Play and Socio-Emotional Health

As we wrap up May which is Mental Health Awareness Month, as the social worker here, there is definitely a power in play with regards to socio-emotional health. As with any school here we have a major emphasis on academics as a top priority; one of the biggest things that I have tried to shine a light on is that enjoyable things such as games, sports, and puzzles are key in the development of a child who is mentally healthy both socially and emotionally, and this is a major indicator of academic success.

As a school social worker, one of the things that I have been intentional in doing is giving breaks to children who are highly stressed; paying special attention to children who suffer from any mental, learning, or emotional disabilities. This is especially important around times of high stress with academics such as testing, when they are faced with peer conflict and also returning from long breaks that result in any disruption in their normal schedules. Just as in trauma therapy, they have play therapy, in school we operate somewhat the same. For example my largest group is of boys 6th-8th and through our time in groups I’m able to have the boys have a safe space to express all of their emotions, build peer relationships, as well as develop healthy conflict resolutions skills. This was all achieved by first creating the safe space for them to just be kids who want to play games, football, and eat snacks; as I incorporated these elements the young men engaged in the process, and it helped me to help them as they navigate middle school both socially and emotionally. For some of my girls who struggle in positive peer relationships and working together effectively, I’ve incorporated puzzles into my work as a method to increase group work as well as well as what I have found is that this activity literally preoccupies them so much that they forget to argue and can talk through the issues as they build the puzzle.

As we think about the next school year that starts in September my goal is to continue my current practices and find many more ways of incorporating play into my work with the students here, and to ramp up the various ways that we achieve this.