There’s a magic phrase you hear when kids are playing, and it changes everything - Just pretend.
When uttered, what typically follows is a negotiation of the ‘next’: a possibility, plot development, character arrival or development, stage on the journey, thing to try, object to transform, etc.
Usually, the ‘next’ is short lived - the experiment doesn’t last too long - and the players surface to re-engage with the phrase Just pretend; going in and out like this allows them to evolve their exploration of what’s possible, trying things out to see if they ‘work’ and problem solving, step-by-step. Coherence is important.
Just pretend is the sound of kids playing with what is, might, and cannot be real. Is this the beginning of critical thinking?