With the help of a frilly dress, tiara, and magic wand, your 3-year-old is transformed
into the queen of a magical universe where her hobby horse is a winged unicorn. When
you're asked to taste the pink clouds, you agree that they're a lot like bubblegum.
Your son pulls a sheet over his shoulders and runs as fast as he can across the
lawn. The air lifts the fabric; your boy's legs leap into the air. "I'm flying, mommy!"
the 4-year-old says. He's a superhero, out to save the backyard from dragons hiding
behind the bushes and find treasure buried in the sandbox.
Parents of preschoolers have a front-row seat to some of the most imaginative theater
ever produced. These are the so-called "magic years" — when a child's brain
is developed enough to imagine grand stories but not yet complex enough to reason
the way adults do and ask, "But can that really happen?"
Here's why imagination is so important and what you can do to foster these magic
years.
How Preschoolers View the World
There's a lot that very young children aren't yet able to grasp about the world
around them. As a result, they "fill in the blanks" and often make up their own sometimes
magical explanations for how things work.
This time, which peaks during the preschool years, was dubbed "the magic years"
by child development expert Selma Fraiberg, PhD, in 1959 when she wrote a book of
the same name.
Babies use their senses (touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound) to explore their
world. As they develop, they begin to understand the basic function of things ("If
I push this button, the pony will pop out of the barn!").
Now, as preschoolers, they take this knowledge and combine it with a growing imagination
to come up with fantastical ideas about why and how things happen.
Pretend play lets kids try out new roles for themselves (like superheroes, princesses,
wild animals, or even parents) and allows for creative problem-solving. But it also
helps them deal with another hurdle of the preschool years: intense emotions. Baby
dolls might be put in "time out" and scolded for actions suspiciously similar to your
little one's latest offense. An imaginary friend (who's a bigger troublemaker than
your child ever could be) might be dreamed up to help your child deal with feelings
of guilt and remorse following a moment of lost control, such as hitting a playmate.
Self-control is
a tough skill to learn, and pretend play helps kids practice it as well as play out
the frustration it creates.