Work and play: synonyms?

As I watched my 23 month-old spend 20 minutes trying to put on a t-shirt and pants, I realised that for very young kids, work and play are absolute synonyms.  She was working immensely hard at a very important task, yet she approached it in the playful spirit of a fun challenge.

In my last post I mentioned that some people find it possible to get into "flow" doing relatively mundane things like house-cleaning.   If you think about it, Candy Crush helps millions of people get into flow, yet it's essentially mindless.  People say that they feel like they're accomplishing something, "getting something done" when they clear a level.

Maybe that could be part of the way to encourage students to tackle fairly mindless, but necessary repetitive work such as grammar exercises.  I've noticed that with the right music and the right environment, some of my students can get so absorbed in their workbooks that they look up in surprise when I announce the end of class.