Thoughts for the Week:

One of the most misleading phrases in our language is "child's play." We use it to suggest something that's easy to do, something trivial. But it's not - not by any means. When children play, they're working. I once heard a four year old at nursery school tell his mother, "You can leave now; I have work to do." For children, play is both a serious and necessary business: a way for them to try on different roles, pretend to be bigger than they really are, stronger than they really are, or even, at times, smaller than they really are. And playing gives children a chance to rehearse for events that may be worrisome to them - a visit to the doctor, a first haircut, or the first day of school. By pretending about such things, children can find out how they feel about them. When grownups are alert to children's play and pretending, they can often help children with their fears by letting them know what will happen in the course of a new experience and, just as important, what won't.