Playfulness and the development of divergent thinking abilities.

The purpose of this paper is to extract from current literature about play those concepts which seem to have most significance in the psychomotor development of the young child. For the purposes of this paper physical education is limited to that physical activity which occurs within the confines of a school. Very brief reference is made to play in relation to sport and the wider context of present-day culture. The concept of mastery play and stimulus seeking are examined as part of the child's growing maturity and the question is posed whether playfulness shown at an early age may be associated with a particular style of thinking in later years.