Picture yourself sitting in a classroom, your mind blank, your eyes flicking towards the window and the beautiful, yet torturous baseball field calling out to you. School can be great, but at the same time, it's not hard to sit in the classroom and feel bored out of your mind. Why is that exactly? As students, we are constantly obligated to sit in the classroom for hours under the same circumstances nearly every time, taking in facts, memorizing them, and repeating them verbatim. This is the norm for a majority of schooling systems and its certainly not helping with keeping students in school.

What can be done to fix this situation and keep students wanting to go to school? The other night I went to a presentation for one of my college classes and this very subject was touched upon. The speaker put a lot of emphasis on how learning can be improved for all students from kindergarten up to college. The answer to this is simple: play. Her mind was filled with the potential of how beneficial play can be, only there's more to it than just playing.

One of the more important concepts she stressed was not only implementing playtime into school and learning routines but also doing things playfully. For example, you can learn information in a textbook by acting it out and jumping into the character of one of the people mentioned in the book. I personally never thought of learning this way, but at the same time people often make songs or rhymes to memorize things, so why wouldn't it work? An engaging learning technique is enough to keep everyone wanting to come back.

It's also important to keep a playful nature in how you carry yourself in your everyday life and to be prepared for whatever may come your way. This can also be helped by incorporating a playful mannerism into your routine and setting yourself up to challenge yourself by doing things you may not do normally. You can maintain this way of living through improvisation and challenging yourself to step outside of your comfort zone. This childlike spirit of joy can be kept with you as you go about your business every day and it will ultimately raise your spirits and motivation to a new level.

The part of her speech that especially hit me was the fact that she traveled to some overseas countries and discovered that the children there were so caught up in getting their education that they didn't know what it meant to play. They had no recollection of what playing was or how they could even have the time for it. Can you imagine living life so seriously that you don't know how to have fun? One phrase telling these kids that it was ok to play instantly changed their mentality and lifted their spirits as they remembered all of the fun games they used to play when they were little. It's just amazing how beneficial one change of mindset can be.

So there you have it. A new form of education that will hopefully be implemented more into children's learning experiences. Reminding the children to maintain a playful way of life will keep them more motivated and prepared to conquer whatever life may throw at them. They'll be able to live a happier life and spread that to others as well.