ChildrenWebmag - Play Really Matters

By Dr John Horton,
Centre for Children & Youth, University College, Northampton

Play is fundamental, in all sorts of ways, to the wellbeing of all children and young people (and everyone else too). And play is, increasingly and thankfully, On The Agenda.

A number of notable recent UK policy statements have asserted the need for the (perhaps ostensibly frivolous) issue of play to be taken very seriously. This is testimony to the far-longer-standing work of campaigning organisations such as the Children’s Play Council (www.ncb.org.uk/cpc), the Children’s Rights Alliance (www.crae.org.uk), 4Children (www.4children.org.uk) and many others (see http://www.londonplay.org.uk/links/links1.html). There is thus a growing groundswell of recognition that:

• Play is a vital, valued and everyday part of all children and young people’s social, cultural, physical, developmental and intellectual lives. Play “benefits children, families and communities”(1) ;

• Here and now – in a context where many children are “bred into captivity”(2) and many childhoods are thus characterised by fear of public space, stranger danger, rigid parental control, inactivity, couch potato-ness, obesity and so on – the need to protect and/or create opportunities for play is perhaps particularly acute;

• “Social changes have left many children and young people with poorer access to many kinds of play opportunities, especially those who need outdoor space”(3) ;

• Play matters differently to different children and young people at different times in their lives, and in different places and at different times. Play is thus a complex issue. In any community there will be multiple play needs, all going on at once;

• Play ought to be “integral to local planning, in particular in relation to the expansion of childcare and overall services for children”(4) ;

• The issue of play continues to be too-easily overlooked, is too-rarely anybody’s priority, and too-often ‘falls between stools’ of existing policies and strategies.

There is thus a growing acceptance that play matters, and growing support for the idea that positive actions and interventions (on many levels, at many scales) are needed to improve play provision, and to meet play needs. But this is easier said than done, not least because, when it comes down to it, play is little-understood:

• On the one hand, and in general, there is often fundamental ambiguity over what play is. After all, what is play? “We all play occasionally, and we all know what playing feels like. But when it comes to making… statements about what play is, we fall into silliness. There is little agreement among us, and much ambiguity”(5) . The point is that play is a tricky, messy, complex business (certainly more complex than we sometimes imagine, or it is convenient to imagine). We need to know more about what play is, to avoid damaging oversimplifications when we attend to the issue of play;

• On the other hand, and at a more tangible, nitty-gritty level, there is often a fundamental lack of data about what actual children and young people actually do and/or actually like to do and/or would actually like to do, when they play, wherever they are. The details of particular play issues and needs of particular children and young people living their everyday lives in particular places, at particular times are all-too-often very poorly understood. We need to know much more about all this, and in particular we really do need to listen to what children and young people themselves have to say.

In both these senses, we need to know more about play, before we can effectively do anything for play. To tackle these issues head-on – in order, ultimately, “to help children… enjoy better lives”, by “improv[ing] children’s access to better play and leisure opportunities”(6) – Redbridge Children’s Fund (http://www.redbridgecvs.net/children.htm) has commissioned a major and pioneering piece of research into play provision and the play needs of children and young people in the London Borough of Redbridge. The project is being undertaken and co-ordinated by the Centre for Children and Youth at University College Northampton
(http://www.childrenwebmag.com/about%20us.htm#centre).

The Centre for Children and Youth, and its specialist research partners, are currently undertaking a research project in Redbridge, incorporating an extensive and multifaceted suite of quantitative and qualitative methods. The key principles and ethos of this research are as follows:

• “[T]he right of the child to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and the arts”(7) is fundamental to the project. The aim of the project is to enable this right to be protected, supported and developed in a particular local context.

• For the purposes of the project, ‘play’ is defined broadly and inclusively as “what children and young people do when they follow their own ideas and interests, in their own way and for their own reasons”(8) . The aim of the project is thus to map what exactly ‘play’ is for particular communities of children and young people in a particular place. The project will thus enable tangible, nitty gritty interventions to be made at the local level.

• A conviction that play is “of value not only to children themselves but also to their families and the local community”(9) is a guiding principle of the project. A sense of “the importance of having communities where there is somewhere safe to go and something to do… (providing) recreational activity for children and young people,… building the fabric of communities and increasing young people’s skills, confidence and self-esteem”(10) is thus central to the project. The project thus approaches play as a part and parcel of children and young people’s everyday lives and communities, not as a stand alone issue.

• The project is founded upon a belief that “all people [should] have equal, easy and dignified access to London’s buildings, places and spaces”(11) , and in particular that “all young Londoners should be able to play within their local neighbourhoods”(12) , “regardless of who they are or where they live”(13) .

• A central premise of the project is that “children are not just the citizens of tomorrow; they are also the citizens of today”, and that “as full members of a society [children and young people] have the human right to participate in its activities”(14) . Fundamental to the project, therefore, is a conviction that “involvement and consultation with children should be at the heart of play… strategy”(15) .