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Home » Parenting » What is Pretend Play?

What is Pretend Play?

This post may contain affiliate links. See my disclosure .

Authentic, real experiences are critical for children. One of my Montessori instructors at MEIPN opened a session with an exercise she coined “Abstract Orange” to emphasize the importance of authentic, concrete experiences for children and their developing brains.

{Image courtesy of foto76 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net}

{Image courtesy of foto76 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net}

She said: “We are adults with the ability to think abstractly so imagine you are holding a ripe orange. Tell me what words you might use to describe the orange.”

We immediately began shouting our words like:
Orange
Juicy
Bumpy
Sweet
Sour
Wet
Moist
Bright
Round
Juicy
Pulpy
Stringy
Fleshy
Refreshing

Then she said, “Imagine a plastic orange used for play.”

Orange
Juicy
Bumpy
Sweet
Sour
Wet
Moist
Bright
Round
Juicy
Pulpy
Stringy
Fleshy
Refreshing

Then she showed us an image of an orange:

orange

Orange
Juicy
Bumpy
Sweet
Sour
Wet
Moist
Bright
Round
Juicy
Pulpy
Stringy
Fleshy
Refreshing

Then she showed us an illustration of an orange:

illustrationorange

Orange
Juicy
Bumpy
Sweet
Sour
Wet
Moist
Bright
Round
Juicy
Pulpy
Stringy
Fleshy
Refreshing

You get the point. This exercise is really meant to make a point with educators and parents. I suppose you could also do the exercise with older children. I hope you enjoyed this exercise. I will post the second part of this series tomorrow.

Warmly,
Marnie

Tagged With: Child Development, Pretend Play

About Marnie Craycroft

Marnie hails from Maine where she spent summers buried in sand and winters buried in snow. She is the daughter of a nearly four decade veteran of the public school systems. Teaching has always been a part of her life. She founded Carrots Are Orange in 2010.

Carrots Are Orange is a Montessori learning and living website for parents and teachers.

Marnie graduated from Wesleyan University in 1999 with a BA in Economics. She spent nearly a decade working in investment management. In 2006, she earned her MA in business from the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business.

Marnie moved to the west coast in 1999 and currently lives in Boulder with her husband and three sons. She is Montessori trained. Her work has been featured on Apartment Therapy, Buzzfeed, PBS Kids, BabyCenter, the Melissa & Doug blog, Huffington Post, and WhattoExpect.com. Besides writing, passions include running (usually after her three sons), photography, and outdoor adventures.

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