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180 Inspiring Play Quotes for Kids

Are you looking for inspiring play quotes for kids? Then you are in the right place!

Here are 180 Playing Sayings for Children including matching books, activities, and free printable lunch box notes.

Let’s have a look!

inspiring play quotes for kids

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Benefits of Playing

Before we get started with our fun playing quotes for kids, let’s learn a little bit about the benefits of playing for children.

Studies show that children learn important life skills through playing. Here are just some benefits children can learn through play:

  • Having fun and helps make friends
  • Improves social skills
  • Better problems solving skills
  • Boosts self-esteem and confidence
  • Awakens curiosity and creativity

Play Idea Books for Kids

After we learned some cool facts about the benefits of playing you might like to have a look at these books and get inspired:

Young readers will enjoy reading about Coach Papa Bear and his players in this addition to the Living Lights™ series of Berenstain Bears books. Children will learn how to play fairly and act in a way that pleases God.

This fun-filled guide inspires kids to get out of the house and explore the great outdoors where they can discover the wonder and amazement of the world around them, whether in their backyard, across the country, or around the world.

303 Kid-Approved Exercises and Active Games help 6-8-year-old kids get off their chairs with fun and age-appropriate exercises. Exercise for children must be fun. These exercises have been used for personal training sessions, kids’ fitness classes, kids’ fitness camps, birthday parties, and in schools; they have all been “Kid-Approved!”.

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180 Best Play Quotes for Kids

Playing is very important, to inspire your children to play check out our play quotes for kids.

Our list includes best play quotes and sayings for kids, best playtime quotes for students, inspiring play quotes for toddlers, kindergarteners, and students, play captions and slogans, quotes about playing, inspiring and motivational play quotes, and fun play captions and puns.

Let’s have a look and get inspired!

Play Sayings for Kids

First are our kids play quotes:

  • “Play is the high form of research.” – Albert Einstein
  • “Play is not a luxury. Play is a necessity.” – Kay Redfield Jamison
  • “In our play we reveal what kind of people we are.” – Ovid
  • “Go and play. Run around. Build something. Break something. Climb a tree. Get dirty. Get in some trouble. Have some fun.” – Brom, The Child Thief
  • “Work like a captain play like a pirate.” – Unknown
  • “People tend to forget that play is serious.” – David Hockney
  • “Sorry about that mess, we are just learning here.” – Unknown
  • “Play is where the fun happens.” – Unknown
  • “Give Play Cherish” – Unknown
  • “When life gives us a rainy day, play in the puddles.” – Unknown
fun play quotes for kids

“Let children play.”

Unknown
play sayings for kids
kids play quotes

Playing Quotes for Kindergarten

Followed by our kindergarten play quotes:

  • “Play is the work of the child.” – Maria Montessori
  • “It is a happy talent to know how to play.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • “Play all day!”
  • “Let’s start playing a game.”
  • “There should always be time to play.”
  • “Excuse the mess… the children are making memories.” – Unknown
  • “We all need empty hours in our lives or we will have no time to create or dream. – Robert Coles
  • “Play nice, work hard, be kind.” – Unknown
  • “Play is the beginning of knowledge.” – Unknown
  • “With play comes wisdom.” – Unknown
Playing Quotes for Kindergarten

“Happiness is playing with friends.”

Unknown
kids quotes about playing
play quotes for kids

Best Play Quotes for Students

Next are our student play quotes:

  • “Play is the brain’s favourite way of learning” – Diane Ackerman
  • “Play is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.” – Joseph Chilton Pearce
  • “Play is training for unexpected.” – Mark Bekoff
  • “The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct.” – Carl Jung
  • “Play is the beginning of knowledge.” – George Dorsey
  • “It is paradoxical that many educators and parents still differentiate between a time for learning and a time for play without seeing the vital connection between them.” – Leo F. Buscaglia
  • “You can’t use up creativity; the more you use, the more you have.” – Maya Angelou
  • “Whoever wants to understand much must play much.” – Gottfried Benn
  • “Play builds the kind of free-and-easy, try-it-out, do-it-yourself character that our future needs.” – James Hines Jr.
  • “Play builds the kind of free-and-easy, try-it-out, do-it-yourself character that our future needs.” – James L. Hymes Jr.
Best Play Quotes for Students

“You will get smarter through simply playing.”

Unknown
motivational play sayings for students
playtime quotes for toddlers

Did you enjoy our playtime quotes for kids?
Then read our tips on How to Engage Kids in Nature next.

Play Quotes for Kids

How about the following kids play quotes?

  • “Happy times are never ending when you are playing and pretending.” – Unknown
  • “Play the day away!”
  • “Play: to make a mess with toys.”
  • “Create – Play – Explore”
  • “Playroom rule: Let’s just play.”
  • “It is a lovely day to play.”
  • “It is a happy talent to know how to play.”
  • “Happiness is watching your children play make-believe.”
  • “Play learn and grow.”
  • “Play with fairies, ride a unicorn, swim with mermaids, chase rainbows.” – Unknown
playtime quotes for toddlers
playtime quotes for kids

Best Play Time Quotes

Next, check out our playtime quotes for toddlers and kids:

  • “Playroom: Share – Imagine – Laugh”
  • “When children play the world wins.” – Unknown
  • “Play the day away.”
  • “We love playtime!
  • “In this room, we play.”
  • “The playroom is our happy place.”
  • “Playtime is the best.”
  • “It is nap time not play time.”
  • “Play time friends are the best.”
  • “Splish, splash it is playtime in the bath.”
kids play quotes
play quotes for kids

Short Play Quotes

What do you think about these short play quotes for kids?

  • “People tend to forget that play is serious.” – David Hockney
  • “Play is the exultation of the possible.” – Martin Buber
  • “Surely all God’s people…like to play. – John Muir
  • “The debt we owe to the play of the imagination is incalculable. – Carl Jung
  • “Do not keep children to their studies by compulsion but by play.” – Plato
  • “The opposite of play isn’t work. It’s depression.” – Jane McGonigal
  • “Culture arises and unfolds in and as play.” – Johan Huizinga
  • “A child loves his play, not because it’s easy, but because it’s hard.” – Benjamin Spock
  • “There is for many a poverty of play. – D.W. Winnicott
  • “All work and no play will make you sad and grey!” – Habeeb Akande
Short Play Quotes

“Don’t forget to play.”

Unknown
fun Play Quotes short
short play quotes for kids

Quotes About Playing

If these weren’t enough check out these quotes on playing:

  • “Children learn as they play. Most importantly, in play children learn how to learn.” – O. Fred Donaldson
  • “Time spent playing with children is never time wasted” – Don Lantero
  • “In play, a child always behaves beyond his average age, above his daily behavior. In play it is as though he were a head taller than himself.” – Lev Vygotsky
  • “You play like you practice and practice how you play.” – Marcus Luttrell
  • “The most creative people have this childlike facility to play.” – John Cleese
  • “Play is essential to development because it contributes to the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being of children.” – Kenneth R. Ginsburg
  • “Play is the primary way children were designed to learn.” – Kathy Hersh-Pasek and Roberta Golinkoff
  • “Play is the mediator of the invisible and visible. – Dora M. Kalff
  • “Play hard or go home.” – Unknown
  • “Every child should have time for arts, music, sports, drama, robotics, school newspapers, and the like, not to mention recess and play.” – Chris Gabrieli
Quotes About Playing

“It never hurts to play.”

Unknown
playtime quotes for kids
fun play quotes for kids

Inspirational Play Quotes

Time for some inspiring play quotes:

  • “Deep meaning lies often in childish play.” – Johann Friedrich von Schiller
  • “When children pretend, they’re using their imaginations to move beyond the bounds of reality. A stick can be a magic wand. A sock can be a puppet. A small child can be a superhero.” – Fred Rogers
  • “We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the game.” – Randy Pausch
  • “It is time for a return to childhood, to simplicity, to running and climbing and laughing in the sunshine, to experiencing happiness instead of being trained for a lifetime of pursuing happiness. It is time to let children be children again.” – L.R.Knost
  • “Playing is magical.” – Unknown
  • “Children have always learned and created places for themselves through play.” – Donna R. Barnes
  • “Life is this simple ~ birth, eat, drink, play, explore, and relate to family and friends; be happy and enjoy life…!” – James A. Murph
  • “Play is power.” – Unknown
  • “We are never more fully alive, more completely ourselves, or more deeply engrossed in anything than when we are playing.” – Charles Schaefer
  • “Play and Learn.” – Unknown
Inspirational Play Quotes

“Mother nature has the best box of crayons.”

Unknown
inspiring play quotes for kids
kids playing quotes

Motivational Play Quotes

Check out these motivational play captions:

  • “Play and playful forms of activity potentially lead towards increasingly complex forms of knowledge, skills, and understanding.” – Elizabeth Wood
  • “Keep calm and keep playing.”
  • “In limits, there is freedom. Creativity thrives within structure. Creating safe havens where our children are allowed to dream, play, make a mess and, yes, clean it up, we teach them respect for themselves and others.” – Julia Cameron
  • “Every child should play.” – Unknown
  • “Play keeps us vital and alive. It gives us an enthusiasm for life that is irreplaceable. Without it, life just doesn’t taste good” – Lucia Capocchione.
  • “You grow through play.” – Unknown
  • “Play is hard to maintain as you get older. You get less playful. You shouldn’t, of course.” – Richard Feynman
  • “Life is a song – sing it. Life is a game – play it. Life is a challenge – meet it. Life is a dream – realize it. Life is a sacrifice – offer it. Life is love – enjoy it.” – Sai Baba
  • “If music be the food of love, play on.” – William Shakespeare
  • “Playing is fun.” – Unknown
Motivational Play Quotes

“Have you ever not enjoyed playing?”

Unknown
play phrases for kids
kids playing quotes short

Playtime Quotes for Toddlers

Do you have a toddler? Then these toddlers play quotes are for you:

  • “Almost all creativity involves purposeful play.” – Abraham Maslow
  • “Just play. Have fun. Enjoy the game.” – Michael Jordan
  • “Life is more fun if you play games.” – Roald Dahl
  • “Creative play is like a spring that bubbles up from deep within a child. – Joan Almon
  • “Nothing lights up a child’s brain like play.” – Dr Stuart Brown, M.D.
  • “Let your toddler play!”
  • “Play turns out to be stunningly essential in childhood it’s like love sunshine and broccoli all juiced together.” – Lenore Skenazy
  • “Toys are the tools of childhood, and the simple act of playing allows kids to develop a lifelong love of learning.” – Mark Carson
  • “Think of playtime like an innovation lab where tomorrow’s civilization is being actively designed.” – Jordan Shapiro
  • “Let them play! The more they play, the more resilient and socially adept they will become.” – Jessica Joelle Alexander
Playtime Quotes for Toddlers

“Play, Play, Play!”

Unknown
play quotes for toddlers
quotes about kids playing

Best Playtime Quotes

These are our best quotes about playtime:

  • “Give childhood back to children: if we want our offspring to have happy, productive, and moral lives, we must allow more time for play, not less.” – Peter Gray
  • “Time is a game played beautifully by children.” – Heraclitus Fragments
  • “Children need to move to develop their brain; it’s a natural urge. That’s why boys will run after a ball and play soccer despite how many video games are available to them, and they can’t help themselves from building with Lego bricks as well. They want to be creating something that’s uniquely their own.” – Jorgen Vig Knudstorp
  • “No child should ever be too sad to play.” – Andrew Galasetti
  • “Playing a game together actually builds up bonds and trust and cooperation. We actually build stronger social relationships as a result.” – Jane McGonigal
  • “Children don’t need more things. The best toy a child can have is a parent who gets down on the floor and plays with them.” – Unknown
  • “You are never too old to play.” – Unknown
  • “You see a child play, and it is so close to seeing an artist paint, for in play a child says things without uttering a word. You can see how he solves his problems. You can also see what’s wrong. Young children, especially, have enormous creativity, and whatever’s in them rises to the surface in free play.” – Erik Erikson
  • “Our brains are built to benefit from play no matter what our age.” – Theresa A. Kestly
  • “Playtime with friends is the best.” – Unknown
playtime quotes for children

“Play gives children a chance to practice what they are learning.”

Fred Rogers
play slogans for kids
play sayings for kids

Funny Play Quotes

How about these fun play quotes for kids?

  • “Necessity may be the mother of invention, but play is certainly the father.” – Roger Von Oech
  • “If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play” – John Cleese
  • “Life is a playground. Enjoy the ride.” – Unknown
  • “Slow! Grandparents at play.” – Unknown
  • “You can’t always play the hero. You have to play the villain.” – John Kani
  • “Can’t talk now, I m playing.” – Unknown
  • “Life is a playground, all we need is imagination.” – Unknown
  • “Life Play Balance.” – Unknown
funny play quotes
play quotes fun
play kids quotes

Famous Play Quotes

You will enjoy these famous play quotes:

  • “Do not keep children to their studies by compulsion but by play.” – Plato
  • “When the fun goes out of play, most often so does the learning. – Joanne E. Oppenheim
  • “Life must be lived as play.” – Plato
  • “Just because I can’t walk, doesn’t mean I can’t play!” – InclusivePlay
  • “Playing creates memories.” – Unknown
famous play quotes
famous play sayings
play quotes about kids

Play Quotes for Adults

Even Adults could use some playtime. Here are some adults play quotes for you:

  • “Play is the royal road to childhood happiness and adult brilliance.” – Joseph Chilton Pearce
  • “Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.” – Heraclitus
  • “When you play, play hard; when you work, don’t play at all.” – Theodore Roosevelt
  • “If animals play, this is because play is useful in the struggle for survival; because play practices and so perfects the skills needed in adult life.” – Susanna Miller
  • “A child who does not play is not a child, but the man who does not play has lost forever the child who lived in him.” – Pablo Neruda
  • “The true object of all human life is play.” – G. K. Chesterton
  • “Dance. Dance for the joy and breath of childhood. Dance for all children, including that child who is still somewhere entombed beneath the responsibility and skepticism of adulthood. Embrace the moment before it escapes from our grasp. For the only promise of childhood, of any childhood, is that it will someday end. And in the end, we must ask ourselves what we have given our children to take its place. And is it enough?” – Richard Paul Evans
  • “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” – George Bernard Shaw
  • “The playing adult steps sideward into another reality; the playing child advances forward to new stages of mastery.” – Erik H. Erikson
  • “Those who play rarely become brittle in the face of stress or lose the healing capacity for humor.” – Dr Stuart Brown, MD
Play Quotes for Adults

“In every real man a child is hidden that wants to play.”

Friedrich Nietzsche
adult play quotes

Fun Play Captions

Next are our funny play captions:

  • “Let’s get our play on”
  • “Play. Explore. Discover the possibilities.”
  • “Ready to play wild and free?”
  • “Everybody needs a little adventure in their life.”
  • “Come play with us.”
  • “Play, laugh, and be the kid you used to be!”
  • “Together – What time is it?… Playtime!”
  • “Fun, friends and family: what a playdate is made of.”
  • “A playground doesn’t have a fence – it’s the freedom to play and create.”
  • “Life is better when you play…”
fun play captions

“Play. The world is your playground”

Unknown
kids quotes on playing

Funny Play Puns

Last but not least are our fun play puns for kids:

  • “Life’s short. Play hard.”
  • “Let the games begin.”
  • “Hey, hey! We’re just getting started! Wanna play?”
  • “Treat yourself to a playdate.”
  • “Don’t just play…leap.”
  • “Kid tested, mother approved.”
  • “Jump around and play!”
  • “Have you ever been on a ride so big, that you felt like a kid again?”
  • “Play all day, every day.”
  • “You can create your own fun.”
fun play puns for kids

“Live your life like a slide.”

Unknown
funny play puns for kids

For our visual learners, I made the following play quotes video for you to get inspired:

More Quotes

I hope you enjoyed our amazing play quotes for kids. How about the following quotes for children next?

Easy Play Activities

After you are done with these fun play quotes and sayings, let’s show your children some fun activities to have fun with:

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FAQ

What Is the Quote About Learning Through Play?

  • “In the realm of play, children are not just having fun; they are masterfully crafting the architecture of their minds, building foundations for a lifetime of learning.” – Unknown
  • “Play is the language of childhood, a vibrant dialect that teaches lessons beyond textbooks, fostering creativity, problem-solving, and the joy of discovery.” – Unknown
  • “The classroom of play is where the alphabet of imagination meets the calculus of curiosity, creating a curriculum that unfolds through laughter, exploration, and hands-on discovery.” – Unknown
  • “Learning through play is a journey, not a destination. It’s the compass guiding children through the landscapes of knowledge, one joyful step at a time.” – Unknown
  • “In the playground of possibilities, children are not just playing; they are becoming architects of their education, constructing bridges of understanding and towers of lifelong curiosity.” – Unknown

What Is the Quote for Child Play?

  • “In the world of child’s play, imagination takes the lead, and every game is a chapter in the adventure book of growing up.” – Unknown
  • “Child’s play is the universal language of joy, where laughter is the currency, and every shared moment becomes a cherished memory.” – Unknown
  • “The playground is not just a space; it’s a canvas where children paint their dreams with the vibrant colors of laughter, friendship, and boundless imagination.” – Unknown
  • “Child’s play is the rehearsal for life’s grand performance, where the script is written in giggles, the stage is set with toys, and every moment is a chance to shine.” – Unknown
  • “In the theater of play, children are the stars, and every game is a standing ovation for the creativity, resilience, and magic they bring to the stage of childhood.” – Unknown

Now I would like to hear from you!
Which saying about children playing did you choose? Did you find a better one?
Either way, let me know by leaving a comment below right now.
I would love to hear from you!