From Froebel Gifts to Educational Games

What's the word for this definition?
Engage in activity for enjoyment and recreation rather that a serious or practical purpose.

The answer is simple - 'Play'.

Play can be simple and yet bring immense happiness. The innate nature of play is wonderful - it engages, it's an activity with no pressure, brings joy, relaxes, and best of all, has no purpose. The young of all creatures play and their first playmates are from the family.

What's hidden in play?

Nature is a smart cookie. She realized that creatures learn best when they are not learning. Strange but true. When the young play, they learn the ways of their kind and to deal with others. It's innocuous and becomes a part of growing up. 

Froebel's gifts

Friedrich Fröbel was a german who set up a play and activity centre he called the kindergarten in the late 1800s. He designed toys for kids to play with which he gifted kids and those got the name Froebel's Gifts. They ranged in simplicity from a 1-20. The youngest got a set of six colorful crocheted balls. His idea was for kids to be involved in a self directed activity. 

Frank Lloyd Wright remembers playing with smooth blocks at age 9 and internalizing geometry, without even knowing it was geometry. 

Today's self directed play

We have a come a long way by ways of technology and toy building. But play has retained its importance. As have Froebel's Gifts. Many of the educational games kids play today do involve kids in self directed play. 

Along with the physical world, they also play in the virtual world. With educational gaming moving forward in leaps and bounds, kids get on to computers and other e-devices early on in life. Many of the early education games involve the same things that were used for kids before the computer took the world by storm. 

What is not to be done is to expose the child to just one world. They must play in both the physical and the virtual world. The emphasis should be on play, which will stand kids in good stead their entire life.