The Entitlement-Free Child

Learning to be Entitlement-Free through Play

Your child learns important entitlement-free skills through age-appropriate games and activities:

• Learning to play a board game teaches your child to take turns, to wait to move to prized spaces, and that someone will finish second.
• Playing with dolls or action figures gives your child an outlet for social drama: acting bossy, acting aggressive, or acting like a baby.
• Mastering a challenging jungle gym teaches your child to keep trying and that muscles get stronger.
• Making mud pies might be the perfect place to learn stress management.
• Seeing men-in-the-moon or stories-in-stars shows your child how to find a new way to solve an old problem.
• Negotiating positions in a game helps your child recognize other people's perspectives and his strengths relative to other people's needs.
• Fighting over the rules in a game of backyard soccer helps your child to understand which rules matter and which ones don't.

Imagine the decisions and actions involved in every form of play. The child without the time or space to engage in meaningful play never learns constructive alternatives to tantrums, to frustration, or to failure. Play is serious business, important and necessary.