Originally Posted by MunchkinWrangler:
To be honest, if you direct play for small increments throughout the day, not all day but part of the day it will lead to times where they will independently play.
I feel like this is the problem. I end up directing their play anytime we have free play. I lead activities throughout the day (music time, "exercising", crafts, special activities, story time, etc), and then at free play they seem to think they can't do anything without me playing with them then too. I understand they don't have anyone their own age to play with (like I said, I usually have two opposite ages at once: 10 month old and 6 yr old for example), but I feel like they should be able to play alone sometimes too. With the two school age dcgs, I do enforce a "quiet time" during nap time and they are given quiet activities or toys to play with in a room away from the nappers and myself (where I can still supervise, but where they can't talk to me the whole time and beg me to play with them). They hate quiet time and say it's just so boring
But I tell them it's that or nap
I would like to see them be able to direct their own play as well, during free play. At 6 & 7 years old, they shouldn't need my attention or direction so much, even if they are playing alone. Especially considering how much "adult led" stuff there is throughout the day already.