Gray, P. (2015). Free to learn: why unleashing the instinct to play will make our children happier, more self-reliant, and better students for life. New York: Basic Books.
p.120 - "Groos’s explanation of play’s biological purpose allows us to make sense of the patterns of play seen throughout the animal world. For starters, it explains why young animals play more than older ones; they play more because they have more to learn. It also explains why mammals play more than do other classes of animals. Insects, reptiles, amphibians, and fishes come into the world with rather fixed instincts; they don’t need to learn much to survive, given their ways of life, and there is little if any evidence in them of play. Mammals, on the other hand, have more flexible instincts, which must be supplemented and shaped through learning and practice provided by play."
We don't play games to while away to early years of our youth. We play games as part of the serious business of understanding the complex nature of th...
In *[[202002291651 Free to Learn]]*, Gray quotes Karl Groos who says that biologically, we use play as a way to learn. His evidence is that lower for...