets to play chess and get better at chess. And that’s something that’s interesting to him. I’m not going to play chess with him. I’m not interested in that at all. But he’s he’s finding that outlet. And um, for me, I I was always a crafty person. And when I have busier seasons of my life, I don’t have time to do crafts, and and I do think of it as like superfluous and um not a good use of my time when I’m in a busy season. But I’m much happier when I’m able to find, even in the busiest moments, if I’m able to find a way to do a little crafty project, I feel good and I feel happy and I feel fulfilled and I feel confident. Um, and my daughters are 10 and 7 now, and they’re I so my specialty, my expertise is in preschool, pre-K, TK, five-year-olds, four and five-year-olds. And I was always worried about the older years because I was like, well, I’m not an expert in anything older than that. What am I gonna do? But they are entering this amazing phase where we can kind of have similar hobbies. We’ve started bedazzling things. So I got this like bedazzling kit, and we’re just like finding things to bedazzle. We have fun, we found some old toys, and um, we have, let’s see, I have a pick, I found this old uh, it’s like a little wooden toy, and we’re just bedazzled putting bedazzling on it because they’re not playing with it anymore, and we’re just finding new ways to do it. And I, this is something that I love, and I find it so valuable to sit and we put on music and we’re just tipping the glue and putting the little jewels on random items, and they’re they’re not gonna get a scholarship in bedazzling. That’s not why we’re doing this. But we’re come conversing and we’re our uh our stress levels are very low. We’re enjoying ourselves, and it’s so beneficial for our relationships, our mother-daughter relationships, their sister relationships, they’re you know, but they’re also working their fine motors and math, and there’s all these skills that are going on in their brain that I might not be picking out because I’m busy bedazzling my own things. But um it’s these hobbies are play and and they’re synonymous. And sometimes as an adult, we have to call it a hobby to give ourselves permission to do it, but it’s still play, and that it’s beneficial because it brings us joy, and there are so many, in addition to the joy, which should be enough, but sometimes we don’t feel like it’s enough. There are other ways we benefit by engaging in our hobbies, what no matter what that is.
Dr. Amy Moore 47:01
So I want to go back uh to the youth sports thing real quick. Um, what I was hearing you say is that um we should not force kids to participate once it stops bringing them joy. And so, what is your advice then to parents who have the um have the mindset that if you started it, you have to finish it. We’ve paid for it, you have to stay in it. Um that is not my philosophy, but I do get questions about that a lot. Speak to that if you wouldn’t mind.
Gennie Gorback 47:33
Well, I I actually did not say that. So I said it’s no longer true play if the child is no longer feeling joy. Um I am not an expert in sports. Like I’m the last person you should really be talking to about sports, to be honest. But um, I can talk about play. And so it’s it’s no longer true play if the child is not enjoying it, but sports are very expensive. They, you know, there are a lot of benefits to them. And so I wouldn’t say take the kid out of it, let them stop immediately if they’re no longer enjoying it. Um I would say kind of help them try to find the joy if you can, um, and and try to figure out kind of be self-reflective and see if you as an adult are maybe if you’re yelling in their face while they’re trying to learn something, is maybe are your behaviors affecting their levels of joy and and affecting their enjoyment and if there’s anything you can do to help them with that. And then when it’s time to sign up again for next season, talk to them. At a certain age, they can have this decision themselves. They know if it’s something that they want to keep doing. Sometimes if their best friend’s doing it, they’ll do it anyways because they want to spend that time with their best friend. Um, so that’s a joyful for them, even if it’s not their favorite sport or whatever. So um, I think the real advice I would love to give is to find the joy and respect your children’s wishes and listen to them. Um so listen to your child. But if they’re saying, I really want to do this, um, and you’re not sure, and you you let them try it, and then they decide they don’t like it, and you’re like, oh, I was right, I knew it, what a waste of money. Like, you don’t they you don’t have to put that on your child. You can say, well, let’s think about what you love about it. Let’s think about how to make this fun. And if they’re really, really miserable, see if you can get your money back, or you know, something like that. Like, there’s ways around forcing your child. Like we talk about how important time is in a child’s life, their precious childhood. This is the only time they’re a child. We want them to use their time wisely. Some people interpret that as reading a physics book or you know, doing this physics worksheet or going to tutoring for hours and hours after school. In my opinion, that’s not the most wise use of their time. There is an open-ended play that they could be doing, or following their their own choice in in activities and and you know, things like that. Um but also are you are you making the decision for using their time wisely once they have made their decision and communicated what they want. Now, sometimes we don’t have the luxury. So moving back to like after school care, sometimes you need that babysitter to pick them up after school and bring them home, and that’s what’s going to be safe and that’s the best thing to do. Um, and they might complain, they might rather be doing a sport or they might rather be doing an art class or things like that. And sometimes your family just can’t do that. So, how can you find the joy in the place where the child is, meet them where they are, meet them where they need to be for whatever reason going on with your family? Um, create an environment for play. If the child has to be home with, you know, grandma napping on the couch for safety, but that they have to get home. How can you set up an environment where they can engage in play even if they’re by themselves or even if they have a friend over? Or, you know, things like that, that you can really create this culture of play where the child knows that you value their play and you value their interests. And that alone is going to help their confidence levels and their um their dry internal drive to follow what they’re interested in, which of course is going to benefit them in their future career, whatever that is.
Invitations To Play That Work
Sandy Zamalis 51:26
We’re talking about a lot of macro ideas of play here. But one of the things I love about your book is that you give parents a lot of like mini homework assignments about how to start reintroducing play if it has not been a priority in your home. So let’s go there. What kinds of things could we give our listeners? Like we want to just try to start incorporating this mindset of play. What are some very small little baby steps we can take to uh have those little homework assignments?
Gennie Gorback 51:58
Um, have you heard the concept of invitations to play? Is this something that you’ve talked about before? So, just for anyone who doesn’t know, an invitation to play is an item or items set up in a way that’s interesting to the child’s eye, that’s basically saying, Come play with me. Um, you know how chefs create like this beautiful plate of food because you eat with your eyes first. We we say kids play with their eyes first too, if they are seeing children. Um, so there’s different ways you can set up an invitation to play. If you um know your child loves play-doh, for example, you can leave the play-doh on the shelf and say, go play with the play-doh. That’s one way. That’s your vision, you’re verbally inviting them to play. Or if you know they’re gonna come home after school, probably grumpy. Again, this is kids who go to school outside the home, or you know, if you’re homeschooling when they wake up in the morning and you’re getting ready, you can leave an invitation to play for those exact moments. So a tray, there’s different levels, right? So you can leave it on the shelf, the play-doh, or you can put it on a tray with some tools next to it. That alone, for some kids, just putting a tray on the table where it not isn’t normally is going to engage in some, you know, curiosity and ideas. And the kid might come over and try to open, try to open that play-doh container themselves, which is very difficult. So you might have to help them with that. Um or you could go a little bit bigger and you could open the play-doh for them and put it out on a nice uh can in an interesting bowl or put it in like a swirl shape and put some animals next to it. Um, or you could go even bigger and you could create a playscape with multiple colors of play-doh where you make a little scene and you put animals there, like walking around on the playscape, and and and leave that. But you’re still getting out of the way. You’re just leaving something. There’s novelty there. It’s toys that they already own. You’re not buying them new toys every single day. You’re leaving something that to engage their their curiosity, saying, Well, what can I do? Some kids would prefer an invitation to smash. And this is where I might create a castle or a sculpture out of Play-Doh and leave it there with a lobster mallet or, you know, a hammer of some sort next to it. That kid’s gonna know what to do with that. They’re going to have the time of their life smashing that Play-Doh castle. But I’m over here in the kitchen doing what I need to do. So when they’re done smashing it, they’re gonna say, okay, now what? And I don’t have to tell them. And they might build, I don’t know, a cloud or something, some like table, or you know, I don’t know, whatever they want to build. So maybe an animal, I don’t know. We don’t want to encourage that, but like, and then they can build things up for themselves if the kids by themselves, of course, um, to smash and being that might be fun, or then you might be able to say, Oh, I actually have these um marbles, and you just put a bowl of marbles next to them and see what they can do. And we’re not smashing the marbles, but they might put it in the building and build with that. And so there’s ways to use what you already have to engage a child’s curiosity and get them to play because sometimes we get so frustrated because kids say they’re bored when they’re like sitting in the middle of a room that has shelves after shelves of toys, and you’re like, oh my gosh, I just bought you all these toys, or you just had a birthday and you got 20 new toys, and they’re sitting right there. And you were begging for this toy, and we got it for you, and now you’re ignoring it. It’s like it’s not there. It’s not their fault. It’s it becomes kind of wallpaper. Their brain is primed to ignore things that are in the same place every day. So set up that invitation to play with the play-doh, which you know they like, or a new toy that they got from their for their birthday three months ago and haven’t engaged, they played with it for hours that first day, and then they put it on the shelf and haven’t engaged with it. Put it on a table somewhere. Put it in a doll bed, like even if it’s like a robot, like something curious like that. They’re going to want to engage with it. And if not, maybe it’s time to get rid of that toy because it means that it’s no longer engaging, and and you can give it to someone who would want to play with it. Um, and that’s another way to we talk a little bit about clutter and and what what it means to have in a playful environment without it looking like a preschool classroom, which I personally don’t mind because I love a preschool classroom or a Regio classroom would be beautiful. But um, some parents they don’t want their house to look like a preschool classroom, and I don’t blame them. So there are ways to do to do that as well. Um we do talk about what shelves you use really matter, what you put the toys in. A lot of parents don’t want to see the clutter, but the kids are not going to remember that they have these toys unless they visually see it. So that trick of taking something out, just an invitation. My mother actually does this when she watches our kids. Um, she has just a coffee table, a big square coffee table. And every time the kids come over, she puts out multiple ideas of stuff to play with. And she said she got it from our book, but she’s been doing it for longer, so so we can’t take credit. But she puts sometimes it’s new things, you know, sometimes it’s a craft kit. My kids are the crafty one. Um, sometimes it’s just um pipe cleaners. And she’ll just put pipe cleaners out in like a little rainbow order and and let they’ll just go to town and and make crazy craft projects because they’re given the time and space to do it. But we have thousands of pipe cleaners at my house in the craft drawer. Why aren’t they using it? Because it’s just not in a novel space and it’s not kind of pulling at their attention in the same way that my mother is doing that by leaving it on the kit the coffee table when they arrive, looking for something to play at the right time. Does that make sense?
Sandy Zamalis 57:48
And sometimes kids just need you to narrow it down, right? Like it’s just too overwhelming. There’s too many options of things to play with. I mean, I used to do that with my son at the library. Like I we’d say, go pick a book, and he would be like, What? So I lit we’d literally have to pull like you know five or six and go, which one of these looks interesting? Like I would try to pick and choose what I thought he might like. And so he could at least narrow it down. But there is something too, you know, visually overstimulating environments, or you know, just having too many toys to choose from. Um, or, you know, if you can narrow it down in some way or do it in an interesting or unique way that might reignite an interest in an item that they haven’t looked at in a long time, like the pipe cleaners or making cool, you know, ornaments for the season or yeah, or all you have to do is put it in the giveaway pile.
Dr. Amy Moore 58:41
And as soon as they see it in the giveaway pile, it’s novel again, right?
Gennie Gorback 58:46
Oh, yeah. And I never believe you would ever give that away. I love it. And I often say, When was the last time you played with it? And of course they don’t know. If you haven’t played with it in two years, I’m getting rid of it. But I’m gonna play with it now, mom. And I’ll say, Okay, I’m watching.
Gennie Gorback 59:04
Yeah.
Where To Find The Book
Dr. Amy Moore 59:06
Danny, how can our listeners find more from you?
Gennie Gorback 59:10
Oh goodness. Um, we have a website for our book. Um, but our book is it’s it’s available wherever books are sold. You can buy it on Amazon, you can buy it at Barnes and Noble, you can buy it at Target. It’s at Walmart, I just found out, which is pretty cool. Um uh bookshop.org if you want to shop independent. Um, so I recommend getting it. Um, that would be great for us. We appreciate it. Um, you can find me. My personal page is on Instagram at GorbakPack. Gorbak is my last name. G-O-R-B-A-C-K-P-A-C-K. And our book has its own Instagram as well. Um, and it’s go dot play underscore the dot book. We had to get creative with the punctuation, so hopefully it’s not too confusing. Um we are active on mostly Instagram, I think, but um, we really appreciate you learning about play and taking the time to respect your children enough to make time and space for them to play because the society is going to be better if we all let our children play. I truly believe this. So um thank you to everybody who’s taking the time to listen to this.
Dr. Amy Moore 1:00:20
Yeah, thanks for being with us today. This was insightful and fun and full of energy. And we really appreciate you taking your time out of your busy schedule to bless our listeners with your knowledge and wisdom. Yeah. Thank you so much. All right, let’s close this show. So, listeners, thank you so much for choosing to spend this hour with us every week. Um, we love it, we appreciate it. And uh, if you want more from us, you can find us on social media at the Brainy Moms. You can go to our website where you can sign up for our free newsletter at theBrainymoms.com, and you can find Sandy on TikTok at the Brain Trainer Lady. Look, that is all the smart stuff that we have for you this week. We hope you feel a little bit smarter after spending this hour with us. We will catch you next time.