Are Your Kids Playing As Much As They Should Be?

By Sydney Wu

Obesity and depression rates for kids have increased as the time American youngsters spend outdoors at play has shrunk. The results have been stark: inactive kids ages 15 and under are four times more likely to be depressed and even suicidal, according to research.

Rather than kicking a football, children’s heads are buried in textbooks, eyes are on smartphones and video games, and many parents are fearful of letting their kids out of sight.

Some communities are trying to get kids playing again.

KaBOOM!, a national nonprofit, spent $16.5 million to build 165 playgrounds across the United States in 2013 to provide play opportunities for children.

In 2009 and 2011, First Lady Michelle Obama teamed with KaBOOM! to build two playgrounds: one at Bret Harte Elementary School in San Francisco and another at Imagine Southeast Public Charter School in Washington, D.C.

“Play is nature’s way of allowing children to practice and learn the skills that are essential to have a happy and successful life,” said Peter Gray, author of “Free to Learn” and a psychology professor at Boston College who specializes in the field of children’s play.

Daphna Yeshua-Katz, a parent of two from Bloomington, IN, believes 20-30 minutes of recess at school is not enough time for a seven-hour school day.

“If they have such a long school day, they should at least get an hour in total to play outside during school time,” she said. “It’s better for their concentration. It’s better for their appetite.”

Depression and clinically significant anxiety disorders are five to eight times what they were in the 1950s, Gray said. Suicide rates for children 15 and under are four times higher.

Although no study has linked depression and anxiety directly to playtime, the increase has not correlated with wars, economic cycles or even divorce rates. When animals were deprived of play in studies, they showed signs of depression and difficulty getting along in groups.

A decline in playtime may have also contributed to the obesity epidemic in the United States.

From 1980 to 2012, obesity has more than doubled in children ages 7 to 11, from 7 percent to 18 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The percentage has quadrupled for adolescents, from 5 percent to 21 percent.

Gray said playtime helps children learn to be independent and cooperate with others. It also allows them to let loose in a non-competitive environment.

“The more [children] play, the more well-rounded they’ll be,” said Kim Calichio, a parent of a 2-year-old in New York City. “I think it helps them socially. It helps them experiment and learn everything — colors, numbers. That’s how they absorb the world.”

Kids everywhere, even those in war-torn countries, play on a regular basis, said Peter LaFreniere, a psychology professor at the University of Maine, who focuses on development from an evolutionary standpoint as it relates to childhood.

“Kids are going to play pretty much no matter what, but what a culture can do is provide opportunities for play or restrict them,” LaFreniere said. “I would say right now, since maybe 20 years, we’re restricting children’s play.”

Gray said two reasons for the decline in play are longer school days and shorter summer vacations. “Play doesn’t go onto a resume,” he said.

Parents’ fear for their children’s safety could be another reason kids today play less.

In some communities, like Chicago, where gun violence runs rampant, parents’ concerns are legitimate.

But Gray said that overall, kids today are likely as safe, if not safer, than kids in the 1950s.

Yeshua-Katz said parents today worry too much.

“I think we as kids had a lot more freedom to play outside by ourselves,” she said. “You become concerned because the other parents are concerned. You hover because the other parents do, too. I wish we would be able to give them more freedom. They need it.”

One way parents can assuage their fears is by taking their children to the playground or park, and watching over them but not interrupting. That’s a practice Patch blogger Kate Bassford Baker addresses in her blog post “Please Don’t Help My Kids.”

“I am not sitting here, 15 whole feet away from my kids, because I am too lazy to get up and help them climb the ladder,” Baker writes. “I brought them here so they could learn to climb it themselves.”

John Salgado, a father of five in NYC, has only one rule for his kids: You can play any game you want as long as you don’t get hurt.

“I teach my kids how to fall,” he said as his son climbed along the outside of a playground fixture in NYC’s Madison Square Park. “You have to teach them to try first, to go at it. Teach that if they fall, it’s OK. Get back up. My kids will have scars, but the scars tell stories. It builds character.”