About PlayEducation.

PlayEducation came into being in 1982. It was created by Bob Hughes, a playworker since 1970, to address the chronic shortage of training and education opportunities in the field of playwork.

Since then PlayEducation has provided state of the art play and playwork training and education for playworkers, childcare and early years workers, environmentalists, scientific professionals, architects and parents in locations as diverse as Northern Ireland, Japan, Wales, USA, Scotland, Argentina, England, Australia, the Republic of Ireland and Portugal.

PlayEducation provides this in the form of courses, seminars, weekend problem-solving residentials, conferences and professional debates. It’s main thrust is in developing useful and authentic practical responses to children’s play needs and identifying and developing the credible scientific arguments which support and clarify why children need to play and why societies like ours must make provision for play.

The scientific evidence shows that opportunity to play is more than simply a right for our children, it is a life essential. This means that if children do not play they will suffer from a condition known as play deprivation, which in mild doses makes children irritable and unhappy ^{(Huttenmoser and Degan Zimmerman 1995)} but which in more concentrated forms turns children into killers and mass murderers^{(Brown 1998)}

Playing is an integral component of the human evolutionary process and play in one of its forms has probably been a part of human behaviour for many millions of years. ^{(Hughes 1996a)}

Play is essential to brain growth and to balanced neurochemical activity. ^{(Rosenzweig 1962, ’71, 72 and Damasio 1994)}

It exploits biologically ‘sensitive periods’ ^{(Huttenlocher 1990)} during which certain kinds of experiences trigger rapid brain growth. Children under ten years of age are thought to have the potential to grow brains twice the size of those of children over that age. Some scientists regard play as one the main factors that human beings have not yet become extinct ^{(Lorenz 1972, Sylva 1976)}, because of the flexibility it gives them to adapt to changing environmental and meteorological conditions.

Although play itself is vital to human survival and development and to our identity as a species, and is important for those reasons, because increasingly children around the world are being deprived of the space, time and freedom to play our concerns are with the development of appropriate practical opportunities for children to play too. Developing, operating and maintaining these practical opportunities is known as playwork.

PlayEducation has provided high quality playwork training and education for over 20 years now, to those who wish to develop, operate and/or maintain provision for children’s play, and provided fascinating insights into the biological and evolutionary reasons why provision for play must satisfy developmental and evolutionary, rather than simply financial and political criteria.

As well as writing ‘Notes for Adventure Playworkers’ in 1975, ‘The Playworker’s Taxonomy’ and ‘Play Environment’s’ for PLAYLINK, and ‘The First Claim’, and ‘Desirable Processes’ for PlayWales, PlayEducation’s Co-ordinator Bob Hughes made a significant input into the world’s first national play policy, instituted by the Assembly for Wales in 2003. He also wrote ‘Evolutionary Playwork’ in 2001, contributed a chapter on play deprivation, to ‘Playwork Theory and Practice’ (2003), was Managing Editor of the International Play Journal from 1993-1996, and organises the Annual Play and Human Development Meetings.

If you would like further information about the work of Bob Hughes or PlayEducation, or would like to discuss how we can help you develop playwork courses or quality provision for your children, please contact us at: played@dial.pipex.com

Please visit the rest of the PlayEducation web site to find details of the other services, events and publications we offer.

Revised 17/09/04