Research Essay: Children and Imagination

One day, around the hot and humid summer times of 2015, my mother went to her
weekly visits to the supermarket and she mandated we stay in the car. It was flaming hot
that day, to the point where not even the air conditioner was doing any wonders to our
poor little bodies, and the sun kissing our faces made every single person in the car sweat
to the point where I believed we could fill up a water bottle with our fluids. I was bored,
hot, and tired so I proceeded to just close my eyes and imagine myself being in a cold and
comfortable place. I started to see myself on a snowy day, playing with my friends and
throwing snowballs at everybody; I jumped by hearing the car’s door open: it was time to
go home. I contemplated what I did for a second. I knew right away that imagination was
the key to get through boring situations as a kid. Even though the trips and the constant
exhaustion of following my mother everywhere were still present, so was my imagination
and my ability to transport my body and spirit into a more “fun” world.
I can state from personal experience that kids need to be able to develop
and explore their childhood through imagination. According to Jim Davies, imagination
is the ability to explore ideas that are not present in our environment or things that are not
even real, this means that imagination can bring our creativity as part of our lives by
visualizing the idea out of our heads. Children tend to observe and analyze their

surroundings according to their capacity and what they can comprehend at the moment,
stating that kids are only able to see objects and things from their immature perspective.
Imagination in a kid cannot only develop their ability to see the world from different
perspectives but also enjoy the world around them more pleasantly and innocently.
The ability to form new ideas, images, and concepts without the need to sense or look at
the objects that are present, is not only a skill that expands the kid’s creativity but its
sense of resourcefulness according to Jill Holtz. According to this, kids have the power to
play with limitations which their imagination helps them complete the scarce of resources
even if they do not have a real boat to play to pretend to be a pirate.
Every kid needs and has the right to experience life through different
perspectives, play with their surroundings through imagination, and appreciate
experiences as they move on in life. Imagination can teach us how to get out of situations
that might not be as entertaining; you could say it’s a way humans have of transport into
their happy place.

One important benefit is that when kids play with their imagination it helps them
comprehend their environment and experiences in the world so far, allowing them to push
boundaries and how doing different things might cause different outcomes whether
positive or negative. These types of activities can be fun and enriching if it’s supervised
and controlled by parental figures (Holtz). It enables social and emotional development,
helping children to contemplate a variety of confrontations and resolutions in life (Holtz).

Something that comes along these definitions has to be fictional friends which is
the practice when a kid’s personality is portrayed indirectly as another entity like for
For example, kid’s having an imaginary friend that “plays and interacts” with them is a way
that kids get out of the zone of boredom or a way to entertain themselves.
Fictional friends play an important role in kids’ imagination since it helps them
build new relationships within themselves and others. For example, kids by building a
fictional friend in their heads can make a new friend that listens to them also share the
same ideas since that imaginary friend has been built over the kid’s perception and
personality. According to Rebecca Eanes, fictional friends do more than just exercise the
mind but boost social and language development as well as cope with hard life events
that they might not be able to understand or process. These actions can develop
due to how kids when playing with fictional friends tend to socialize and interact with
them as they play, kind of like they have someone in front of them even though it is not
real.

With this being said, kids that tend to play or communicate with imaginary friends
are more likely to be better when it comes to understanding other perspectives and points
of view. For example, kids by the time they create in the subconscious another entity for
their entertainment they are building another personality into that little friend of theirs
(like another perspective out of their original), which makes them have not only another
point of view but different influences on their decision-making process.
Imagination can help the child be more physically active. Something particular
about imaginative play is that it does not happen only sitting down and just spacing out
into your deepest thoughts but you tend to use your surroundings as a source of
recreation. As kids play, they tend to use gross motor and fine motor skills (exercises
that include the upper parts of someone’s body like the torso, biceps, etc…). This type of
exercise helps the kid develop better physical and mental health by constantly being
active, running, and hiking. Kids that tend to play actively can regulate their
movements and behaviors (“Imagination in Child Development: Why It’s Important.”).
However, claims state that imagination can be harmful later on in a child’s life
and destructive scenarios can be shown in the kid’s play. For example, some kids tend to
play by pretending they are ninjas that destroy their enemies by kicking and punching the
evil in them which can not only harm the kid but those around them(“HOW TO
MANAGE A SMALL CHILD’S VIVID IMAGINATION.”). By this being said, violence
is exposed to the child’s life and the absence of self-control can be lost. This is not safe to
say since by this the public is normalizing kids not being able to make mature decisions
and understand the differences between what’s wrong and right when in reality kids are
smarter than what we think.

Kids are just like sponges; they absorb anything around them. Kids tend to be messy,
dirty, loud, curious, and full of infinity energy. Although kids do get hurt while playing at
the park or just playing by themselves, we as adults are not supposed to protect kids from
every single event or thing in life, and making mistakes such as falling, hurt a knee, as
well bleeding from their elbow are things that teach the kid that sometimes it’s okay to
get hurt as long as you get up and keep being happy.
Children to grow up and be functional members of society would need to
experience their childhood from different points of view making decisions and making
mistakes are what make a human capable of becoming better. Imagination brings these
points into the children’s lives through meaningful experiences, just like how I noticed
that sitting in a car does not only have to be hot and unpleasant but with a bit of creativity
and imagination I could make that moment pass by faster.

Works Cited
Colier, Nancy. “Are You (Unknowingly) Discouraging Your Child?” Psychology Today, Sussex
Publishers, accessed Feb 4. 2021, www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/inviting-monkeytea/202001/are-you-unknowingly-discouraging-your-child.
. Davies, Jim. “What Imagination Is.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, accessed Feb 5.
2021,www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-science-imagination/201207/whatimagination-is-0.
Eanes, Rebecca. “The Psychology of Imaginary Friends.” Creative Child Magazine, accessed
Feb 3
www.creativechild.com/articles/view/the-psychology-of-imaginary-friends.
“Imagination in Child Development: Why It’s Important.” Miracle Recreation accessed 3 Feb.
2021,
www.miracle-recreation.com/blog/importance-of-imagination-in-child-development/
“How to Manage a Small Child’s Vivid Imagination.” Focus on the Family, 15 June 2020,
accessed Feb 4. 2021,
www.focusonthefamily.com/family-qa/how-to-manage-a-small-childs-vividimagination/.
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Jill Holtz, et al. “Why Imaginative Play for Children Is So Important.” MyKidsTime accessed 4
Feb. 2021, www.mykidstime.com/for-parents/imaginative-play-children-important/.
“Nurturing Creativity & Imagination for Child Development.” Bright Horizons accessed 3 Feb.
2021,www.brighthorizons.com/family-resources/nurturing-creativity-and-imaginationfor-child-development.

 

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