February 9, 2026
Important Dates…
Monday, February 9: New Family Registration for the 2026-2027 school year opens at 8 a.m. online.
Tuesday, February 10: Dine to Donate from 4-8 p.m. at the Troy Panera.
Friday, February 13: School CLOSED for Parent-Teacher Conference Preparation.
Monday, February 16: School CLOSED for Presidents Day.
Monday, March 2-Friday, March 6: One week residency with Visiting Artist Beth Wright of Muse Machine.
Letters from Leadership
You have almost certainly heard us talk about how Overfield is a “play based program.” But what does that mean exactly? And why is that important?
To begin at the beginning, let’s define play. Play according to Oxford Languages is to “engage in activity for enjoyment and recreation rather than a serious or practical purpose.” Dr. Stuart Brown, who founded the National Institute for Play to study the scientific knowledge about play and to understand the implications of this pervasive activity, says, “Play is state of mind that one has when absorbed in an activity that provides enjoyment and a suspension of sense of time. And play is self-motivated so you want to do it again and again.” Peter Gray, another one of the foremost researchers of play, boils the definition down to these five characteristics: play must be self-chosen and self-directed; play is intrinsically motivated—means are more valued than ends; play is guided by mental rules, but the rules leave room for creativity; play is imaginative; play is conducted in an alert, active, but relatively non-stressed frame of mind.
At Overfield, we believe that play is essential; it is one of the fundamental rights of children, and it is the best way for children to learn. There are many benefits garnered during play. One of the base benefits is that it allows children to practice the skills needed for adult life. This “practice theory of play” can be seen in many animals, as it is a way to ensure adaptive behaviors are developed which support the development and survival of that species. Human children also play in many other ways, which we can be broken down into types as follows:
physical/locomotor play, which includes running, leaping, swinging, chasing, and fighting
constructive play, which involves building things, and can be extended into artistic and musical play
language play, which starts with cooing and babbling and extends into puns, alliteration, jokes, and poetry
fantasy or pretend play, where children can imagine things that aren’t present, and construct pretend worlds
games with formal rules, which need to be articulated and thus can be negotiated and passed on, but must be agreed upon by the group
Many different things are learned through each of these types of play, and this learning supports the development of the whole child–the cognitive, physical, social-emotional, and creative domains. For instance, when children build with blocks and loose parts, they are encountering physics and math concepts, using their muscles to lift, balance, and place; they are engaging in symbolic thinking, testing and reformulating, negotiating, and creating imagined worlds that they will then inhabit.
One more qualifier is often listed when describing types of play, and this spans all types of play: social play. Social play simply refers to play that involved two or more children. For most of history, social play has been far more common than solo play. As Peter Gray describes, this play is fundamentally important: “Social play is how children learn how to get along with peers. It is how they learn to compromise, negotiate, recognize one another’s needs, and please one another. This is true whether they are play fighting, building something together, engaging in word banter, co-creating a fantasy, or playing a game with formal rules. We are an intensely social species. We survive by cooperating and sharing, and social play is how children learn to do that. It is hard to imagine any skill more crucial for a satisfying human life than that of getting along with peers. This cannot be taught; it can only be learned through experience, and for children that experience comes primarily in play.”
Even as we recognize the benefits of play as described above, the world seems to push ever harder on children’s right to play. We see this in myriad ways, from many parents’ focus on academic skills as a top qualifier for preschool programs, to the limiting of children’s autonomous play, to a lack of permission from adults for children to engage in “risky” play. And yet all of these things are fundamentally important to the healthy development of children. Children need to be given the time and space to test their limits, to author their own ideas, to learn to negotiate conflict, to develop resilience and independent thought and leadership skills. And, perhaps counterintuitively, even academic skills have been shown to be more successfully gained and retained in play-based programs vs. academic focused programs.
This, however, does not mean that teachers–and parents–don’t have an role in supporting play, which supports the development of cognitive, social, emotional, creative, and physical skills. We are called to set up thoughtful and developmentally appropriate environments. We are important champions of these skills as we observe play and provide children with traces of that play though the process of documentation–using photos, transcripts of their conversations to support recall, reflection, questioning, and expansion of ideas. We are essential advocates for play and a child’s right to be both cared for AND autonomous as we model conflict resolution and limit setting only when needed–when our default setting is to watch and only intervene when truly necessary. When we do this, we give children the essential gift of time and space to be the authors of their own stories, to develop confidence in themselves as thinkers, problem solvers, negotiators, creators, and friends.
So what does all of this mean? It is simple: it is a child’s right, and most important job, to play. And it is our job to protect that right for children.
Beth Poronsky – Program Lead
Registration for 2026-2027
Enrollment for the 2026-2027 opened today for our current and alumni families! You can find a description of class offerings and can sign your child up on our website.
If you have not already registered, we encourage you to do so right away, as classes fill quickly.
PLEASE NOTE: After you have submitted your online registration form, you will be contacted by the office within the next 72 hours to verify your class choice and pay your registration fee. Your registration is not confirmed until you have been contacted by the office and paid your registration fee. If the class you wish to enroll in is full, you will be given the option to be put on a waiting list.
Don’t hesitate to reach out to the office if you have any questions about next year’s class offerings. We hope to welcome you to Overfield next school year!
