If your child uses Minecraft to create intricate worlds, becomes absorbed in arranging objects or repeating symbolic routines, or seems more at ease in imaginative play than in structured tasks, they may not be avoiding learning—they may be doing it, just not in ways that conventional settings are equipped to recognise.
The psychoanalyst and paediatrician Donald Winnicott proposed a powerful idea that still resonates today: play is not a break from development—it is development. For autistic and ADHD children, whose sensory and emotional experiences of the world may be more intense, disorganised, or richly patterned than expected, Winnicott’s work offers an essential reframe. It allows us to see play not as optional recreation, but as the primary mode through which the self forms, emotional regulation is established, and meaning is made.
Understanding how Winnicott conceptualised play and psychological space can help you support your child in ways that feel natural, protective, and aligned with their unique way of engaging the world.
Play as the Ground of Emotional Life
Winnicott believed that play was not just something children do—it’s where the self begins to exist. In early development, when a child first begins to separate their internal experience from external reality, they need a space in between—one where reality and imagination can meet. He called this the potential space, or transitional space (Winnicott, 1971). This is where creativity emerges—not creativity as performance, but creativity as an expression of feeling, curiosity, and agency.
For many neurodivergent children, the need for this kind of space continues well into adolescence. When they engage in immersive, symbolic, or repetitive play, they are not escaping the world—they are managing it. They are trying to regulate emotion, explore identity, and interact with symbols that feel safer than language or direct interpersonal contact.
If your child plays in solitary or patterned ways, if they return to the same themes or worlds repeatedly, or if they create elaborate imaginary systems, they may be doing essential psychological work. Winnicott’s theory allows us to take this seriously—not as symptom, but as symbolic exploration.
The Space Between Inner and Outer
Winnicott described transitional space as a kind of psychological territory where the child is neither fully in themselves nor fully in the world. It’s a space of exploration—safe, flexible, and creative. It’s where fantasy and reality overlap without collapsing into one another.
For neurodivergent children, especially those who are frequently overwhelmed by external demands or find verbal expression difficult, this kind of space is crucial. It allows for experimentation without risk, for agency without exposure.
In this space, the child can test ideas, try out emotional responses, or process sensory input through metaphor and gesture. It might look like stacking, scripting, designing, or building. It might look like repeating the same game scenario for weeks. But beneath the repetition is the function: regulation, exploration, coherence.
Parents are often told that their child’s play needs to become “more functional” or “more interactive.” But Winnicott reminds us that the function of play is not always visible to the adult eye. It lives in the child’s rhythm, not in our expectations.
Creativity Without Pressure
Winnicott distinguished between creative living and compliance. He argued that a person can appear to function well—especially in social or institutional settings—while feeling inwardly disconnected if they are living without access to spontaneous, creative engagement with the world (Winnicott, 1965).
This is particularly relevant when supporting autistic and ADHD young people who may seem compliant or high-achieving on the surface, yet emotionally distant, withdrawn, or rigid underneath. Often, they have had to give up their sense of spontaneity in order to meet the demands of the environment. What’s lost in the process is not just play—it’s self-authorship.
When a child is offered a space where they can create freely—without pressure to perform, produce, or correct—they often begin to show us who they are. Through gesture, symbol, and metaphor, they express feelings and meanings that cannot always be reached through conversation or curriculum.
In Winnicott’s view, creativity is not an ability. It is a state of being. It is a way of relating to the world as something that can be shaped, played with, and internalised on one’s own terms. This matters deeply for neurodivergent learners who often find themselves in systems that require output before ownership.
The Holding Environment
Winnicott also introduced the concept of the holding environment—a psychological space made possible by the parent (or therapist, or teacher), in which the child’s emotional and imaginative processes can unfold safely (Winnicott, 1960). It’s not simply about supervision. It’s about containment—creating a space that feels predictable, attuned, and responsive enough for the child to risk expressing something authentic.
When a neurodivergent child has access to this kind of space—where their symbolic play is taken seriously, their rhythms are respected, and their need for control is honoured—they often show signs of deeper regulation, increased confidence, and spontaneous connection.
But when that space is filled too quickly with correction, direction, or performance pressure, the result is often emotional shutdown, scripting, or escape into internal worlds.
Your role as a parent is not to eliminate the world for your child—but to offer a space where the world can be approached at their pace, through their symbols, in their language. That is what Winnicott meant by holding.
How This Informs the NPA Model
If your child’s play is often misunderstood—if they’re asked to explain themselves before they feel safe, or expected to perform before they’ve been truly seen—Winnicott’s theory offers a different lens. It affirms the psychological value of play, the quiet power of symbolism, and the need for spaces where your child can reveal—not defend—themselves.
The Neurodivergent Pedagogical Alchemy (NPA) model I’ve developed is directly informed by Winnicott’s understanding of play and psychological space—but with a specific and structured purpose. While it may appear to be “just play” on the surface, the space is carefully designed to reveal how your child learns—not through tests or verbal assessments, but through the ways they engage symbolically, respond emotionally, and regulate themselves in an open-ended environment.
Within the NPA model, play is not the outcome. It is the cognitive mapping medium.
Each interaction, gesture, and build within the play-based environment offers rich information: about your child’s attention patterns, sensory sensitivities, executive functioning profile, co-regulation needs, and relational style. These are not anecdotal observations. They are part of a structured interpretive process, grounded in theory and observation, that culminates in a full Neurodivergent Learning Profile.
This isn’t a checklist or behavioural summary—it’s a comprehensive insight into how your child initiates, sustains, and integrates learning. It maps their sensory sensitivities, emotional regulation strategies, attention rhythms, and cognitive preferences. It helps you understand not just what your child struggles with, but why, and how to support them in ways that honour their neurodivergent mind.
As a parent, this profile offers you clarity where there’s been confusion. It gives language to things you may have sensed but couldn’t quite explain. And most importantly, it gives you a way forward—one that’s grounded in observation, shaped by theory, and deeply respectful of your child’s inner world.
If that’s something you’ve been searching for, I’d be glad to speak with you. Learn more about the NPA model here.
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