Illustration: Luo Xuan/GT

 

During frequent visits to neighborhood parks with my two-year-old son, one thing that strikes me as curious is the local attitude toward playing games. To be more specific, in Beijing it seems as if games playing is generally regarded as an activity for adults, especially those of the senior variety, rather than children.

While pensioners can often be seen playing cards or mahjong, and university students let off steam on the basketball or volleyball court, it is quite rare to see city children engaged in group play. In fact, the only times when I have seen children in China playing games together without direction from an adult is in small villages far outside the metropolis.

Why is this? Largely, it has to be said, the relative gamelessness of Chinese childhood (compared to, say, Europe, Latin America or Africa, where kids can be seen playing soccer everywhere) can be attributed to the one-child policy. In an era devoid of siblings, it is a natural tendency for caregivers to trail after their only child, anxious to ensure that it stays out of harm's way.

In my experience, in Beijing's parks, interactions with other children are fleeting as families pass each other by like wandering nomads in a games-playing desert. The ever-present parent controls play, and this has the effect of dissuading the infant from making spontaneous connections with peers.

Such a situation seems not only a pity but also, I would argue, detrimental to the psychological and social development of the children themselves. Games are a way of learning to socialize with one's peer group while following rules which facilitate communal activity. This is an aspect of games-playing that has not been well understood by Chinese parents, who seem to prefer that their kids become lone wolves in spotlessly clean brand-name clothing, unsoiled by excessive contact with the rest of the world.

Here, of course, the cut-throat nature of Chinese education needs to be mentioned. Parents seem to see their offspring as individual units in competition with all the others in a zero-sum game of scholastic success or failure. This means that activities which encourage interaction - such as playing games - are not valued as much as they should be.

There is also a very real sense in which children are used as status symbols rather than emphasizing their development as people. In our local mall there is a custom-built sand pit equipped with an amazing range of toys. Here, for a mere 60 yuan ($9.60), parents can sit in their designer sunglasses and watch their little darlings dabble in sand so clean and fine that it is literally impossible to build sand castles out of it.

Facilities like these, it goes without saying, are intended to allow parents to show off the fact that they have the wherewithal to place their nippers there, rather than with the intention of encouraging learning through play. As a consequence the kids sit alone in squeaky-clean splendor, fiddling solemnly while their mums and dads gloat from the sides.

In the end, what I am trying to suggest is that children need to be exposed to activities - such as games - which foster close-quarters engagement with the peer group, for the benefit of both individuals and the society as a whole. Experimental play with other kids is likely to produce more rounded adults than an environment in which the child is constantly monitored by a supervising authority such as a parent.