19. Recess Without Rules

A research experiment done by two local universities on the playground of Swanson Primary School, Auckland, New Zealand, went so well that the school decided to make the changes permanent. What were the changes? The experiment required the playground to abandon all rules. Students were obliged to climb trees, ride skateboards, play contact games--such things that would normaly be prohibited on a school playground. The results were unexpected; bullying, serious injuries, vandalism were decreasing while concentration levels in class increased. Professor Grant Schofield of Auckland University who worked on the experiment claimed that limiting children's play is harmful to children in the long run because it ignores the benefits of risk-taking. However, despite this professor's encouragement on other schools to embrace the same freedom of "play and risk-taking", the American school administrators are not showing any attempt towards this approach. Turns out to be that parents are the ones at the steering wheel, driving the nation's tendency toward more restrictive playground rules since they are the ones who sue schools when children get hurt.

At first, Lahey's main purpose of the article seemed like it was to introduce a new approach made in a New Zealand school that ameliorated childrens' academic skills and showed decline in bullying and injuries. Nonetheless, ever since Lahey mentioned American parents, it seemed like Lahey was ridiculing the overprotective characteristic of American parents and their inclination to sue anything as soon as something hurts their child. Lahey gave a situation where in one of her issued articles, "Why Parents Need to Let Their Children Fail" was accompanied by enthusiastic comments of parents agreeing with her, she doubted their same reaction if one of their own kids get hurt. Layhey also mentions that she has even written a book on how parents should let their children fail and give them freedom to take both physical and emotional risks. It is clearly shown that Lahey strongly supports the Swanson School's decision. While she says she is being "cautious and optimistic" about this controversy, her writing is surely persuasive-getting the readers to agree with her. Although I'm not sure what she was trying to get the readers to agree on, whether if schools should abandon rules like the one in New Zealand or just proving that American parents are all about the lawsuits.

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/01/recess-without-rules/283382/