This isn't really a question. My cousin is a play therapist and she posted this really great article from NPR on her facebook page. I just thought you might enjoy it as your researching and thinking about teaching the importance of creative and imaginative play. It's something that I've been learning as a parent. My children as SO happy on Sundays because they spend the whole morning (we have late church) building Lego cars, ships, towns, and playing with each other. On Saturdays they watch tv in the mornings and just veg out. I see a big difference in how they treat each other on the different days. When they pretend and play with each other they are nicer to each other. When they watch tv or play the wii all day they aren't kind in their words to each other and they fight a lot more. (I've been controlling the tv consumption more and more. They think I'm mean. I think their nicer--so I don't care if they think I'm mean.)
Anyway, here's the link to the article.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=19212514