The Power of Imagination

                One evening I was in the truck alone with my nephew as we were waiting for my husband.  As I talked with my nephew I realized he had no imagination skills.  I knew though, that he would benefit more if I accepted what was and proceeded to do what I could to help him develop imagination rather than to get angry or frustrated with him.  Because I worked with little children, I realized how important it was for him to learn some level of imagination.  Most children naturally have imagination; they will take a flower and turn it into a princess or a rock becomes a car.  But not all children have the natural tendency to imagine.  Helping them to develop this skill is invaluable.

                Some of the benefits of an imagination include social and emotional skills, language skills, nurturing skills, and cognitive or thinking skills. 

                The use of imagination benefits social and emotional skills.  Through imagination, your child will step into a different character’s footsteps.  When they are pretending to be a princess or a warrior, or something else, they expand their social skills because they begin to think like someone or something else.  This has potential for giving them an insight into other peoples reasoning, feelings, and reactions.  This teaches them the valuable moral of empathy.   Other benefits include creative problem solving, importance of turn taking, and sharing responsibility.  And one of the best qualities imagination helps enhance is self esteem.  Through imagination, your child can pretend to be anything he wants to be.

                The use of imagination boosts language skills.  A child will take the words he/she hears from their parents and use them in their own play.  It is not uncommon to overhear a child talking while playing by themselves.  This act allows them to experiment with language.  Through their interaction with adults, they gain words and have some understanding of their meanings.  Then, with their own imagination, they begin placing words together in a way they imagine.  It is a great play of words that allows them to learn.  This often happens when they reenact a story, a movie, or a book they may have had read to them.  They begin connecting oral and written language which will benefit them during their school experience.

                The use of imagination develops nurturing skills.  Children will pretend to cook meals especially after watching their own parents cook.  They love to make cookies and other goodies from play dough, mud, or simply imagination.  Many children will care for a baby doll; feeding it and wrapping it in a blanket.  Some children will pretend to go hunting or shopping so they have food.  Nurturing skills are widely used during pretend play and help children learn how to care for themselves and others.

                The use of imagination enhances cognitive or thinking skills.  During imagination, your child has great opportunities to problem solve.  They may have to think about how to make something, which roles each child will take on, or how to alter roles if they both want to be the same character.  And, most effective with adult supervision, roughhouse play also has its benefits.  In the book, The Art of Roughhousing: Good Old-Fashioned Horseplay and Why Every Kid Needs It, by physician Anthony DeBenedet and psychologist Lawrence Cohen, it explains how roughhouse play stimulates growth in the part of the brain that is responsible for language, logic, and emotional memory.  Roughhouse play helps a child learn such skills as reading social cues, understanding facial expressions, and interpreting body language.  It also helps to develop emotional and cognitive intelligence.  As mentioned above, roughhouse play may need monitoring by an adult as children learn their boundaries.

                So, there are a few reasons why imagination is important in childhood.  Imagination usually comes naturally and as parents, we can encourage and allow imagination that is healthy.  However, lets not forget the children that struggle with natural imagination. 

Referring back to my nephew, I had to walk him through his first experience with imagination.  Together we decided that we wanted to create a dragon.  Step by step, we described his color, size, sounds, and actions.  It took quite awhile to accomplish and several times we had to go back and talk about how it was just for pretend.  By the time my husband finally got back in the truck, we had created a perfect little dragon that he was holding in his hands.  With help, he was able to tell my husband about his dragon.  And it surprised me when several years later, his mom told me how he still talked about the dragon that he had created that night.

To help enhance imagination, you can make sure there are items around for your child to play with that are not necessarily considered toys.  Things like blankets, boxes, empty crates, old clothes, shoes, backpacks, etc.  You can even have old books, stamps, pencils, crayons, stuffed animals, utensils, hats or any other countless items that you are okay with having used, or even destroyed.  These are some of the best toys because they ignite imagination rather than subdue imagination. 

For children who are learning to develop or use an imagination, they may need you to walk and talk them through it a few times.  Other kids are a great help too because they already want to play and they will fill the role easily.  It may be beneficial or necessary to tell the other children to be understanding of those who are still figuring out imagination; and rather than get angry, encourage them to seek an adult to help them out when they start to get frustrated because your child is ‘not getting it’ yet. 

Let the games begin and the imaginations roam freely.  Good luck striking the imagination in your children.  Keep me posted on how this helps out.  Thanks!