[barrysteve]

I don't understand this. We were free-to-play, but it was not unstructured. Quite the opposite, you had to be somewhere on time, in a heirarchy or school structure and there were teacher imposed rules.

I miss that heirarchy more than I'd care to admit. The endless cycles of milking the good while it's good, is an offensive and time wasting replacement for what used to be a well-timed culture.

It is deeply humorous to see fear of traffic and crime listed as a valid reason to keep kids inside. When you list fear of data leaks as a valid reason for privacy from surveillance, people discount you. So much emotional picking and choosing lately.

Parentalism is destroying the West, make no mistake, "security" is a massively overrated parasite, sucking the life out of it's inhabitants. Get off my back.

[trealira]

Typically, unstructured play is defined as playing without predefined rules or adult guidance, like playing on a playground or drawing pictures. The child is left to their own devices.

Structured play has predefined rules; for example, playing Monopoly, role-playing, or cooking with an adult's help.

Although you had to follow rules in a school setting, it wouldn't necessarily make your play structured, since you always have to follow those rules anyway; it's not like playing Monopoly, where the playing itself is governed by additional rules, and everyone takes turns, and follows a set structure.