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“Play is often talked about as if it was a relief from serious learning, but for children, play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.” -Fred Rogers

Play is not just a frivolous pastime; it is a fundamental component of childhood that contributes significantly to a child's physical, emotional, social, and cognitive development. When children engage in imaginative play, they are not just pretending; they are developing essential lifelong skills and learning how to interact with their peers, negotiate, share, and develop empathy. 

The students at Landmark’s Elementary·Middle School have turned the campus into a magical world of make-believe. From Swanson Field to the playground, alliances have been formed, intricate shelters constructed, and saplings gathered for their stick-based economy. It all began with a small group who built a lean-to fairy house on the playground, inspiring students of all ages to stake out their own sites, collect sticks, and create shelters. Students across campus now spend the duration of their milkbreak time hanging out with their friends, all of whom have distinct roles within each “tribe”. There are the traditional moms and dads, kings and queens, and the more unexpected saber tooth tigers. Students work at different jobs, like the “bakery”, a bench that has been packed with different types of moss and acorns. Students maintain their structures and are constantly sweeping out debris that accumulated the night before in the kitchens, building new mossy pathways, and tidying up their stick piles. They wander into the woods to get vegetation to pack into their leaf huts, trade sticks with the "stickmaster", transfer rainwater collections into containers, and add to the underground acorn caches.

As they maintain their cherished structures, students are not just playing; they are actively shaping their understanding of the world and acquiring skills that will serve them throughout their lives. The magic of play, with its spontaneity and boundless possibilities, reminds us that learning extends far beyond the classroom and that the seeds of creativity and collaboration planted in these moments will flourish in the years to come.

“My childhood play took me to extremes, and all of them, I now understand, were a fun way to test the social realities into which one is born. Surely this is a most important evolutionary function of play—finding out what is fun and fair or not fair on the field of life.” - Jaak Panksepp, Neuroscientist and psychobiologist

“Almost all creativity involves purposeful play.”- Abraham Maslow, American psychologist