The keys to happiness could be in an adult’s ability to play, according to Amy Howell.

The Central Oregon Community College Social Science Lecture series kicks off spring term with “The Power of Play” on May 10. At the event Amy Howell, director of Early Childhood Education at COCC, will be facilitating activities and discussions emphasizing the importance of play in peoples’ lives.
“We will be doing what children do, [things] that we’ve forgotten how to do,” Howell said. “We’re going to be playing.”
Activities will include simple exercises meant to get people using multiple aspects of learning.
“It’s based on building things together,” Howell said, “interaction with materials and the socializing that comes with that.”
Howell, who has been teaching ECE at COCC since 2004, understands the benefits these types of interactions have on children as well as adults.
“It’s fundamental to human learning,” Howell said. “Everything that we do in the adult world has its roots in play.”
This will be the first of a three-part series titled “Create, Play, Flourish. The Keys to Happiness,” according to Andria Woodell, psychology professor at COCC.
“The whole idea is creativity and the ways to happiness,” Woodell said.
Woodell began the lecture series over four years ago as a way for students and faculty to come together to explore different issues. In 2012-2013 subjects ranged from vampires and zombies to nutrition, with spring 2013s focus on happiness.
“It’s meant to take a theme, then bring in speakers to talk about that theme from different backgrounds,” Woodell said, “to get people excited about things they might not have been thinking about.”
Howell looks forward to getting people excited about playfulness.
“We don’t give ourselves time to wonder and create,” Howell said. “I don’t think adults and children are all that different.”
“The Power of Play” will be held at COCC in the Ochoco building from 10 am to 11am on May 10.

–Darwin Ikard

The Broadside

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