In PHQP_0025 Instead of NO, Jeff discusses the value of following up a “No” with a “But” in order to better support playful learning.

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Welcome to the Playvolution HQ Podcast, I’m Jeff Johnson, thanks for pushing play, I’m with the show. So I was on a walk the other day and I ran across an Easter game, kids were playing a game of dodge croc. This is, you can imagine, dodge ball using a croc shoe, you know, those really ugly shoes, instead of a ball.

Nobody wanted to run home and get a ball, so somebody kicked off their shoes and they were playing with the croc. And they were using a pinkish, purplish colored croc, I think crocs of any color will work if you want to play dodge croc. But I thought this was ingenious, it goes to show how creative kids are, how versatile loose parts are, and how kids are wired to make do.

We don’t need a lot of fancy toys to make play happen, we just need space and an environment and interest and kids will come up with all kinds of things for the props necessary to make their play work. When I do write up the dodge ball post for the Playvolution HQ collection of classic kids games, I will make sure to include dodge croc in there as a game variation. What are we going to get into next? Well, we’ve got one topic for this week, and that is no but.

This kind of is related to the dodge croc, right? Anybody got a ball so we can play dodge ball? No but, I do have this croc, and that’s the way they move forward. I think no but is a much better option when it comes to dealing with activities kids are choosing than no, because often times for adults we get in this habit of saying no and just putting things to a complete stop when kids are doing things that we don’t approve of. Now, absolutely there are times when we need kids to stop what they’re doing.

It’s okay, I mean I’m not saying never say no to kids, what I am saying is much of the time when it comes to supervising and keeping play safe and promoting learning, we can opt for something less than no, and I think no but is a good variation there, because it’s easy for no to become the default response. Along those lines, my experience is also, since I do a lot of training and talking about caregiver burnout, saying no all day, no, no you can’t do that, no you can’t do this, no you can’t do this, I can’t have you, really has an impact on our mindset, and we start taking on the negative mindset of that no, and one of the strategies for reducing burnout just a little bit for caregivers is to create an environment where you’re not saying no as much, because it truly does have an impact on your mindset. Maybe that’ll be a future episode.

So instead of no, we can start going with no but, and that curtails the children’s activity and learning, just like no does, but it offers another option, and that’s where it becomes valuable. So instead of shutting down the activity completely, it offers them a way to move forward with it with slight changes. And look, this is basically redirection, right? And I think it’s more thoughtful if we think about it in these terms of looking for ways to support the thing, because oftentimes just basic redirection is they redirect, the child is redirected 180 degrees from what they are already doing, and what we’re talking about here is making minor changes to what they’re already doing so they can keep doing some version of it.

I think that’s the difference between basic redirection and no but. Yes, might be impossible, impractical, or inconvenient. That just happens.

There are going to be, like I said, there are going to be those times where we do absolutely have to say no to kids, and no but could be that alternative. No but provides options and choice and a little bit more power and control for the kids instead of being redirected to something that may be 180 degrees away from what they wanted to be doing in the first place. And so thinking about no buts can be valuable.

Throwing, for example, if you have a kid in the block area who’s got a large hardwood maple block that they are repeatedly throwing across the block area because they are interested in trajectory schema play, which is an interest in how things move through space, and you have other people in the block area with delicate human skin, and you’ve got a window in the block area with delicate glass, a hardwood block flying through that space over and over and over again is something you probably want to stop. But instead of having that kid stop throwing the block and leave the block area and redirecting them to the art easel, no but would have you redirect them to throwing something different. Jessica, I can’t have you throwing blocks, but here’s something else you can throw.

And then you redirect that child to a corner in the room where you’ve got a basket full of things that are safe to throw inside around people or outside to a place on the playground where you’ve set up a space where kids can throw heavier stuff because you’ve set things up in your classroom where there is a space or your playground where there’s space for throwing at the far end of the playground. You can throw things here because there aren’t people here and making throwing bigger, heavier stuff okay in that area. There are ways to make that throwing acceptable without shutting it down completely.

So no just takes away the throwing completely and the kid gets sent to the book area or the easel or maybe time out and the no but takes that activity and saves the essence of it and redirects it to someplace else. Most kids most of the time are going to be cool with this because they’re able to keep doing the thing they wanted to do and that’s the important part. Not all kids all of the time.

There are going to be kids that rebel against it or they’re going to be kids that you didn’t suss out correctly what they were doing because their interest in throwing that block might not be about throwing the block and an interest in trajectory schema. They might have been interested in annoying their playmates or they might have been interested in annoying you and so redirecting with throwing someplace else wouldn’t allow them to follow that and so it doesn’t work all the time and I don’t know how you would redirect somebody from annoying somebody to annoying somebody. Go be annoying to Beth over there on the other side of the room.

I don’t think that would work. That might be one of those times where we need to do a 180 degree redirection or just simply say no to those kind of things I guess but we’re getting off track. Play fighting is another example.

In the last episode, we talked about proprioception and play fighting is a valuable, valuable activity for building proprioception but it gets shut down in a lot of programs completely. Zero tolerance for it, right? But if you take a no but approach, you confine it to a certain space or you curtail the way that it happens. Maybe we have to play fight on our knees because you think that’s going to lead to fewer injuries or maybe we have to be on the tumbling mats or whatever it is.

You have the constraints you put on the play fighting so that some version of play fighting can still happen but you’re not shutting it down completely and then the kids get to engage in that activity that they’re interested in. Climbing is another one. If kids like to climb, kids need to climb, toddlers are very interested in climbing and they’re skilled at it.

A lot of times, toddler climbing gets shut down because we worry about safety but it also helps build proprioception and all the other sensory systems and so we need to find ways to support it. I can’t have you climbing, no, you can’t climb the bookcase but yes, you can climb over here on this climbing structure. No climbing the bookcase but you can climb over here.

Those kind of things. So thinking about no but as a tool for redirecting kids’ behavior into something that makes you feel a little bit more comfortable with it and also supports their needs to engage in a specific type of activity at a specific time. No but can also be a step towards more yeses in your classroom.

You can think of it as a midpoint. Instead of going from no to yeses for things, you can use it as a halfway point, as a way station on your journey from lots of no’s to more yeses. That doesn’t look like the way yeses should be spelled but that bothers me.

But that’s a whole other episode, I guess, I don’t know what that would be called. So sensory play is something that we can maybe say yes more to. My brain froze for a minute.

There’s something going on in the corner of my eye that’s distracting me. Sensory play is something that we say no to a lot, that we could say yes to more. But maybe no but would be a step towards that.

Instead of kids getting totally messy, maybe you get a little bit more friendly with mess with a no but. Roaming sand is one that we used to have a problem with. In our program, I thought I had to be the sand cop.

I don’t know if I’ve talked about it on this podcast before. I know I’ve talked about it on other podcasts. We used to have the sand stays in the sandbox rule.

And then we started letting the sand roam because I figured out that was better than saying no all the time. And we transitioned. I was able at the time to transition from saying no to saying yes, the sand can go pretty much wherever it wants.

And so it was a no but, it was a jump straight to yes. But maybe if you can get a little bit more friendly with the sand roaming, you can be more supportive of the creative play that comes out of it. If we want, like I talked about last episode, we want kids doing more heavy work, activity that pushes or pulls against the body or involves carrying, hauling buckets of sand all over the playground is a great way to do that activity that builds the proprioceptive in other systems.

So it was a step in that direction. So maybe you can go from letting the sand go a little bit out of the sandbox, or maybe somebody can take sand every once in a while, sometimes over to the mud kitchen and use sand that way. Maybe you get a little bit more sand flexibility in there.

I don’t know. So think about this. No but, instead of no, as a path to more yeses in your early learning environment.

It might be worth considering. I’d love to hear your thoughts if you have any on the topic. Wrapping up this episode, try some no buts.

Instead of no, instead of just 180 degree redirection, try some no buts and see how they work for you. Do an experiment. It might be worth it.

Amazon idea for this month, or this week, is this cute little thing. It’s a little baby holder. I don’t know.

They get mobile, they can crawl out of there, but for the less mobile infants, it is a little way to contain their toys and that kind of thing. Somebody used the Amazon link that supports this podcast and the Playvolution HQ site to purchase one of these guys. They got the animal themed one.

I like the rainbows one, but the animal one is cute. They’re easy to clean up. I would use that thing, since it’s so easy to clean, I would use that for baby sensory play.

I put them in there, maybe strip them down to their diaper, and put the sensory stuff in there, non-toxic stuff, the stuff they can get in their mouths. It’s not going to hurt their eyes or anything, but that they can fuss around with different textures and feels, and let them mess around with that stuff in the little baby trough there, and then take that sucker outside and hose it down after they were all done with the little ones in it. Another version of this, if you want something a little bit more durable that you can pick up at your local big box store, is those shallow kid’s wading pools are about the same size, and cost a little bit less, and probably a little bit more durable, that work good for the same kind of thing.

So, also, you can use that Amazon link if you want to support things, but you can also share things. Share things on the Playvolution HQ site, share this podcast if you find it useful with somebody else who might find it useful, I appreciate it. Next week, we’re going to get into avoiding pediatric occupational therapy. Pediatric occupational therapy is a wonderful thing, and I’m glad it exists, and there are too many kids in need of it, and there would be less need for it if we made some simple changes in our early learning environments, and so we’ll get into that topic. Dad joke, dad joke for this week, all right, ready for this one? Why did the coffee file a police report? It got mugged. All right, this here has been the Playvolution HQ podcast, thanks for listening, back soon, bye-bye.

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