As a parent you might never guess all the ways a good imagination benefits your child.
It helps a preschooler:
父母可能永远无法意识到好的想象力对于孩子能有多大的帮助。以下的建议适用于学龄前儿童：
Develop social skills 锻炼社交能力
As children play pretend, they explore relationships between family members, friends and learn more about how people interact. Playing doctor, they imagine how physicians care for their patients. Playing house, they learn more about how parents feel about their children.
孩子们在玩过家家的时候，可以增进家庭成员和朋友间的关系，还能掌握很多人际交往的技能。比如扮演医生，他们可以体验医生是如何照顾病人的。扮演家长，他们可以了解父母对孩子的情感。
Imaginative play helps develop empathy for others. They become more willing to play fair, to share, and to cooperate.
过家家的游戏可以增加孩子对他人的认同感。孩子会更乐于公平竞争、分享以及合作。
Build self-confidence 树立自信
Young children have very little control over their lives. Imagining oneself as a builder of skyscrapers or a superhero defending the planet is empowering to a child. It helps them develop confidence in their abilities and their potential.
小孩子很难支配自己的生活。让孩子假装是摩天大楼的建造者或者保护星球的超级英雄，他们就会自我感觉很强大。这还会激发他们的自信心以及更方面的潜能。
Boost intellectual growth 促进智力发育
Using the imagination is the beginning of abstract thought. Children who can see a king"s castle in a mound of sand or a delicious dinner in a mud pie are learning to think symbolically. This skill is important in school where a child will have to learn that numerals symbolize groups of objects, letters symbolize sounds, and so on.
想象力是抽象思维的基础。无论是在沙滩上堆起国王城堡还是用泥团做出美味的晚餐，这都是孩子们在学习抽象思维的过程。上学后抽象思维的能力显得十分重要，比如用数字表示一系列物体和用字母来表示语音等等。
Practice language skills 练习语言技能
Kids who play pretend with their friends do a lot of talking. This helps boost their vocabulary, improve sentence structure and enhance communication skills.
孩子们在和朋友玩过家家的时候会进行大量的交流。这回拓展他们的词汇，提高他们的语言组织能力以及交流的技能。
Enjoy reading books 享受阅读
To encourage your youngster"s imagination, read to him every day. Books offer children the opportunity to visit other worlds and create new ones of their own.
要想增加他的想象力，就要让他每天阅读。书籍可以让孩子们有机会接触其他世界，并且创造出属于他们自己的新天地。
For generations children have enjoyed reading the story of Peter Pan because Peter takes them on fascinating adventures.
