Learning through Play

The concept of "Goodies" and "Baddies" is remarkably difficult to explain to six year olds.

I found this out over the weekend when entrusted by family friends to host their twin boys on the event of their wedding anniversary when quality Mummy and Daddy time was on the cards.

It was a sleep-over at our place and the boys were over excited by the prospect of the visit, not so much on the criteria of quality care, lots of treats, going to bed late or our entertainment value but because of a plastic box of toy cars.

The contents are the property of our own son, now in his early twenties, but represented many shopping trips and transactions involving pocket money.

The vehicles are of the chunky die cast type and have managed to survive the demands of imaginary play which inevitably include being parachuted out of an upstairs window using a handkerchief as the canopy, burial under various geology types, immersion in bath water, being left on public transport and gratefully returned by kind members of the travelling public, compression under parental foot, saturation with juice or foodstuffs, impact with furnishings and wall plaster and not a little disrespect from other users (I blame the parents).

There is a definite theme to the collection of cars, or at least a good proportion of it, and that is the means of getting about by the Secret Agent, James Bond.

Our stay-over visitors do of course have their own toy box and I am in fact quite jealous of , in particular the farm vehicles, Disney spin off creations and heavy machinery including a huge remote control JCB Excavator but, and I put this down to political correctness and gender equality issues, they have nothing of a similar rootin', tootin' and shootin' calibre as the car pool of James Bond.

The boys, whilst on previous visits to our house, have developed a fascination with the concealed gadgets and features of a typical Bond motor and with it comes their inevitable questions about "Goodies" and "Baddies".

It must be a confusing time for their young minds.

Don't get me wrong they have been brought up in a very ethically sound household, attend church weekly and already have a strong moral compass but how, they ask, can a person with good intentions (ie, James Bond's commitment to the Defence of the Realm and Western Democracy) have such an armoury of bad-ass (my words) mobile weaponry?

Surely, in the real world, I can see them thinking, only a baddie, intent on sinister and maleficent (their word) behaviour would have the resources and motivation to put together such an armoury intent on madness and mayhem?

Learning through play is a valuable technique and so I endeavoured to explain as tactfully and sensitively as possible the purpose of the Espionage role in modern society taking each of  the die cast Bond vehicles in turn.

There is of course a definite need for a car to transform from a conventional road vehicle to a fantastical  underwater submarine in  order for a "Goodie" to escape the attempts by "Baddies" to stop him.

Tactical missiles and heavy calibre machine guns are also quite important but, I stressed to the boys, only for purposes of self defence, and if provoked by others in the first place.

Being able to drive on varied road surfaces and also where there are no carriageways or byways at all is a handy attribute and so having tyres that can pop out snow grips at the press of a button or a set of clever ski-type outriggers for added stability is just good common sense design.Such is the far reaching influence globally of the Secret Service that an all terrain capability is essential.

I was careful to play down the speed element of the powerful Bond cars although on the wood floor of our living room the boys showed a good grasp of doing a doughnut, handbrake turn and drifting in their toy car based play.

Speed limits and sensible gear changes for best fuel economy were things that I tried to explain although above their realistic vocal impressions of turbo charged petrol engines I am not sure if the message got through fully.

There are also Bond Villain's cars in our sons collection with an equivalent fire power and means of creating chaos to that of their adversary but I was keen to play down any rights and entitlements of "baddies" to have such things. If there was any hint of a turn-around in roles in the play scenarios being enacted out by the boys, for example, where James Bond looked like he was losing , I was quick to bring up questions of discussion on the moral righteousness of a State sponsored secret service and I think that they took it on board as it was mentioned whilst they had a short break of milk and mini-cheddar biscuits.

In my own childhood I had a deep respect for the Police and authorities and would blush easily if spoken to by an Officer of the Law, not I add out of any implied guilt. So, how do I explain the less than respectful stance of James Bond towards law enforcement bodies particularly those in what is portrayed as the old Soviet Bloc? Having a laser beam in a wheel hub cap is a good deterrent but actually deploying it to sever the chassis from an old Lada Police Car could be seen as being a bit excessive. The boys seemed to agree with me on that.

I found the experience very interesting. The Classic Bond Films in which the cars in my son's collection featured are from a wholly different era in history with a starkly contrasting set of values, behaviour and attitudes that we just do not tolerate today.

It is all well and good being able to have discussions and debates on all manner of subjects and topics with your peer group where some form of reasoning and wider worldly knowledge can be applied but just try to put together a rational sounding sentence to convince sharp minded and inquisitive six year olds about something and you can find yourself in quite challenging territory.