plork.fun

Playwork

I think I might have just created a job for myself.

I think I might be an adult playworker. Or a creative playworker. Or - maybe - a plork-worker?

In the book Playwork: Theory and Practice, Dr Fraser Brown describes playwork as work which uses “the medium of play as a mechanism for redressing aspects of developmental imbalance caused by a deficit of play opportunities” (2003, p52). This includes “adventure play, therapeutic play, out-of-school clubs, hospital play, environmental design, and much more” (ibid). Brown’s work has gone on to influence policy across the UK, with both Play Scotland and Play Wales utilising playwork as a defining aspect of their modus operandi. Playwork, for Play Scotland at least, is:

“…an approach to working with children in which children determine and control the content and intent of their play, rather than it being led or directed. The play process for children includes exploration, trying out things, testing boundaries of ability as they grow, learning from successes and mistakes to build resilience and adaptability.” (Play Scotland, date unknown)

Children’s play “is freely chosen, personally directed behaviour, motivated from within” (SPRITO, 1992), and it is the job of the playworker to facilitate spaces where children “are relatively free from adult intrusion and direction, have high autonomy in exercising agency and ownership, and have a high level of self-regulation and control over their involvement in play” (Wood 2013). This is all valuable work. But what about adults? Once again, us grownups are left to fend for ourselves in the realms of play. The focus on children - whilst absolutely relevant - perpetuates the ongoing fallacy that adults shouldn’t be wasting our time with play; we should be working. But why should the young have all the fun?

The central principle of playwork is to facilitate, to create space. The Playwork Principles (SPRITO 1992) also emphasise that playworkers must operate with a deep and contemporary understanding of play and operate a reflective practice which allows them to continue to develop their knowledge and practice. At its heart, this is exactly what my research is trying to achieve! Where playworkers facilitate play, I am encouraging an engagement with play with a specific motivation to create works.

What I’m trying to demonstrate here is the application of playwork - the creation of space for play - to an adult, creative-practitioner audience; in essence, not so much playwork, as plork-work. So let’s return to the definition of playwork and remove the age-specific rhetoric, and reframe it for the creative practitioner: “an approach to working with creative practitioners in which they determine and control the content and intent of their playful approach to work”. But a key difference here is that playwork denotes the playworker as facilitator for someone else (i.e. the child) to have that space to play. In contrast, the creative practitioner is ‘doing it for themselves’; if playworkers’ subjects (if you like) are children, then the creative practitioner is the subject of their own practice. Plork-work, therefore, might not be centred as directed outward, but directed inward: “a playful approach to making works in which creative practitioners determine and control the content and intent of their practice”.

In essence, this definition is a definition of plork rather than a separate phenomena of plork-work. But what playwork is to play, perhaps plork-work might be to plork: playwork describes the action of creating space in order (for children) to play. Plork-work, therefore, is not the process of plork - the playful approach - but perhaps it is more the work of creating that space in order to do so. And perhaps that IS as much for others as it is for ourselves; after all, whenever I’m running a workshop or taking a lecture on plork, and I not trying to facilitate others making their own space: to plork in their own practices? As such, am I not plork-working?

If this all sounds terribly clunky and unrefined, of course, it is. The ideas need further development. I was just struck as I read about playwork about the similarities and differences between playwork and plork. But perhaps it boils down to this: if playworkers are workers that work in play, and artworkers work in art, what do you call people who work playfully and play workfully, and promote plork as a central aspect of creative practice? Or, to look at it another way, perhaps playwork itself needs an updated definition. Because I definitely work in the realm of play, and play in the realm of work; I attempt to create space for playfulness in my own practice and support other creative practitioners doing the same.

To try and clarify my thoughts, I’ve adapted the Playwork Principles from SPRITO 1992. What I like about this is it lays out a potential set of principles for plork both as an individual practice and indeed as a political and social practice. And while they still need development, I think the idea of a set of principles for plork - if not plork-work - is valuable.

Plork-Work Principles

  1. All adults need to play. The impulse to play is innate. Play is a biological, psychological and social necessity, and is fundamental to the healthy development and wellbeing of individuals and communities.
  2. Play is a process that is freely chosen, personally directed and intrinsically motivated. That is, players determine and control the content and intent of their play, by following their own instincts, ideas and interests, in their own way for their own reasons.
  3. Work is activity driven by output or extrinsic motivation.
  4. The prime focus and essence of plork is to support and facilitate one’s own play-full process as a methodology for work. This should inform the ways of working.
  5. The role of the plork-worker is to support creative practitioners in the creation of a space in which work can be a way of playing, and play a way of working - beginning with their own practice.
  6. The plork-worker’s response to creative practice is based on a sound up to date knowledge and experience of plork, including reflective practice.
  7. In disseminating plork, the role of the plork-worker is not to dictate how to be playful, but instead to create understanding of why be playful; to facilitate and support individual engagement with playfulness.
  8. Plork-workers recognise their own impact on practitioners’ plork space and also the impact of practitioners on the plork-worker.
  9. For plork-workers, plork process takes precedence and plork-workers act as advocates for plork when engaging with non-play-oriented agendas.
  10. Plork-workers choose an intervention style that enables creative practitioners to ‘let their selves out to play’. All plork-worker intervention must balance risk with the professional and artistic benefit and well being of practitioners.

References

Guidance on Playwork. In: SCOTLAND, P. (ed.). Play Scotland.

  1. The Playwork Principles - an overview. In: WALES, P. (ed.). playscotland.org: Play Wales / Chwarae Cymru.

SKILLSACTIVE 2016. NOS for Playworker/Playwork Practitioner. UK.

SPRITO 1992. National Occupational Standards in Playwork. London: Sports & Recereation Lead Body.

WOOD, J. 2013. Free choice and free play in early childhood education: Troubling the discourse. International Journal of Early Years Education, 22.