What happens when you stop just playing with your kids and start letting them lead?
This best-of brings back two Season 2 conversations. Game designer Elan Lee, co-creator of Exploding Kittens, tells Melissa and Esther how a stack of boring preschool board games ended with his four-year-old daughter saying "let's fix them," and how the games they built together at his crafting table, Hurry Up Chicken Butt among them, ended up on store shelves. He shares the rules they designed by: the parent has to have fun too, kids have to be able to win without being let win, and there can be a winner but no losers.
Then developmental psychologist Dr. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek shares the small tricks that turned the hardest parts of the day into play. She also talks about her work on playful learning landscapes: hopscotch at bus stops, I-spy murals in hospital waiting rooms, and why a bench doesn't have to just be a bench.
From the full episodes How Boredom Led to a Global Line of Family Games with Elan Lee and Why Play Is Key for Child Development with Dr. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek.
Learn more about Dr. Kathy's work:
Learn more about Elan Lee:
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