One thing that I’ve learned over the years is that the best way to learn is through playing.

And I don’t mean “how we learn X”. I mean “how we learn.”

To me, “play” is when you are trying to do something in a safe environment with rich feedback and encouragement. That describes most video games, but it describes lion cubs wrestling with and gently chomping their siblings.

It also describes school.

But only in the most abstract possible way. At least in the US. And even then, only sort of.

Standardized testing makes the stakes too high. Consequences are permanent WAY too early. You can’t play if failure is an *actual* fail state. You can’t adapt to feedback if you don’t get a chance to iterate. You can’t process criticism if you don’t feel safe.

Students have little room for experimentation or exploration. The actual mechanics of the game are often incredibly uninteresting. It’s all cerebral and abstract, and there’s little physical engagement in subjects that aren’t explicitly physical.

It’s weird that “school” is how we’ve standardized “learning”, and that we smash kids into rows of chairs so early throughout their most formative years and that most of the feedback they get is *punishment* or *failure* for trying new things.

It’d be interesting to contemplate a more play-oriented learning process. I know some other countries do a much better job of this. And as someone who did well in the “traditional” schooling methods, it’s taken me a really long time to realize how *weird* it is that this is how we do it.