Hi, this is Janet Lansbury. Welcome to Unruffled. Today I'm going to share your stories. This is my favorite thing to do.
Not only because I love hearing about your experiences and I'm so grateful that you share with me, but also because I feel like as a parent, hearing other parents stories of how it's working for them can be instructive and encouraging and motivating. I've shared two of these podcast episodes this year that are about success stories. The first one was back in January, crying, screaming, resisting sadness, your best responses to your kids emotions. And then a bit later, I think it was in the spring discipline that works your best responses to your kids behaviors.
So if you haven't checked those out, you may wish to if you were like me and you really enjoy hearing stories from parents. In this episode, I'm excited to share stories about play, how it's going with parents who want to encourage their kids to gain all the benefits of self directed play. All kinds of play has benefits, right? Playing with us, playing with peers, it's nothing but positive.
And it's the best way for children to learn, build social skills, explore creativity. It has the therapeutic value being able to play. We tend to play out experiences that maybe trouble us or confuse us. Children have all these incredible instincts to learn this way and it takes a lot of heart play, right?
Because we can allow them to do all these things that we thought maybe we had to teach them or show them. And we find that they can learn most of these concepts naturally. They're motivated to from infancy. So before I share these stories, I just want to offer a few basic guidelines that I recommend for encouraging children's inner directed instinctive play.
I often also call it independent play because it's not dependent on any other kind of entertainment. It's all coming from their own ideas. So how do we encourage this? We value play.
We know that every child can do this and every child can receive the learning and the emotional health benefits. So we develop a routine that prioritizes play in all the in betweens of our day. So it's almost like the default when we're not doing a meal or getting ready for a transition or taking our child on an outing, or even on an outing, we can allow our child to self direct their play. There's at least one example of that in the stories that I'm going to be sharing, but especially when children are just home having downtime.
We begin as early as possible actually to make time for play in our daily routines where usually after we have breakfast, you have time to play. Or maybe that's when you go to school or care, ideally at your school or care, you're mostly playing in these early years especially. So whatever our day looks like with our children, whenever there's time, we want to try to recognize that this is a special opportunity that we can give our child. So all of that is valuing play.
The second guideline I want to share is to have boundaries in the environment and with us in regard to play. Before play can be free to a child, it has to be in a situation where it's safe, where they're not getting stuck nagging us, nagging us that they need us to do something or to play for them or to entertain them in some way. Those boundaries are what free children like. Boundaries always do.
Actually, boundaries aren't this negative thing. They're what allow children to be able to let go of the environment or of us and enjoy their play. Third, trust your child to follow their inner direction and don't interrupt. So this is a hard part for us as parents because most of us, especially me, want to give our child an idea for how we think they could make this better.
Or we want to remind them, oh, you should finish that. You took all the pieces out. No. Are you going to put them back?
Those are kind of adult ways of thinking that we have, and there's nothing wrong with them, but they can be interruptive to our child's flow. It's just something to consider, at least part of the time or as much as possible to allow play to really belong to our children. Because we do value it, we do want to make time for it. And children thrive best in it when they feel like we trust them to make play their own.
And then the fourth point, do less, observe more, enjoy most. That's a quote from Magda Gerber that you may have heard. And yes. So just kind of keeping that in the back of our mind, oh, maybe we need to go to this activity or that or do that thing, or I need to pull out a game for them or a craft project.
Oftentimes less is more. I'm not saying never do those things, of course, but realizing that we don't have to and that children, they don't need as much stimulation as we might need as adults or we might like as adults. They're in a much slower paced frame of mind. They take things in slower, they absorb everything.
So a lot of stimulation could be too much for them. Maybe we take them somewhere special, to the zoo or whatever. And ideally they need time in between to assimilate those experiences, process them instead of going straight into something else. So that's one of the big ways that developmentally they're a lot different from us as adults.
Okay. So with those guidelines, value play. So we're going to develop a routine that prioritizes it. Boundaries in the environment.
Trust your child, follow their introduction, don't interrupt and four, do less, observe more, enjoy most. We all want to do that, right? We want to enjoy most. So these are ways you can do that.
And that's what these parents are finding. Okay, I decided to share these in age order. So we're starting with this one. About a five and a half month old, and this parent takes sort of a circuitous path to talking about play.
But I just wanted to share as much of a story as possible so you can get the idea of where she's coming from. Okay. She says, My son is five and a half months now, and I was fortunately introduced to Ry Magda Gerber and your work when he was three and a half months. We already see such beneficial transformation.
His first three months were a great treasure to both of us. My approach was somewhat Waldorf or Montessori. Equipped with plenty of books, I still couldn't find much great detail on how to guide the first days or months of an infant's life. So while passionately still researching for a better way of parenting, I was still using the conditioned approach of not allowing my baby to cry until slowly everything started to the rocking to sleep needed an extra hopping or swinging the entertainment with songs needed to be continuous and more flashy.
Our baby became too heavy for slings. Everything needed to change and fast. And that's when I found your blog. I was looking for answers on the entertainment issue, and the more I was reading, the more I was naturally hooked.
I found all the answers I was looking for and so much more. The transition to your approach was not so smooth and suddenly we found we had on our hands a normal crying baby. We'd never heard or allowed him to cry before. It took about two weeks for him to readjust to the new way of playing.
In the beginning, he would get very frustrated if he couldn't reach a toy, and for some time I thought that it was his personality that was playing out. But slowly he and I relaxed about it. And now at times he can complain a little, but it's mostly just when he's tired. He can play now for a passionate 20 to 40 minutes without being interrupted.
Sleeping is also so much better. After a Little bit of crying with our affectionate support, he falls asleep on his own, and everyone is so much more fulfilled and happy. Okay, so she's talking about this transition of adjusting to less. And that's what comes up for a lot of us.
When we started out with a lot of entertainment and stimulation and avoidance of the flow of feelings that children have beginning as babies, it is really hard for us to hear when they cry. Right. It's impossible for us to hear. But there are ways of responding to that that encourage children to share it rather than being distracted out of it.
And when we start valuing play because we realize our child can do this, even as a baby, they can have some moments where they're taking in their environment. And this is so positive. And it builds into the kind of play that actually looks like play to us, where they're moving around the room, exploring and experimenting with the materials that we've chosen for them. It starts with just having those times where they can be present in the environment without us doing a big show around it.
Now, you've probably heard me say in my articles and books and probably been on this podcast at some point that I was convinced I needed to entertain my baby. I was pulling cords that made stuffed animals play music, and I was dangling them right in front of her face. Had her in a seat where she couldn't really move her body very well or stretch herself out without kind of slipping out of the seat. But I thought that I needed to fill her up with stuff and learning and entertainment.
And the truth is, I didn't really see her until I backed off on that and then observed and saw, wow, she's got a lot to think about. She's looking around. She's got a lot to do. And this is three months old, so it can be a big eye opener and actually start us on a path where our child feels more comfortable engaging in activities without our involvement, which has a lot of benefits for both of us, actually.
Okay, here's the next one. Hello, Janet. I'm an early childhood educator by training. I taught toddlers and preschoolers for over a decade and also spent several years doing parent education and home visiting.
I'm taking a break from my career now to raise my daughter, who is nine months old. Your work resonates with me and what I've always believed children to be capable of. They're fully in charge of their development, and their purposeful, important play deserves our respect and attention. My partner and I have loosely followed many of your teachings with our daughter, and it has become clear to us these past weeks how strong, competent and capable she has already become.
Has been all along, really. I'm sitting on the living room couch folding laundry. This afternoon, my daughter set out on what we call a crawl, about to do baby stuff. I checked on her a few minutes ago and found her sitting on the floor of her bedroom, a yes space.
A few toys and books strewn about, playing with a clean, empty plastic bottle, happy, busy and unaware that I even popped my head in her room to check on her. So absorbed she was in her baby stuff. Just now, I heard her cry out for help. She had closed the baby gate and had locked herself in her room.
She wanted out and I was happy to oblige. She went back to play. I went back to the laundry. Thank you, Janet, for continuing to advocate for what young children need most.
Loving, respectful caregivers and uninterrupted time to play. So thank you to this parent. She did bring up the yes space. That's actually the term that I created to describe the boundaried space that helps us not to have to say no, no, no, which is not a fun thing to do.
Be constantly vigilant with a child because of what they might do. So we make a place that is 100% safe for our baby to be in. And then if we want to go do the laundry or whatever, then we know that they're going to be safe. Now, this parent, she opened the gate, which won't work for every child, but she can see that her daughter was involved in it.
Nine months. It's probably a pretty safe thing to do. Just to show her you're not afraid of leaving it open. And to be listening, of course, to hear what she's up to and make sure she's not getting out and getting into an unsafe place.
But what bliss, right? I trust you. I see what you're doing. You're busy, you're doing your play, I'm doing my work.
It's this comfortable way that we can be together with children that's very freeing for both of us. But yeah, we have to start by valuing this and then making space for it with boundaries, being comfortable with these boundaries and then not needlessly interrupt our children and observing and enjoying. That's what this parent got to do. And she got to get her things done as well.
This is a gift that every family can make happen. If you want this. All right, here's the next one. Just wanted to share my 10 and a half month old daughter's playtime with you.
We're unpacking from a trip. And at first I was flustered that I'd left her with the bags and she'd strewn items all over the floor. I typically only give her a couple of items to play with at once. I stood and watched as she played with a plastic bowl and two headbands for 20 minutes, putting them in, dumping them out, putting one in, then both, and so on.
Thank you for teaching me to stand back and allow her to learn and to celebrate discovery. Yes. So this is one of my favorite types of play, the kind that happens totally unexpectedly. Right.
Sounds like she wasn't in a play space. She was wherever they were unpacking. But the baby found some things to do and rather than following the urge that people like me have to say, oh, don't do that, that's not for you. Don't make a mess, whatever.
We try to see from our child's point of view, if possible. And our job is so much easier the more we can connect with that and try to see from their view a lot of the time, see through their lens. These are the same as any toy to a child. These items, everything is to explore, everything is to experiment with.
And as long as it's safe and this parent didn't have to rush to be somewhere, why not let it happen and then. Wow. The attention span, right? People think that babies have short attention spans.
That's not at all the case. They might have a short attention span when we're stimulating them or showing them something that we want them to learn. But when it's all up to them and it comes from their interest, they can have a surprisingly long attention span. And imagine how positive it is getting to practice sustaining that kind of attention.
Okay, here's another one I'd like to share. A win I had the other day with my 13 month old. Each morning after breakfast, we go into the play space and my little one always immediately goes over the books and selects her favorites for me to read to her. She's very insistent, pushing the book into my hand and sitting herself in my lap.
We would read maybe 10 to 15 books each morning. Sometimes we'd only get through a few pages before she'd grab the book, throw it, and go pick another one, repeat ad nauseam. It got to the point where I would almost dread going into the play space each morning because she would completely ignore all her other toys, even activities I'd set out the night before. I realized we didn't need to be locked into this routine.
I'm not Going to destroy our love of books by changing this pattern. The next morning, we went to the play space as usual. She selected a book, I read it and maybe three more, and then I told her I was done reading. She didn't even seem to mind that much.
She seemed almost relieved. I was able to leave her while I made my tea, and when I came back, she was quietly reading to herself. Since then, there have been a few tears and a little bit of anger when I've said no. But overall, she accepts the boundary and her independent play has gotten so much better.
She doesn't seem to need me to be involved in her activities as much, although I do love to sit and watch her play. So this is a really common situation that we can fall into as parents, especially with something like books, right? We want our children to love books. And it can be scary to say, we're not going to read more books.
Are we going to discourage them? But this parent realized that boundaries are actually, especially when they're reflecting what we want to do or don't want to do. We're being honest about our needs with our child. We're letting them know us that we don't want to read 10 to 15 books every morning.
Especially if she's almost, like, testing it out, I'll bring another and another. How many will my parent do? Children are so aware and intelligent. This way, they really, really have our number.
So the parent realized she could say no. And instead of that ruining her child's love of books or play, it actually freed her child to play and let go of her parent, which is what asserting our boundaries always does. Children may react negatively very emotionally to them, but inside a part of them is saying, okay, phew, I don't have to try to control this too. I don't have to be the one in charge of my parent here with books.
They can take charge and free me to not have to do this. So the more we can see boundaries that way with everything, the easier it's going to be for us, because we can see this as such a positive, loving thing to do for ourselves, too, that we're getting to be honest about our feelings with our child. We're not just trying to cater to them out of fear that somehow being ourself with them is going to ruin something when it's actually the opposite. We free them, we help them.
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Learn more at telus.com onlinesecurity no one can prevent all cybercrime or identity theft conditions apply. Okay, here's another one we recently had to attend a family funeral with my daughter and her two cousins, four and six years old, as the only young children in attendance. In the family room before the ceremony, we cracked out the crayons and paper and I let my 18 month old daughter explore the new space where she would be spending the next few hours. I explained to her earlier that morning how the day would unfold, what would happen, and that some of the adults would seem a bit sad.
She soon went over to a small side table, toddler height, and without my prompting or showing her, picked up some crayons and paper and proceeded to draw and talk to herself for at least 20 to 30 minutes, occasionally showing me her work. I was sitting close by quietly observing, narrating and engaging when she made eye contact, but really enjoying watching her do her thing. It was such a treat to see her enter the zone. All of her relatives remarked in a surprised tone how well she entertains herself and plays with herself.
They were amazed that an 18 month old could be so quiet and independent and well behaved. She does have her clingy moments, but I always respond by acknowledging and where possible fulfilling her request for closeness. But when I can't, I calmly explained that I can't right now for X reason. Hands full, need to go into the car, need to go to the bathroom, etc.
So a couple things there. The boundaries again coming into this are comfort with setting boundaries. That's how we encourage play to happen. But what do we have here?
We have the parent was very respectful in communicating to her daughter what was going to happen even though her daughter's only 18 months old. It really makes a difference when kids know and that's one of the reasons to make play part of our daily routine so the kids are able to anticipate this is what's going to be happening and then they can come into that situation feeling on top of it and being able to confidently fulfill their role in that situation. It gives them a better chance of doing that when we help them to know in this big world where everything seems very unpredictable to them. A lot of the time that you can be on top of this, you can predict this, you're a part of this because I'm sharing it with you.
So then she was able to do this amazing thing, right, which is also therapeutic to be able to go into my space of comfort in an uncomfortable situation because children are picking up everybody's feelings and the parent was amazing. She let the child know that adults may be feeling sad around her, so she was able to find a place of comfort in that through her independent play and because her parent had respectfully prepared her for the situation. All right, here's another one. I've recently been introduced to your website and podcast, and I've started incorporating some rye strategies in raising my son, who's 21 months.
I had an incredible parenting lesson this week that I wanted to share with you. Our playdate that morning had been cancelled, so I offered my son the option of going to gymnastics or going to the science museum. He was very interested in the science museum. So we began our morning routine of getting out the door roughly in time for the grocery shopping and going to the museum before returning home for lunch.
There was story time at the museum at 10:30, which I knew he'd enjoy, so I kept things moving that morning to ensure we could do the shop and make it there by 10:30. I was struggling to get my son to focus on putting on his shoes, jacket and hat. He wanted to play with the door instead. Finally, feeling more and more rushed and frustrated, I got him outside and let him wander around a bit while I put things into the car.
He kept asking to walk and I explained to him that we wouldn't walk to the museum as it was too far and we needed to go into the car. Asking him if he was ready to get into the car and he said no, which I respected in that moment. Then I suggested we walk and get the mail and do a little walking before getting in the car. It was sunny and the birds were singing and he was having such a great time.
Usually that little redirect and saying yes to something for him is enough for him to agree that it's time to get into the car afterwards without a fuss. But he was still resisting. Instead, he wanted to throw sticks and rocks down a little hill by the driveway. I hovered in the garage near the car, growing impatient and telling him that we're going to miss the story time and we're not going to have much time at the museum since we needed to get groceries and get home for a nap.
Then something just clicked in my brain. Why was I hung up on getting him to the museum if he was happy here? It was something that he wanted to do, and if he no longer wanted to go, I really didn't care one way or another. Yes, we needed to get groceries, but it could be later that morning or in the afternoon, and he was very obviously having a wonderful time.
My agenda didn't need to trump this lovely outdoor independent play that my son was having. So I grabbed my thermos of tea and sat in the sun on my back stoop and watched my son play for nearly an hour and a half. Completely contentedly. He threw rocks, sticks, leaves, and walnut shells.
He wandered around the backyard in search of more things to throw. It was lovely. I just slowed down enough to see that we didn't need to go to a story time or a science museum for a fun morning. I followed his lead and we were both much happier.
A true win for both of us. Thank you for your insights. I look forward to continuing my own growth as a parent. So I feel like I had a version of this story as a parent many times that this thing that we had planned that I thought was gonna be really cool wasn't necessarily what my child would want to do as much as doing much less and just hanging out and getting to connect with their own simpler interests.
So I love that this parent shared this story. This parent was able to let go of their agenda, do less, and just enjoy what was. Enjoy what their child was expressing. What a gift, right, that children can give us, but we don't take them up on it a lot of the time because we really get stuck in our different way of seeing things.
So, brilliant lesson. I feel like, okay, here's another one. Last weekend I saw that my three and a half year old son was playing with letter magnets on the fridge. And I was about to jump in and start talking to him and playing with him when I reminded myself to take a minute to observe what he was doing on his own.
First, it turned out he was arranging the fridge magnets along a beam of sunlight that was falling across the frid. I almost missed this beautiful moment by jumping in and controlling a play. Glad I took a moment to value what he was doing first. Okay, I love that.
Like the parent in the last story, this parent was able to catch herself and say, wait, this is me. What about them? And maybe their play has enough value that I should observe more, do less, and let their interest take priority. So, last but not least, here's a really short one that could maybe be my favorite example of all, because it's this mini masterclass in letting go of peer pressure and conventional notions of what play and learning should look like.
At the park where there are lots of kids, the toys that they have brought with them and the play equipment my 3 year old chooses to explore, picking up a stick, inserting it through the gaps in the bench, and then climbing underneath to retrieve it and start over. That's it. That's the whole story. And this parent sounds so comfortable in the way they're viewing their child.
So I hope these stories have maybe encouraged you or inspired you. I just want to say that after I did the Success Story podcast episode on Discipline and Boundaries, I did get a note from someone saying that this actually made them feel like, why am I not getting it right? Why is it not working for me and all these other people? Which is obviously the last thing that I want in sharing these, that someone would feel discouraged hearing this.
Please know I have many posts, many podcast episodes all about how to make this happen for yourself and your child. You can just do a search with my name and play and you're going to find many resources or you can go straight to my website. All my articles and podcasts and transcripts are there for free and you can read or listen to the step by step advice for how to do this. Because no, there's nothing wrong with this for this not working.
It's some very specific information that isn't mainstream. There's a nuanced process, but every parent is capable of it, every child is capable and we all need this kind of joy in our lives, I feel as parents. So I hope you'll take me up on it if you do have questions and look into some of the resources that I've already shared on this topic. Thank you so much again to all of these parents for trusting me with your stories and thanks to everybody for listening.
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