Why do kids love playful aggression like roughhousing, pretending to be superheroes, or playing with toy weapons? In The Playvolution HQ Podcast episode, Jeff Johnson dives into playful aggression, explaining why it’s natural, beneficial, and essential for children’s development. Learn how rough-and-tumble play fosters growth across physical, social-emotional, cognitive, adaptive, and communicative domains, and discover practical tips for creating environments that support this type of play. Jeff also introduces a fun DIY project—the “Amazing Rough-and-Tumble Sidekick”—perfect for supporting active, self-directed play at home or in early learning programs.

Watch Now: PHQP_0001 The Benefits of Playful Aggression

Hey, welcome to the Playvolution HQ podcast. I’m Jeff Johnson. Thanks for pushing play on with the show.

Topic one for this episode: who is this show for? Well, I thought this would be a good thing to clarify here at the beginning of the show, so nobody listens if it might not be for them.

I think the show is first for professional caregivers, people who work on a daily basis with young children. Next up, parents who are interested in play and playful learning and knowing more about those things so that they can understand the play that’s going on at home and be more thoughtful about selecting early learning programs for their children to make sure their kids are getting what they need. And I think also maybe a subset of parents who are homeschooling young children, either preschool or early elementary kids, may also find value in the show.

And then beyond that, anyone interested in how children learn through play, because that’s gonna be one of the big themes here of the show.

Moving on, topic two: core values. I was trying to put together some core values for the show, and the list kept getting longer and longer, so I thought I would spend the first dozen or so episodes introducing those.

So this is part one of what I think the core of this show is, and basically, the core of early learning. Later on, I’ll share some links to a reading list I put together of top 10 books that really get into the research and information behind these core values if you wanna check those out. So first one is young children need large blocks of uninterrupted time for self-directed play and exploration.

I wanted to break that down. So young children. Here at Playvolution HQ, I think young children covers everybody from birth to age 10.

I know some organizations cut it off around age eight. I think that’s a little bit too early. I think that’s kind of leading to some of the age compression that’s going on.

So young children, kids under the age of 10. Large blocks. What are we talking about with large blocks of time? I’m talking hour-plus blocks of time where kids get to be the choosers.

This is a problem in a lot of early learning settings because the day is broke down into little 30 minutes, maybe 25 or 15-minute blocks of time. And so not only don’t kids have an opportunity to go deep into their play, they’re always going through a transition time. So one of the things we’re gonna advocate on this show is big blocks of time and fewer transitions during the day.

Uninterrupted. So what’s that all about? That’s about us adults getting up in their business when they’re playing. Children should be really a lot more free to do their own thing.

So, we need to stop interrupting them so much. And by doing their own thing, I mean self-directed. They should be the rule makers and the problem solvers and the organizers and the material gatherers of their play because that pre-play stuff is all part of the play process.

So all the getting ready, the planning, the organizing, the solving problems that come up in the play that should be owned by the children. That’s self-directed. And then, finally, play and exploration.

There’s not time in this episode to go deep into that, but basically that’s what this show is about. Play, I think the best definition of play is Dr. Peter Gray’s five conditions of play. And we will spend more time on that in future episodes.

And exploration, that’s basically, let’s consider that going out and getting hands-on with the world. Young children are hands-on active learners. They need to engage with the world. They need to touch, feel, and mess with it.

Topic three: the benefits of playful aggression. I think a lot of programs, a lot of parents have some concerns about children acting aggressively.

This is an article I put together on the Playvolution HQ website. It’s called The Benefits of Playful Aggression. There is a link in the episode notes for this episode on this, but basically breaks this topic down.

First up, I wanna talk about the learning that goes on in this play. Playful aggression, we’re talking about rough and tumble play and superhero play and weapons play, covers all five developmental domains of learning when kids are engaging in this kind of play in an environment that’s thoughtfully supported by adults. So there’s physical development, there’s communicative development, there’s social-emotional development, there’s cognitive development, and there’s adaptive development.

That might be a category of learning that you might be unfamiliar with. That pretty much lumps in all of the stuff kids are learning about how to survive and thrive and get along in the world. We’ll be talking about those five things more in future episodes of this show.

And this article, the bulk of it is giving examples of those kinds of learning in aggressive play. But before we get there, I think we need to look at what aggressive play is. And it’s the grappling, pushing, punching, kicking, rough and tumble, superhero, like I mentioned.

And children have a drive for this kind of play. The drive to engage in such play is inborn. Children take part in such play because it benefits their development.

This drive is so strong that kids will do it even if it’s prohibited. They’ll still engage in it, even though they have to suffer consequences. If you’ve got an early learning program and if you have banned rough and tumble play or superhero play or weapons play, it’s going on.

And you probably maybe spend a fair amount of your time trying to stop it. Instead of trying to make these types of play taboo, we need to look for ways to support them and invest time and energy and resources in them. And so there are two reasons I think we tend to shut down playful aggression.

One is that it looks violent. On the surface, it can look violent. And the other is we consider it dangerous.

We worry about the kid’s safety. We worry about parents being upset if a child gets a bump or a scratch or a scrape, those kinds of things. And so first, thinking about that appearance of violence, I think it’s essential to distinguish between playful aggression and violence.

And it’s pretty simple. Violence involves an intent to harm. Playful aggression doesn’t.

Playful aggression is a consensual act. Kids choose to rough-and-tumble, and grapple, and kick, and punch, and wrestle with each other. Their perseverance choose to engage in the activity.

It looks violent, but it isn’t. It can turn violent because somebody might get grabbed or pushed a little bit harder than they like, and then they become violent. And so one of our jobs as supporters of this is mitigating hazards.

We need to be paying attention to the children’s playfaces and putting down tumbling mats and doing those kinds of things. When it comes to mitigating hazards, one of the things I think we need to do is clarify our language. A danger is something that may cause harm.

A hazard is a danger that is not easily seen or predicted. And a risk is an informed choice to do something that may or may not cause harm. And so our primary job in keeping playful aggressive play safe is to mitigate the hazards, to make sure they’re not engaging in rough and tumble play around tables with sharp corners, make sure we’ve got a tumbling mat down, make sure kids understand consent.

And that kids can choose to engage in a play and they can choose to stop. And these kinds of things make it a little bit easier for us to do. And then also wrapping our head around the fact that since kids are hands-on learners, it’s gonna come with some bumps, bruises and scratches and scrapes.

And we should expect those kinds of things as part of the activity. And then the article goes on to cover those developmental domains and go into a couple examples in each one of those domains. So that’s basically what we’re talking about there.

Again, link to that article is in the episode notes. I’ve got show notes, which is basically what you need to know about the show as a whole. Those aren’t gonna change very often. And then episode notes, which will be specific to each episode. So there are plenty of links in the show notes, the topic, you’ll find the links.

So topic four is the amazing rough-and-tumble sidekick. So this is something I put together for those kids who are maybe, maybe they don’t have somebody to rough and tumble play with. Let’s take a look at this. This is something I recorded a while back.

Hey, Jeff Johnson here, Explorations Early Learning. Thanks for pushing play. Today, I’ve got a DIY for you.

The amazing rough-and-tumble sidekick. I named it that because it’s a good playmate for kids who wanna engage in kicking and punching and pushing, either if they’re all alone and don’t have anybody to fight with, or if they are as a group wanting to fight a common enemy, the rough and tumble sidekick is a good choice for that. Thought about calling it the let it outinator because this thing is also good if you have a child who is violently aggressive because they’re emotionally upset.

And it happens sometimes in the early years. The Letitoutinator is a great tool for giving them something to push, hit, and punch instead of actual other people. So it’s a great thing to redirect those angry kids to and help them let it out of their systems so they can find equilibrium again and move on with their day.

But ultimately, you could also call it the milk jug clump because that’s basically what it is. Let’s take a look at the very simple process for putting it together. So you’re gonna want some plastic milk jugs.

They don’t have to be milk jugs, but one-gallon jugs. Ideally, you want more than four and probably less than 30, but the number is totally up to you. You’re gonna want some rope.

If you’re looking at five or six jugs, six foot of rope is probably sufficient. Longer if you are using more jugs. And basically, you’re gonna take your section of rope.

Let me get it untwisted there. You’re gonna fold it over six or eight inches, and then you’re just gonna tie a loop in one end. Before you go stringing your jugs together, you’re also gonna wanna take some glue and glue the lids on the jug.

What that does is it gives the jug some structural integrity. They’re less likely to crumple if the lids are securely attached, and that just helps your milk jug clump live a bit longer. Then, all there really is to it, you’re gonna take that loose end of the rope, and you’re gonna thread that through all of your jug handles.

I’m just using three here because I’ve got limited amount of space. And then you’re gonna pull the rope through until you get a nice, tight clump of jugs. After that, it’s just a matter of hanging them up.

Now, if you’re hanging them inside, you need to make sure you’re attaching them to something secure. A well-anchored hook in the ceiling is a great idea. The blades of the ceiling fan, probably not so good.

Outside, a tree branch, you know, two, three, four inches in diameter or bigger is probably a good idea. Smaller than that, and you might have branch breakage problems. Finally, a couple other thoughts.

One, variations. You can vary the height you hang this at. If you hang it really low to the ground, it’s going to be better for cooking.

If you wanna hang it high, and I’m talking like over children’s heads, you can really use it for letting them whack it with pool noodles or that kind of thing. When you’re just getting started with it, your first use, you probably wanna aim for somewhere between mid-shin and waist level for the three and four-year-olds that are probably gonna be the age group most interested in this thing. Beyond that, I think just remember that the jugs, the clump of jugs, make an alluring target for both playful and angry aggression, two things early learning programs frequently deal with.

That’s all I got for you. Thanks for paying attention. Enjoy your day.

Back to you. Hey, so back to me in real-time. I think this thing, the amazing rough-and-tumble sidekick, is also a useful tool if you’re just tiptoeing into supporting aggressive play.

Maybe you’re not ready to let the kids whack it and wrestle and hit and punch each other. You can hang this thing up and let them battle it. It’s a common enemy, and that might be an entry point into this type of play for you because it reduces the possibility of injuries a little bit.

Okay, so we’re moving on to our wrap-up.

First thing, a top 10 reading list I mentioned earlier. This is something I put together.

Again, there’s a link to it in the episode notes. This is just top 10 books I think really are a foundational set of reading for anybody that wants to dig in to what we’re gonna be talking about in this show more. Free to Learn is number one.

Play by Stuart Brown is there. Balanced and Barefoot by Angel Hanscom, and on and on it goes. And then beyond that, I’ve also got a whole section on the PlayvolutionHQ website.

It’s just playvolutionhq.com slash reading hyphen list that I’ve got 250, just about 250 books listed there, mostly early learning, some about self-care. But you can do a topic search. You can do a search by category.

I’ve kind of divided them up a little bit. And then you can search by author if you want to. So there’s some good stuff there.

Links to both of those pages are in the episode notes if you wanna check those out. Next up, photos and videos. For the Playvolution HQ site and here for the podcast, I’m always looking for photos and short video clips of kids engaged in self-led play exploration and just childhood activities.

If you have those, if you are an owner of the material and you have releases for the kids to be shared and you wanna share them with me, there is a link in the show notes for that kind of stuff. It’ll be always there if you look for it in the future. Next up, Amazon ideas.

One way you can support the podcast and the Playvolution HQ site if you want to, that’s very low effort, is to shop through my Amazon link. If you go to Amazon through that link, I get a little percentage of sales made when people use that link. I get to also see what people are buying, but I don’t know who buys them.

And I thought it might be fun to share some of those things here. One that I think is really great and tool use with kids is something we’ll get into in future episodes is this great child-sized hammer. It weighs eight ounces.

It’s got a durable fiberglass handle. I love the orange coloring on there because that makes it easier to find if it gets mislaid. Used versions of this hammer for years with kids.

And so I think it’s a good go-to option if you’re looking at tool use with kids in your program. Next up, share it if you like it. If you like the podcast, if you like any of the links at PlayvolutionHQ, share them with somebody who might enjoy them as well.

That’s how we keep things growing around here. Next week, we’re gonna be talking about observing communication. I put together a handout, oh no, it’s a observation form, excuse me, that talks about this topic, that covers this topic.

Makes it a little bit easier to see the communication going on in an early learning setting. And that maybe helps you reflect on it and kind of documents the communication that’s happening. And also, we’re gonna talk about flashcards.

I’ve got some thoughts about flashcards. Finally, to wrap things up, Dad Joke of the Week. This is gonna be a weekly thing.

You can always stop listening before we get here if you are anti-dad jokes. I happen to enjoy them. Our inaugural dad joke, how many tickles does it take to make an octopus laugh? The answer, of course, is 10.

Tentacles, get it? Tentacles? This has been an Explorations Early Learning Upstairs Studio production. Oh, that wasn’t too bad, was it, Jasper?

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