are when the adult pretends to be more weaker, clumsier and foolish than the child.
This type of play can help the child resolve powerless from routines and school along with processing adult inflicted trauma like anger or authoritarian discipline.
Cooperative games and activities
Co-operative games strengthen your connection with your child without the threat of losing a game.
When you cooperate toward a common goal with your child, whether it’s a game or a real-life activity, you create a meaningful connection based on your child’s desire to contribute, and you learn to recognize each other’s strengths while bringing out the best in each other. These activities can help your child feel connected and valued.
Separation Games
are where you create a short visual or spacial separation between you and your child.
They help children deal with daily physical or emotional separations along with traumatic separations and loss.
Non Directive Child Centered Play
A set time where the child decides exactly what to play. It helps children feel acknowledged, safe, and loved. It is especially useful for reconnecting after stress or separations, helping children heal from trauma, or simply strengthening your connection.
Contingency Play
Contingency play is any activity in which the adult’s behavior is predictably repeated and contingent on the child’s behavior.
These games can promote connection, enhance trust, convey acceptance, create a sense of empowerment, and establish a reassuring feeling of predictability. The laughter that occurs during these games helps children release tensions resulting from anxiety, powerlessness, and loss of control during previous traumatic experiences.
Activities Body Contact
help children to connect with people, as long as it is done whilst respecting a child's boundaries. (no tickling!)
Develops a sense of belonging an self worth.
Symbolic Play with specific props or themes
is especially effective for helping children heal from trauma. During this kind of play, you take a more directive role by offering specific toys or suggesting a play theme relating to the child’s traumatic experience.
Regression Play
is when children play games and take on a role younger than they are.
This type of play helps children gain independence by allowing a safe space to regress back to as they gain confidence and independence.
Nonsense Play
Nonsense play is any play in which you or your child acts silly by making obvious mistakes or by playfully exaggerating emotions or conflicts. This kind of play qualifies as attachment play when it involves parent-child interaction.
Through Nonsense play you can resolve discipline issues by playfully acting them out to the point of ridiculousness, children can release pent up anger through laughter
My child read attachment play and asked the question: Is sensory play attachment play? Why is it not in the book?
When children do Occupational Therapy they will play with rice, shaving foam, run around a room, swing, climb in and out of stretchies, rolling around etc. It is a form of Non Directive Child Led Play, Co-operative and Body Contact. All Play can be sensory integrating so it is an important awareness for children that might need support with sensory integration that it should be mentioned.
Playing with tweezers picking up things like rice is fine motor skills development.
Rolling, climbing, jumping is vestibular, proprioception and gross motor skill development.
Outdoor play in sand, grass, mud along with digging are all sensory stimulating and calming lowing overload/hyper arousal/disassociation and bringing connection to the enviroment.
Temperature play can be sensory stimulating. Some might lean to cold vs hot. Cold water is known to release brain chemicals that improve clarity of mind as part of the divers reflex.
Research by Professor Christopher Lowry (at both the University of Bristol and the University of California Boulder) demonstrates that exposure to friendly soil bacteria (Mycobacterium Vaccae) stimulates the immune system, resulting in a release of serotonin by the brain. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00213-019-05253-9
When children are tried at the end of the day they will often become 'fussy' or hyper playful. This is the need to release the accumulated stress of the day.
Children that release stress by crying or laughing before bed remain more rested through the night. Developing this nightly pattern with your child creates a healthy release and balancing of brain chemicals, this also prevents nightmares and insomnia.
This could be used as a nightly routine or a single game could be used to address one problematic area like brushing teeth.
1
Bath time
Place a towel on the floor and use it as a train, pull the child between 'stations' (nightly chores) letting the child decide the sequence
2
Drying & Clothes Station
Let the child get dry and select their clothes from a choice of a couple. You can joke around with nonsense play and put clothes on the wrong parts.
3
Dry hair
Dry their hair on the bed and have a pillow fight that they win.
4
Brushing Teeth
Play a Role Reversal/Regression game whilst brushing teeth. Pretend to be a baby and let the child brush yours whilst you then brush theirs. Or use Nonsense play and be a robot arm going crazy as you brush their face.
5
Body contact play
Have some body contact play and use your body/lap to be a race care chair that they drive. Once finished playing, whilst they are still sitting on your lap read a bed time story. Or have 10mins Child Directive play
6
A Loving Limit that it is bed time
Set the limit with time spare so there is no rush for the emotion to come out and have a release of tears, then a restful nights sleep.
Attachment Play is more responsive to the child's current moment.
More transient
A game that's exciting to a young child might only be fun for a short while for a teen. Teens will get agitated if joke is repeated
Night-time releases are still important
Teens may become more talkative before bed or invite some rough and tumble play. This can be harder as children become stronger. Find other ways for power reversal like letting them give you a piggy back but not letting you decide where they go, for girls, let them put make up on you.
Regression Play is still important
Regression play is good for when a child has been exploring independence and reminds them there is a base of unconditional love for their child self.