H. G. Wells, "The New Machiavelli," Chapter 2.
The unsocial novice
Nowhere else, perhaps, not even in his "Floor Games" and "Little Wars" has Mr. Wells, or any other author succeeded in drawing so convincing a picture of the possibilities of constructive play as is to be found in those pages, all too brief, in "The New Machiavelli" where the play laboratory at Bromstead is described. One can imagine the eager boy who played there looking back across the years strong in the conviction that it could not have been improved, and yet the picture of a child at solitary play is not, after all, the ideal picture. Our laboratory, while it must accommodate the unsocial novice and make provision for individual enterprise at all ages and stages, must he above all the place where the give and take of group play will develop along with block villages and other community life in miniature.
FLOOR BLOCKS
In his reminiscences of his boyhood play Mr. Wells lays emphasis on his great good fortune in possessing a special set of "bricks" made to order and therefore sufficient in number for the ambitious floor games he describes. Comparatively few adults can look back to the possession of similar play material, and so a majority cannot realize how it outweighs in value every other type of toy that can be provided.
Where the budget for equipment is limited, floor blocks can be cut by the local carpenter or, in a school, by the manual training department. The blocks in use at The Play School (see cut, p. 20) are of white wood, the unit block being 1-3/8" X 2¾" X 5½". They range in size from half units and diagonals to blocks four times the unit in length (22").
