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Playvolution HQ Podcast

Playvolution HQ Podcast

Auteur(s): Jeff Johnson
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 The Playvolution HQ Podcast dives deep into play and early learning, from loose parts and power play to school readiness and curriculum. This weekly, short-format show goes beyond the resources available at playvolutionhq.com, delivering original content like DIY ideas, terminology deep-dives, commentary, news, early learning history, and more.Explorations Early Learning Relations Éducation des enfants
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  • PHQP_0026 Avoiding Pediatric Occupational Therapy

    PHQP_0026 Avoiding Pediatric Occupational Therapy
    Jun 30 2025
    In PHQP_0026 Avoiding Pediatric Occupational Therapy, Jeff unpacks why more preschool play could help avoid school-age pediatric occupational therapy. Episode Video Watch Now: PHQP_0026 Avoiding Pediatric Occupational Therapy Episode Notes Balanced And Barefoot: How Unrestricted Outdoor Play Makes for Strong, Confident, and Capable Children The Avoiding Pediatric Occupational Therapy Transcript Welcome to the Playvolution HQ Podcast. I'm Jeff Johnson. Thanks for pushing play on with the show. So, update on something I saw. So, episodes and episodes ago I reported on seeing something called the, I called the water punch game, the water bottle punch game. So, kids were, they had a partially full bottle of water and they were just holding it up and dropping it and punching it. And that went on, I saw a bunch of kids playing it and there were only a couple kids playing it. And then over the last couple months, I guess it's been, there's this one kid I see and this seems to be his go-to hanging out when his friends aren't really able to play, thing to do outside. And he's, he's really evolved as a player of this game or evolved the game, I guess. Now it's, it's multiple, multiple strikes on the bottle before it hits the ground. So, he'll, he'll toss it up the air, up in the air and then he'll bat it up and then it'll be coming down and he'll bat it with an elbow and then maybe get it with a knee and then maybe his heel and then he'll punch it farther away from him. So, it'll be four or five strikes before the bottle hits the gun. It's kind of like, like, like dribbling a soccer ball. And, and it's, it's really great. And this kind of relates back to the proprioception episode we did a little bit ago. This kid has a wonderful awareness of where his body parts are in space in relation to his other body parts, as well of, as well as where other things in the environment are in space. So, it's kind of neat to see that, that game evolve and change over, over time. On with the podcast, topic one, only topic for, for this episode is avoiding pediatric occupational therapy. So, what I'm talking about here is not avoiding it for those who need it. I'm talking about preventing the need for it, I guess is what I'm talking about. And maybe I could have worded the title different, but you know, it is what it is. So, occupation, pediatric occupational therapy is a wonderful thing and very valuable for kids who need it. And it would be nice if we lived in a world where fewer kids needed it. And over the, over the last couple of decades, there's been a huge uptick in the number of kids that are needing, needing this kind of, kind of therapy, this kind of assistance. Human children have never been more sedentary than they are now in 2025, something I say just about every episode. And that has, has made this uptick in pediatric occupational therapy necessary. When kids don't move, they don't build the physical skills that they need, the sensory systems they need don't get wired with their brains, and they have a hard time living in their bodies in the world. And that's basically what pediatric occupational therapy does, is it helps kids who are having a hard time navigating their bodies, navigate their bodies and the world a little bit better. But that's also what, what play does. Play is the evolutionary strategy for giving us all of those skills. And then we end up with kids who lack those skills, and then we have these therapeutic settings to, to help them catch up. But again, it'd be nice if we could avoid, avoid the therapeutic settings altogether. One of the reasons for this uptick is also more screen times, because we are usually sedentary when we are in front of our screens. And so shoving young children in front of screens has really done them a developmental disservice. And look, I'm, I'm pro screen. I, there are a lot of valuable things that can come from screens,
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    12 min
  • PHQP_0025 Instead of NO

    PHQP_0025 Instead of NO
    Jun 23 2025
    In PHQP_0025 Instead of NO, Jeff discusses the value of following up a "No" with a "But" in order to better support playful learning. Episode Video Watch Now: PHQP_0025 Instead of NO Episode Notes No links for this episode. The Instead of NO Transcript Welcome to the Playvolution HQ Podcast, I'm Jeff Johnson, thanks for pushing play, I'm with the show. So I was on a walk the other day and I ran across an Easter game, kids were playing a game of dodge croc. This is, you can imagine, dodge ball using a croc shoe, you know, those really ugly shoes, instead of a ball. Nobody wanted to run home and get a ball, so somebody kicked off their shoes and they were playing with the croc. And they were using a pinkish, purplish colored croc, I think crocs of any color will work if you want to play dodge croc. But I thought this was ingenious, it goes to show how creative kids are, how versatile loose parts are, and how kids are wired to make do. We don't need a lot of fancy toys to make play happen, we just need space and an environment and interest and kids will come up with all kinds of things for the props necessary to make their play work. When I do write up the dodge ball post for the Playvolution HQ collection of classic kids games, I will make sure to include dodge croc in there as a game variation. What are we going to get into next? Well, we've got one topic for this week, and that is no but. This kind of is related to the dodge croc, right? Anybody got a ball so we can play dodge ball? No but, I do have this croc, and that's the way they move forward. I think no but is a much better option when it comes to dealing with activities kids are choosing than no, because often times for adults we get in this habit of saying no and just putting things to a complete stop when kids are doing things that we don't approve of. Now, absolutely there are times when we need kids to stop what they're doing. It's okay, I mean I'm not saying never say no to kids, what I am saying is much of the time when it comes to supervising and keeping play safe and promoting learning, we can opt for something less than no, and I think no but is a good variation there, because it's easy for no to become the default response. Along those lines, my experience is also, since I do a lot of training and talking about caregiver burnout, saying no all day, no, no you can't do that, no you can't do this, no you can't do this, I can't have you, really has an impact on our mindset, and we start taking on the negative mindset of that no, and one of the strategies for reducing burnout just a little bit for caregivers is to create an environment where you're not saying no as much, because it truly does have an impact on your mindset. Maybe that'll be a future episode. So instead of no, we can start going with no but, and that curtails the children's activity and learning, just like no does, but it offers another option, and that's where it becomes valuable. So instead of shutting down the activity completely, it offers them a way to move forward with it with slight changes. And look, this is basically redirection, right? And I think it's more thoughtful if we think about it in these terms of looking for ways to support the thing, because oftentimes just basic redirection is they redirect, the child is redirected 180 degrees from what they are already doing, and what we're talking about here is making minor changes to what they're already doing so they can keep doing some version of it. I think that's the difference between basic redirection and no but. Yes, might be impossible, impractical, or inconvenient. That just happens. There are going to be, like I said, there are going to be those times where we do absolutely have to say no to kids, and no but could be that alternative. No but provides options and choice and a little bit more power and control for the kids instead of being redirected to something that may be 180 de...
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    15 min
  • PHQP_0024 Proprioception And School Readiness

    PHQP_0024 Proprioception And School Readiness
    Jun 16 2025
    In PHQP_0024 Proprioception And School Readiness, Jeff explores proprioception, the body's ability to sense its position and movement, and its critical role in preparing young children for school. Episode Video Watch Now: PHQP_0024 Proprioception And School Readiness Episode Notes Proprioceptive System Balanced And Barefoot | Quote 02043 The Important Role Of Kinetic Chains In Early Learning 5 Simple Ways to Support “Heavy Work” Balanced And Barefoot | Quote 02289 Balanced And Barefoot | Quote 02544 Balanced And Barefoot | Quote 02555 Heavy Work Simplified Balanced And Barefoot: How Unrestricted Outdoor Play Makes for Strong, Confident, and Capable Children The Proprioception And School Readiness Transcript Welcome to the Playvolution HQ podcast. I'm Jeff Johnson. Thanks for pushing play on with the show. So, uh, I, uh, if you listen to the show, I've been, I've been, I talked about this before. I decided I was going to learn to play the guitar. That's going to be my new scary thing. And a little bit of an update. I've started developing finger calluses. You can't see them, but I can feel the skin getting thicker on my, on my fingers because of the, uh, the pain of, of the guitar strings. And that's, that's one of the amazing things about our bodies. Our bodies are adaptive. And so after a while, it's not going to be so painful to play. But the other big thing I've found is, uh, related to the topic for the day, proprioception. I am, I was amazed at how poor my proprioception is in relation to the skills you need to learn how to play the guitar because, um, well, we'll get into proprioception in a little bit, but it's about awareness of, of your body's position in relation to other parts of your body in part. And I've got to be able to put my left index finger and my left, left middle finger, my left pinky, all in specific places. Well, my heel is tapping. Well, my right thumb is strumming in the right direction and it's, it's a lot. And, and so one of the, one of the struggles for learning something like this, especially when you're, you're old, like I am, is it literally takes rewiring the brain to build these, these new skills that, that come naturally when we're in kids. And that's why for our topic today, I wanted to get into, um, proprioception and school readiness because maybe if I would have been more proprioceptively prepared in kindergarten, I'd be a better guitar learner now. I don't know if that's true or not, but something we're thinking about. So I wanted to dig into proprioception and its relation to school readiness because, you know, we talk about school readiness in the early learning field a lot, and it's about ABCs and blocks and knowing how to write your name and, and things like that. But a big part of it is having your body physically ready to do the job of going to school. And a lot of kids are heading off to school with bodies that are, are not ready. And part of it is the way we handle programming in early learning settings. And part of it probably has to do with, uh, with other things like, uh, you know, how, how human children have never been more sedentary than they are right now in 2025. Um, and so really proprioception is, is a, is a big part about body awareness. And so let's get into a little bit of that. Um, part of it is being aware of where body parts are in relation to other body parts. Now for just walking around, your brain needs to be aware of where your left heel is and where your right toes are and where your left elbow is and where your right elbow is, and the position of your head and the position of your torso and all of this. Your body, your brain has to be aware of, of all of those things to coordinate things like walking. For me, I'm struggling with the guitar. It's, it's the, the awareness of where individual fingers are in relation to other individual fingers. And this is,
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    17 min

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