Teaching Children to Prioritize Play

This post was sponsored by Landscape Structures as part of an Influencer Activation for Influence Central. All opinions expressed in my post are my own

As adults, we don’t often know how to relax and have a good time. The idea of playing takes a back seat to work, household chores, and other responsibilities. Play is such an important part of childhood (and adulthood if we are willing to admit it). As parents, it’s so important to teach kids to prioritize play and help them develop healthy ways to get out energy, relieve stress, and enjoy life.

How do you teach kids to prioritize play?

Children naturally prioritize play but as they grow older, they often lose that. As parents, it is so important to encourage them to regularly make play a part of their life as they grow. There’s a few things we can do to help them along the way:

• Let them see you playing. Kids do what we do. If we are all work and no play our kids will mimic that. When I start noticing that my kids are stressed, more often than not, I can look at my own habits and realize that I’m not handling my own stress well. Let your kids see you enjoying life. Play with your kids at the playground instead of sitting on the bench glued to your cell phone.
• Encourage them to be silly. Too often we get caught up on getting through the day that we forget to enjoy it. I caught myself one day shushing my kids without thinking. They were being loud and I was trying to work. It wasn’t until after I’d told them to knock it off that I realized they were playing together and laughing and I had jumped in and put a stop to it. Now I really make an effort to encourage them to be silly and laugh together.
• Avoid over-scheduling. There are so many good things to do in the world that it is very tempting to try and do them all. Kids need downtime to be able to relax and just play. Give them time to be bored and get creative.
• Take time to play together as a family. When my kids have been picking on each other, we can usually fix that by taking a break and playing together as a family. It’s tempting to spend time apart when everyone can’t get along but pushing everyone to spend time together actually ends up being the best thing we can do. Our favorite things to do together as a family are go to a local park,

We are very fortunate to live in an area with some amazing parks that my family can enjoy, including several that have some amazing playgrounds by Landscape Structures. I love seeing my kids’ faces light up when we get there and it’s so fun seeing them relax and start playing together . . . even if they had been arguing earlier in the day.

Even my big kids still love playing on playgrounds. They are always so much more relaxed after we leave. We try and fit a park visit in at least a few times a week, especially now that the weather is so gorgeous where we are.

We’ve slowed down a bit since my daughter broke her arm but she misses playing so badly so we visited a new park locally and just all took turns helping her out with the things that she couldn’t do.

Her smile made the visit totally worth it. I love that the Landscape structures near us have so many features to benefit people of all ages and abilities. To find a landscape structures playground near you check out their playground locator.

Are you teaching your kids to prioritize play? I think as parents, we all believe play is a good thing but it’s so easy to give our kids a different message when life gets stressful.

What are you doing to play with your kids this week?

Check out and be inspired at shapedbyplay.com and share this heartwarming video by global playground manufacturer Landscape Structures, which celebrates the promise of our future as kids play and develop skills that shape them as adults on playgrounds: