Play is natural to childhood but school is not: The problem of integrating play into the curriculum

This article explores the tensions that often develop when there is an attempt to integrate an emphasis on children's play into the school curriculum. Borrowing a phrase from Valerie Suransky, the article suggests that these tensions may, in fact, be inevitable due to some ‘unremitting contradictions’ that exist between the essential nature of childhood and children's play, and the essential nature of school. These ‘unremitting contradictions’ are discussed as a series of dualistic concepts including: Piaget's concepts of assimilation and accommodation; Vygotsky's constructs of spontaneous and scientific concepts; the linguistic constructs of descriptive and prescriptive grammars; invented and conventional spellings; space versus time as a way of organizing activity; and Nietzche's concepts of Dionysian and Apollonian music. In each case, it is suggested that the first term of the pair best describes the play of children while the second term best describes the nature of school and schooling. The article concludes by offering two suggestions for ameliorating the tensions that emanate from these contradictions. The first is to not invoke the concept of play when talking about the academic goals of the school curriculum and the second is to make sure the curriculum provides the time and space for the truly self-directed play of children.