How do you feel about mess? Do you let your children have free rein around the house to play with what they like? To pull all the cushions of the sofa to make a boat? To use all their bedsheets to build a den? To take pasta from the kitchen cupboards to use in their pretend kitchen?
And how do you feel about them playing in the garden? Do you let them dig? Make mud pies? Pick up worms? Fill the watering cans to make a swamp? Pick leaves and flowers to ‘bake’ with?
Do you give them messy materials to play with? Play dough? Paint? Felt tip pens? Sand? Glitter?
Someone told me recently that they’d never let their children play with playdough. And someone else commented that they spend so much time cleaning already that they don’t want to encourage their kids to make even more mess. This got me wondering how everyone else views messy play. I wonder if you encourage this kind of play at home or do you keep it just for pre-school? Do you let babies and toddlers get stuck in or do you reserve it for your older children? Do you think messy play is beneficial or educational or just for fun? And what do your children think about messy play – do they love it or loathe it?
I’m not looking to criticise anyone’s approach, I’m just genuinely interested to see what the opinion is on messy play. Will you share your thoughts and tell me what you think?
