Pre-school, play and strengthening children’s emotional resilience
I think sometimes that everyone forgets that an ordinary, developmentally appropriate pre-school experience provides a wonderful place for an emotionally healthy child to continue on their healthy path. It helps them to learn to cope without their parents for short whiles, gives developmentally appropriate emotional separating a good flavour to a healthy child and socialises them to cope in a group, preparing them for the big wide world away from the cosy family group.
But for children with much, much less than perfect home conditions ,and/ or children who have experienced trauma, abuse, bereavement and/or neglect it can be a safe place to go to learn a very different way of being. They observe and experience good nurturing care from a stable, emotionally healthy pre-school trained adult. And the ordinary pre-school play experiences can provide a measure of play therapy if the teacher is able to emotionally contain the group sufficiently.
This experience may not entirely heal a troubled child but it could go some way in processing some of their painful experiences, provide some good attachment experiences and some formation of emotional resilience that could make all the difference in that troubled child’s life. Yes the child may a/ways trail a broken wing a little but maybe s/he will be capable of some flight – some ability to manage a reasonably satisfactory life.
Let’s let pre-school children PLAY – and have lots of time to play in their own way.