“Gardening is one of the things I do to relieve stress, so I made a flower.“,wrote Sophia after playing with large pieces of colorful fabric and black plastic shavings in a Kiwanis LET’s PLAY workshop. It happened at the Florida Kiwanis District Annual Convention on August 9, 2025. Following are photos and reflections that help …
Continue reading “Reflections from KIWANIS LET’s PLAY Workshop”
To be creatively engaged in playing and building structures is a unique and enjoyable experience for members of Kiwanis CKI, Key Club, and Kiwanis Clubs. Really for anyone. Whatever the age, playing with a unique array of unusual, three-dimensional, open-ended materials stimulates curiosity, creative expression, and communication. Self Active Play is a sensory mindfulness practice …
Enjoy this extraordinary moment at the FLAEYC PLAY Space with Meralis Acevedo, Director, Owner and VPK Teacher, at Little Lords and Ladies Academy. After playing silently by herself with open-ended materials, Meralis shares her experience with spontaneity, expressed joy, and remarkable wisdom. In 1922 at Princeton University, Albert Einstein said, “The supreme act of the …
On February 25, 2023, Jasmine participated in a PLAY Workshop at the Manatee Conference on Young Children. Following 15 minutes of silent, solitary self active play, Jasmine came up to me and told me with heartfelt emotion, “This was a nice experiment where I was able to create something out of tassels. A pattern came …
In just a few moments of cutting strips of paper, then with pen and color pencils I made little doodlings and stuck them between wooden blocks,….spontaneous freely formed open compositions that sent my spirit soaring! It was a wonderful simple, powerful, discovery I so enjoyed while playing for a moment at the Florida Kiwanis Foundation …
My friend David Magnani sent me this short article printed in the Boston Globe, December 27, 2021.
Silent, solitary self active play is a sure way of slowing down, focusing the mind, and attaining calm. Exploring and arranging an array of open-ended materials induces a state of relaxing, creative contemplation. In the home or classroom, as a child or adult, this process of attaining calm is rooted in the practice of self …
One of my most treasured play workshops is with tempera paints. Love and creative expression abound spontaneously! Here is one I presented with the staff of the Temple Beth Shalom early childhood program in Needham, Massachusetts. This video shows the wonder and wisdom of silent solo self active play with tempera paints. Participants explore with …
Continue reading “Exciting the Art Spirit: Play with Paints”
On August 1, 2020 I presented a Hands-on Virtual ZOOM play workshop. People chose their own open-ended materials, played with them during the session, journaled, shared images, and told stories about their experience. Here are three journal reflections shared by participants. Cortland Mazzotta I play with my kids that I work with a lot so …
This is it right now. Sitting here writing a few thoughts that you might appreciate, a small accomplishment that means so much to me. Several days ago my wife Kitty and I went to Lowes for some light bulbs and a few two by fours. I wanted to make a frame for a painting I …
Continue reading “A Small Accomplishment that Means So Much to Me.”
Drew Thoughts 