Introduction: research topic

Building playgrounds are a type of adventure playgrounds in Scandinavia that historically took their point of departure in teachers’ observation that children tend to prefer unredacted spaces that offer opportunities for initiative and creativity. Children in some educare centers visit these places with school-age educare teachers.

Theoretical framework

The study uses Gibson’s concept of affordances (1979), to capture how the children relate and interact with features in the environment. However, experiences are here not seen as purely embodied, but include the children’s verbalized reflections on the place and the experiences that it affords.

Research questions

The aim of the study at a Swedish building playground in an urban environment, is to explore children’s perspectives on the affordances that the playground offers, with the following research questions: How do the children describe the building playground and the ways they use it? What discoveries do the children highlight in relation to the affordances that exist and based on the educational support provided by adults at the building playground?

Methodology

Data was collected in Spring 2024 through walk-and-talk conversations with 29 children, (age 9) as well as through fieldnotes, and informal interviews with each child. The children were additionally given the opportunity to take photos of things that were important for them.

Expected results

This is an ongoing study, and the results have not yet been analysed. Preliminary results suggest that the children described, photographed and showed most features of this relatively small playground. They valued both freely building structures using a wide variety of scrap materials, and the sections of the playground devoted to planting. Imagination, play, observing and learning from peers played an important role.

Scientific relevance and practical implications

There are relatively few studies researching the affordances for children of these playgrounds. Understanding the opportunities offered by such spaces for learning and recreation is relevant, against the background of increased instrumentalization of children’s leisure time, alongside a more general commercialisation of public space. This study therefore aims to provide knowledge about children’s experiences, that could be useful for the design of outdoor spaces for teaching and learning, as well as for training educators on how to integrate these spaces in their teaching practice

References

Cele, S. (2006). Communicating place: methods for understanding children’s experience of place [Doctoral dissertation] Stockholm University.https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:186613/FULLTEXT01.pdf

Chawla, L. (1992). Childhood place attachments. In Place attachment (pp.63-86). Boston, MA: Springer US. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-8753-4_4

Heft, H. (1988). Affordances of Children’s Environments: A functional approach to environmental description. Children’s Environments Quarterly, 5(3), 29-37.http://resolver.scholarsportal.info/resolve/08860505/v05i0003/29_aoceafated.xml

Gibson, J. J. (2014). The ecological approach to visual perception: classic edition. Psychology press. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315740218

Klerfelt, A., & Haglund, B. (2014). Walk-and-talk conversations: A way toelicit children’s perspectives and prominent discourses in school-ageeducare. IJREE–International Journal for Research on Extended Education, 2(2), 19-20. https://doi.org/10.3224/ijree.v2i2.19550

Wales, M., Mårtensson, F., & Jansson, M. (2021). ‘You can be outside a lot’: independent mobility and agency among children in a suburban community in Sweden. Children’s Geographies, 19(2), 184–196.https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2020.1773401