Vivian Paley, a retired kindergarten teacher whom the New York Times called "an artist whose medium is the classroom," stressed the importance of child's play to a packed 105 Dartmouth Hall last night.
Paley, the only kindergarten teacher to receive a so-called "genius grant" from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, said children learn morality by playing with other children in the classroom.
"You can't begin to study boys and girls ... without studying play," she said. "In the beginning, you learn who you are by playing and what others think of you in play."
Paley, the author of nine books, discussed a rule she developed in her 37 years of teaching: "You can't say you can't play." Children should always allow other children to play.
Paley said children have already been taught to incorporate others in their games, so educators should demand more of them.
The rule "seemed to so many people such an enormous advancement in thinking about the morality of the classroom, but all children can go further than that," she said. She said meanness and exclusion leave an enormous impact on children, even in their adult lives.
"Children who are rejected do not learn as well, and it is the job of the teacher to make sure everyone learns as much as they can," she said. "The community in the classroom must find a place immediately for the sad and lonely person."
When she showed her book, "You Can't Say You Can't Play" to her mother and her mothers' friends, who are about 90 years old, the women began discussing stories from their childhood.
"People who couldn't remember what floor their apartments were on began to describe the meanness of other children," she said. "It's the mean things that others do that stay with you."
"Things start getting mean later on," she said. "If you begin early enough when kids believe life is fair and ought to be fair, we can make it work."
When exclusion does occur, it can be devastating to parent and child.
"One of the saddest tales a parent can hear is 'they said I can't play,'" she said.
Paley said parents respond to such tales with questions like, "What did you do to make them not let you play?"
Paley said adults need to ask a different question.
"The adult must develop some faith in the rejected child," she said. "They must investigate not what the child has done, but what the standards of fairness are that permit the group to exclude."
But Paley said children know about fairness and niceness from the beginning. "We are so eager when we are children to learn that we really do nice, good things," she said. "We do have a vision of everyone having the same, fair share."
Paley told a story about the natural kindness of students in a nursery school she visited in London.
On the day she visited, children with brain damage were visiting the school "just to be with ordinary children -- no miracles expected," she said. "Teddy," a child with cerebral palsy, was one of the visitors and loved to play with the other children.
Paley said that when the other students invited Teddy to play with them, his face filled with love and joy. "He never imagined that a child like him could be wanted by children like these -- to be in their play and needed in their story-telling."
The story illustrates that "children are far beyond 'you can't say you can't play,' " she said.
Paley's Dartmouth visit is being sponsored by the education department with support from the Rockefeller Center for the Sciences.
