Adjacent Play
See Parallel Play
Affordance
A term coined by the American Psychologist J.J. Gibson as part of his Theory of Affordance.
Affordances are the 'action possibilities' or the things that could happen within a given envionment.
Annihilation
The final stage of the Play Cylce; the end of playing.
Associative Play
The fifth of Mildred Parten’s ‘six stages of play’.
Chase Term
A term used largely by folklorists and playlorists to describe the various terms used by children to describe their chasing games.
Also known as a Tag Term.
Childlore
A term popularised in the 1890s by the folklorist Alice Bertha Gomme (1853-1938).
It describes the folklore of children transmitted largely (but not exclusively) from child to child.
Cooperative Play
The sixith of Mildred Parten’s ‘six stages of play’.
Dark Play
A phrase coined in 1988 by the American academic and theatre director Richard Schechner (1934-to date).
It describes forms of playing that might be perceived by adults as 'not fun' or not frivolous, and challenging because of its themes. It is often seen as being about children subverting social norms and hierarchies while working out their place in those structures.
Folklore
Folklore is the term used to describe the traditional beliefs, customs, practices, and stories of people that are passed down through the generations often by word of mouth.
This includes the Folklore for Children which is transmitted largely (but not exclusively) from adult to child.
Game
A ‘game’ is ‘play with rules’, as opposed to ‘play without rules’ which we usually define simply as, erm, ‘play’.
Independent Play
See Solitary Play.
Linear Playground
A linear playground is one in which playground equipment and other play features are placed along a well-used route rather than gathered together into a single space.
Onlooker Play
The third of Mildred Parten’s ‘six stages of play’.
Parallel Play
The fourth of Mildred Parten's 'Six Stages of Play'.
Sometimes also called 'Adjacent Play'
Parten, Mildred Parten
Mildred Parten (1902-1970), also known as Mildred Parten Newhall, was an American sociologist known for proposing the 'six stages of play' in 1929.
Those six stages being: Unoccupied Play, Solitary (or Independent) Play, Onlooker Play, Parallel (or Adjacent) Play, Associative Play, and Cooperative Play.
Play Episode
A distinct piece of playing with an identifiable beginning, middle and end.
Playlore
A term first coined in the 1950s by the folklorists Iona and Peter Opie.
It describes the childlore associated with children's play, games and playthings .
Respite Term
See Truce Term.
Sand
A natural play material with a long history of facination from children yet only introduced as a deliberate play material around 170 years ago.
Six Stages of Play Theory
A sociological theory of Play developed by in 1929 by Mildred Parten (1902-1970).
Softwar
Softwar is a game concept created by the American counter-culture activist Stuart Brand in 1966 that aims to provide playful opportunities to embrace a natural human need for conflict without it developing into aggression.
Solitary Play
The second of Mildred Parten’s ‘six stages of play’.
Sometimes also refered to as 'Independent Play'.
Spontaneous Playing
A way of describing playing in which children do not need nor seek out the involvement of an adult to begin, develop, and end their playing, first coined by the Playworker Marc Armitage in the early 2000s.
Tag Term
See Chase Term.
Truce Term
A term used largely by folklorists and playlorists to describe the stategy that children use to temporarily make them imune from capture within a game. Also known as a Respite Term.
These special words are often local to a specific location and include terms such as 'kings', 'crosses', 'barley', and 'time-out' among others.
Unocupied Play
The first of Mildred Parten’s ‘six stages of play’.
