A case study exploring the ‘real world’ process of ‘naturalizing’ school playgrounds

Harper, Nevin J.; Lim, Christopher; Alqallaf, H; Naylor, P J

doi:10.1080/09603123.2019.1656174

Cited by 20 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Characteristics of included studies are described in Additional file 4. Of the 25 studies, six were conducted in the USA [75][76][77][78][79][80], five in England [81][82][83][84][85], and four studies in both Australia and Canada [86][87][88][89]. Two studies were conducted in Turkey [90,91] and one in each of Iceland [92], New Zealand [93] and Sweden [94].…”

Section: Characteristics Of Included Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Other participant characteristics, including gender, qualifications, and experience, were inconsistently reported. One study was conducted in a middle school [76], and the remaining were conducted in elementary schools or the international equivalent (with children's ages ranging from 4 to 12 years), except for one study, which included participants from both elementary and middle schools (with children aged up to 14 years) [88]. The school setting was also inconsistently or not reported, however, we identified 12 studies were conducted in urban schools [77, 79-82, 88, 92-98], one study in a rural school [89], and four studies in both urban and rural schools [83][84][85]95].…”

Section: Characteristics Of Included Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although not consistently reported, a range of study designs and methodologies were employed, including participatory action research (n = 3) [75,89,92], ethnography (n = 3) [81,84,85], formative, process, or outcome evaluations (n = 3) [78,93,96], phenomenology (n = 3) [77,90,91], qualitative descriptive (n = 2) [87,99], explorative (n = 2) [76,95], case study (n = 2) [86,88], and field study (n = 1) [94] designs. The most common method for eliciting participant perspectives were interviews (n = 17) [76-78, 80, 81, 83-86, 90-93, 95-97, 99], while four studies conducted focus groups [75,88,89,94], and four used questionnaires [79,82,87,98]. Additionally, over half the studies (n = 14) employed more than one data collection method, such as playground observations in combination with interviews or focus groups.…”

Section: Characteristics Of Included Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Additionally, over half the studies (n = 14) employed more than one data collection method, such as playground observations in combination with interviews or focus groups. A range of analysis techniques were employed; of named methods, content analysis was most common (n = 5) [77,90,91,93,94], followed by thematic analysis (n = 4) [82,88,92,95], constant comparative analysis (n = 3) [79,96,98], framework analysis (n = 2) [86,89], ethnographic analysis (n = 2) [84,85], and hermeneutic interpretive analysis (n = 1) [97].…”

Section: Characteristics Of Included Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The safety concerns of parents were commonly reported; however, this was largely limited to the perceptions and experiences of teachers, principals, and other supervising adults, as only five studies included parents as participants [77,86,88,97,98]. According to both parents and school staff, parental concerns for children's safety in active play centred on physical injury [77,83,86,89,96,98], potential illness (arising from wet or cold weather play) [93], and an associated issue of clothing damage or soiling [81,83], all of which influenced children's access to playground equipment and spaces (such as grassed fields), as well as which games and activities were permitted or forbidden.…”

Section: Parent Safety Concernsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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“Children are precious cargo; we don’t let them take any risks!”: Hearing from adults on safety and risk in children’s active play in schools: a systematic review

Jerebine

Davies

Lander

et al. 2022

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

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Background Understanding determinants of children’s outdoor play is important for improving low physical activity levels, and schools are a key setting for both. Safety concerns shape children’s opportunity to play actively outdoors, therefore, this qualitative evidence synthesis aimed to i) examine adult (e.g., parent, teacher, yard supervisor, principal) perspectives on safety and risk in children’s active play during recess in elementary and/or middle schools, and ii) identify how safety and risk influence playground supervision and decision making in this setting. Methods Six electronic databases were systematically searched in March 2021, with an updated search in June 2022. Records were screened against eligibility criteria using Covidence software, and data extraction and synthesis were performed using predesigned coding forms in Microsoft Excel and NVivo. Framework synthesis methodology was employed, guided by a conceptual framework structured on the socio-ecological model (SEM) and affordance theory. Results From 10,370 records, 25 studies were included that represented 608 adults across 89 schools from nine countries. The synthesis identified 10 constraining and four affording factors that influenced whether school staff were risk-averse or risk tolerant during recess, and, in turn, the degree to which children’s play was managed. Constraining factors stemmed from fears for children’s physical safety, and fear of blame and liability in the event of playground injury, which shaped parent, school staff and institutional responses to risk. Interrelated factors across SEM levels combined to drive risk-averse decision making and constraining supervision. Emerging evidence suggests children’s active play in schools can be promoted by fostering a risk tolerant and play friendly culture in schools through play facilitation training (e.g., risk-reframing, conflict resolution) and engaging stakeholders in the development of school policies and rules that balance benefits of play against potential risks. Conclusions Findings show several socio-cultural factors limited the ability of school staff to genuinely promote active play. Future work should seek to foster risk tolerance in schools, challenge the cultural norms that shape parent attitudes and institutional responses to risk in children’s play, and explore novel methods for overcoming policy barriers and fear of liability in schools. Trial registration PROSPERO registration: CRD42021238719.

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