Do parents care about their children’s happiness? I think it’s an easy answer to say overwhelming they do, very much so. And yet, they don’t necessarily prioritize it in the daily lives of their children. I feel like a lot of parents erroneously believe that academic success will lead to […]

By Peter Gray Ph.D. Freedom to Learn This is Part I of a series on the functions and malfunctions of shame. This seems like a ripe time in history to think about the emotion of shame. We are living in a period of renewed reckoning with the shame of the racist […]

Let them have some iPad time. iStock Nermeen Dashoush, Ph.D., is a mother of two and a clinical assistant professor of Early Childhood Education at Boston University. She was a classroom teacher for over 10 years in New York City. This story originally featured on Working Mother. I have given a […]

Education is much more than what is taught in school. Take advantage. A pandemic is never a good thing.  It’s a terrible thing.  But maybe some good can come from it.  Anything that disrupts our usual ways of being can lead us to try new ways of being, ways that might in the […]

Over the next few weeks, many preschoolers will meet their foundation teachers, spend some time in a classroom and hopefully make some new friends. from shutterstock.com The transition from preschool to school is a big deal for many children and parents. Over the next few weeks, many preschoolers will take part in […]

How can teachers bring common sense and compassion to education policy? The research is clear. Academic training in kindergarten has no long-term benefit. In fact, it has long-term harm. It does not reduce the education gap between rich and poor, which is the usual reason offered for such training. It slightly increases […]

Dads tend to engage in more active, physical play activities with their young children. Shutterstock/pyrozhenka Play is an important way for children to learn about the world around them. Through play, they learn cultural norms, socialisation guidelines and experiment with different ways to interact with their environment. But play between a father and […]

Guidelines advise children under two shouldn’t have any screen time, but most do anyway. Photo by Jelleke Vanooteghem on Unsplash Most (80%) Australian parents worry children spend too much time with screens. But what children are doing on and off screen matters more than how much time they’re exposed to screen media. […]

Part two: overcoming the social isolation society has imposed on children. By Peter Gray Ph.D. Freedom to Learn Children are suffering today from too much adult structuring of their activities and not enough freedom to play and explore in their own chosen ways (for some of the evidence, see here, here, and here). […]

By Peter Gray, Ph.D. Part one: irrational societal fears can paralyze parents and harm children. Children are designed, by nature, to spend hours per day playing with other children, independently of adults.  In such play they practice all sorts of physical and mental skills; discover and pursue their passions; and learn […]