09/15/2024
I’ve posted about this previously, but at the start of a new year it’s worth revisiting.
‘How Not To Cheat Children’ is the seminal 1972 essay by the architect Simon Nicholson who developed the loose parts theory, and if you’ve never read it, then definitely make it your quest to do so 🙏🏻
Because when you do, you’ll unearth the fact that loose parts isn’t just about play or ‘what we do in Early Years’, it’s a deeply political statement about elitism and how children are cheated by a system that very quickly negates who they are.
Now and again, people feel the need to come into my DMs and tell me ‘not to be political’ or ‘I only want to hear about play and ideas’. I’ll say it again for those at the back: play’s ability to even exist is connected to politics and its negation is the direct product of political choices - capitalism, neoliberalism, colonialism, market forces, profit before people - so I absolutely will be political against all these things even if that means sharing about the wider world.
All is connected, and every day when we step into our settings, we are at the whim of a political agenda - in the same way we are when we step out of it.
Yet play - that beautiful, joyous miracle from the soul - is where democracy and solidarity truly live, where children are who they really are, and I, just like you, am going to continue to strive to make that happen for them.
Let’s go…
👧🏻👦🏾not🤖🤖
