Parallel play is often misunderstood as a barrier to the growth of children and toddlers. Children develop even though they are subject to such kind of a tendency. The following essay delivers different aspects of parallel play and focuses on uprooting the so-called fear regarding parallel play in young children and toddlers. Parents should not doubt their upbringing as, after a certain period of time, children themselves start becoming social and take interest in other children as well. No doubt parents do play an important role in helping their offspring to try and mix up with other children of their age group. Finally, what they can only do is give their children ample time to pull themselves out of solitary play and start getting social and friendly with the rest of the kids. It would require enough patience and not worry over this aspect of childhood. There is nothing serious about this as most of the parents think it is. Parallel play is just another phase in the lives of their children. The essay will eventually guide you through different aspects regarding parallel play in young children and will also prove that it has nothing got to do with nurture.
Parallel play… Is it nature or nurture? Why is this such a troubling aspect of people’s lives? Why can’t society just let it be? Why can’t we give our children the time of their own? Is it necessary to make an issue out of such a trivial affair? Can’t we just take it easy? After all, it’s all about our kids. It’s all about the growing process. There is nothing to fret about. The only thing d they surely will as and when they grow up. Children usually enter into parallel playing at the age of 2-3. But, as they grow, they start communicating with we can do is, give our children enough time to accustom themselves to the social environment. Another child of their age. According to some studies, the parallel play also means a group of children working on a common topic. Since they are working together and there are no viewers. But mostly, the ghost of parallel play is restricted to children playing solitarily.
Even though there are other children present in the same room, still some children restrain themselves from solitary play. To play is to learn to live in this world in a skilled and competent way. The four main types of play that help children grow in these ways are solitary play, parallel play, associative play, and cooperative play. Solitary play happens when a child is playing by him or herself (Gordon 404, http://www.exampleessays.com/viewpaper/15100.html). For example, if a child is playing with blocks, he/she while stacking the blocks is developing his/her motor skills. Children while busying themselves in such a game develop their fine motor skills as well as cognitive skills. Motor skills because they use their finger muscles, toe muscles, and facial muscles. Cognitive skills include the cause and effect during the play. These skills include reasoning, perception, and intuition.
Play enhances the child’s ability to cope up with problems and to solve them in the best way they can. Play also increases the creative ability of a child and also in later life, help them to achieve higher grades in school. Were it not for play, it would have been very difficult to enhance all these qualities in our children. It would have been very troublesome to especially incorporate creativity, problem-solving capacity, motor skills, cognitive skills, and the like. There are some skills that one develops only during play and we don’t have any other alternative where we can grab them. Parallel play is one such activity where children learn various skills which they would not have been able to develop had there been no play. Parallel play, hence, can be said to be both a nature among children along a means to nurture them by instilling in them in values explained above. Skills can only be taught when children involve themselves in real-life incidences. Though such practical knowledge is imparted in almost all schools; but when we talk about parallel play, it’s a different matter altogether. Having emphasized enough the cognitive skills, let’s take a broad outlook on the motor skills.
Fine motor skills are those skills that allow you to develop the ability to do such things as write and manipulate small objects. There are many ways in which children develop their motor skills through parallel play. For example, while painting, the finer the brush they use, the better their grip becomes. This in turn helps them to write better when they grow big enough to join the school. Also, while playing with puzzles, children tend to sharpen their thinking ability. They have to decide whether they need the larger blocks or the smaller ones. This also increases their deciding capability. Then, further while cutting, it needs a lot of coordination. Haphazard cutting doesn’t give the children any specialty. But, once they start paying more attention, they tend to do it with more precision. Also, threading is the perfect way to develop a child’s fine motor skills. Putting the beads in the thread or string also requires a lot of patience and concentration.
Then, if we talk about the gross motor skills that the children develop through parallel play, we see that the gross motor skills include activities like running, jumping. Such tasks also require a lot of balance and coordination. Don’t worry if the child falls or trips over something. This will only urge him to get up and repeat the task. This also makes the children physically fit and fine. It doesn’t let them get prone to lethargy. Next, Climbing is an innate characteristic of children. When as toddlers, parents must have noticed their babies trying to climb all the heights they could possibly find in their surroundings. This characteristic gets better and better as and when they grow up and their muscles become stronger and fitter. This is also one way in which children develop their gross motor skills through parallel play. Also, when children are given a paper with dots all over it and they are asked to join the dots, such activity also increases and enhances the motor skills of a child. Even the landscape where the children are put improves children’s skills since they have to tackle the rough and uneven surfaces. This gives them a chance to utilize their bodily skills and enhances their problem-solving capability. (Psychology for Physical Educators: Student in Focus- By FEPSAC Staff, Jarmo Liukkonen, European Sport Psychology Association books.google.co.in)
In other words, parallel play is also a child’s nature as well as it nurtures a child to be able to make himself capable of solving his own problems and to be able to ready himself to face problems when the child grows up to be an adult citizen. The more the children involve in parallel play, the more they will be able to increase their cognitive and fine motor as well as gross motor skills. So, parallel play should not be seen with frightened eyes. It’s not that the children who indulge in parallel play are not able to grow properly or are not able to enhance their basic skills. It’s not that only in school would they get to learn such skills. Parallel play plays a very important and unbeatable role in shaping the child’s highly required adeptness to equip him to face the world and welcome it with complete confidence.
Social skills are something, which develops in due course of their growing period. The parallel play has a very short life span. It is only seen in children among the age group of 2-3 years. But even though it is not been prevalent for a long time, it’s essential for children that they pick up as many skills as they can while they fall between the mentioned age group. After this period passes away, then comes the period when children start mingling with other children of their age group. When children start going to schools, they start communicating with children who share the same classroom. They play with each other and share their own thoughts and ideas. It is then when the curtain falls staging a parallel play. Then maybe the parents take a sigh full of relief thinking that now the state of parallel play has passed away. But they sometimes don’t realize that it is that parallel play that has brought their children to such a state where they can face the real world with enthusiasm and confidence. It is then when the parents realize that parallel play is nothing to fear of. It is nothing to worry about. It is then when they realize the worth of parallel play. Social skills are not hard to develop. But if we talk about development regarding the basic skills, it is an only a parallel play that can serve the purpose. We must therefore make sure that we don’t have negative notions regarding parallel play. Instead, we must promote it among our children. Hence, one can deduce that parallel play is nature as well as nurture.
References
Author, Gordon 404. 2008, Web.
Author, Jarmo Liukkonen, European Sport Psychology Association –Psychology for Physical Educators: Student in Focus– By FEPSAC Staff, 2008, Web.