The Engagement Tax

The cost of active play

A child once brought me a tiny toad, but when he showed it to me, it had been crushed in his hand. This was distressing. I showed him how to cup his hands to give future toads enough room to breathe. He ran off to perform an amphibian burial, and to look for a replacement that he would hold more gently.

This is not the first time that living creatures, both plant and animal, have been harmed by my children. They have caught fish off the dock that they’ve waited too long to show me, and the fish do not recover. They have captured butterflies and caressed the delicate wings so enthusiastically that the poor butterfly never flies again. Just yesterday, they trampled a patch of their grandmother’s day lilies in pursuit of a baby snake (they caught it). The snake was fine, the lilies less so.

This is unfortunate, but I see it as an unavoidable trade-off, a price that must be paid to have kids who are exploring and interacting with the real world. I call it the “engagement tax.” It requires a slightly uncomfortable reckoning on the part of parents that some things will be hurt or broken in the process of learning about the world. But as long as this collateral damage always stems from a place of intense curiosity, and never from malice or poor behavior, then it must be accepted as inevitable, a tax on real play.

The engagement tax takes various forms.

There is the one I’ve just described, which is harm caused to the natural environment by young children picking, plucking, crushing, capturing, and squeezing all manner of flora and fauna in their enthusiastic quest to know it. Then there is the tax on physical well-being, which refers to a potential higher rate of injury from active, adventurous, sometimes-risky outdoor play. Not exactly a parent’s dream, but something we need to become more comfortable with if we want children off digital devices and doing real things.

Related: In Praise of Risky Play

I broke my arm after falling out of a treehouse when I was eight. Yes, it could have been much worse, but it wasn’t, and some of my best memories come from hanging out in that treehouse. (The cast became a badge of honour.) I broke my collarbone while being whipped around the yard in a wagon by my babysitter. With my own kids, I’ve had to deal with various minor head wounds, sprains, slivers, cuts, a scratched cornea, and far too much blood.

All of this is part of the engagement tax.

So, too, is a certain level of chaos, noise, and messiness in the home. I learned years ago that constantly tidying up toys made it harder for my children to get back into creative games and projects that they had started the day before. I started to leave things out—piles of Lego blocks, train tracks, cardboard forts, art supplies, and more. The house was messy, but the kids couldn’t walk past their toys without wanting to play with them again. It was a small price to pay for improved and prolonged playtime.

The engagement tax also comes in the form of wear and tear. My husband tells a story about getting a box of beautiful markers for Christmas one year that were so special, he didn’t want to use them. When he finally got around to it, they had dried out. It was a lesson he never forgot.

And so, we encourage our kids to use their stuff—not irresponsibly, but the way it’s meant to be used. This means their bikes and scooters wear out and need periodic replacement parts. Their basketball net has been repaired numerous times. I replenish art supplies, soccer balls, and running shoes as needed. Their clothes get stained and torn. These expenses are OK because it means they are busy playing exactly how I want them to play.

Replace screens with play

Understanding this engagement tax is critical for parents wanting to curb their kids’ digital device use. I have always maintained that you cannot take screens away from kids without giving them other things to do. Something has to fill the void that is left when screens are removed from the equation, and that thing should be an increase in independent, free-range-style play, where parents step back, subtract themselves, and refrain from saying “be careful” too often.

Parents must understand that their child’s engagement with the real world could result in some injury or damage, either to themselves or to the things they’re engaging with, but that it is fundamentally a beneficial thing. The engagement tax is proof that the child is growing up and into the real world. The child is forging a path, finding their way, and will ultimately be safer for having tested their limits in a low-stakes environment than if they spend their childhood bubble-wrapped in the physical and virtual “safety” of the home, conditioned to fear the outside world.

(Please note that the engagement tax is not an excuse for misbehavior. There is a big difference between out-of-control children destroying things because they’ve never been taught how to act and kids inadvertently harming things that they’re getting to know.)

I like to think of this kind of vigorous play as an implantation process, where every interaction roots the child more deeply within his or her immediate environment. I also believe this rootedness is needed more than ever nowadays, when so much information and influence come from disparate online sources that have little connection to a child’s true place in the world. Free play can help to ground kids in their home lives and foster a sense of belonging, pride, and appreciation for where they come from.

So, let them play with zeal and be prepared to pay the inevitable engagement tax. It may look like a tax right now, but it’s really an investment that will pay dividends in the future.

You Might Also Like:

What Do Screen-Free Kids Do All Summer?
Sibling Camaraderie
Designing for Offline Play

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