Bringing Themes & Activities Into The Son-Rise Program Playroom

An amazing way to help your child learn and grow is to create and introduce themes and games to play with your child in The Son-Rise Program Playroom.

Why are themes and games so important?

1)   They bring excitement and variety into your child’s life and play in the playroom, keeping things new and interesting.

2)   They help motivate you to be more dynamic and powerful in your role of friend and facilitator for your child.

3)   They inspire your child to be interested in other people’s ideas and help them to be more flexible and therefore more social.

4)   They help you to maintain focus during your playroom sessions.

5)   They encourage your child to participate more fully because you are demonstrating to them how to play with another person.

The attitude to have about your theme/activity:

1)   Believing that your child will play your game is the first step to your child showing an interest and participating in your game.

2)   Be persistent!  If your child doesn’t show an interest right away, don’t give up!  Bring your theme or game in the next day, and then the next day and the next.  Sometimes our children need to get used to the idea of something new before they give it a try.  Simply having it in the playroom for them to become familiar with might be enough to sow the seed.

3)   Have fun!  Enjoy and love your game, even if your child doesn’t seem to.  You set the bar for your child, if you are not excited and passionate about your theme, don’t expect them to be.

How to present your theme/activity:

1)   Role-model how to play the game.  Instead of asking your child to participate immediately when they are not familiar with the game, wait for a green light from them (a look, them coming over to the theme and checking it out, etc.).  Then demonstrate how the game is played a couple of times for them to get the gist.

2)   Experiment!  Different children respond differently to the way things are presented!  Your child might respond best to clear direction…in that case, try inviting them to roll the dice, pretend to stir the soup, climb on your back, etc.  Other children might respond best to discovering things for themselves…in that case a more indirect approach of silently leaving the theme on the floor might be more effective.

3)   Be flexible! You might have an initial plan in your mind of how the game is supposed to be played.  Our children are here to teach us how to let go of our expectations and be in the moment.   A way to inspire them to be more flexible is for us to give up control (which only limits us anyway).  If your plan is to take turns with your child and they want all the turns, allow them to have that control.  If they decide they want to take your Origami bird to ism with, let them do so…be consistently friendly and predictable.

Have fun playing! 

Becky Damgaard - Son-Rise Program® Teacher