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Play in Focus: Children's photographic survey of their own sites of play.
Dr Catherine Burke
School of Education, The University of Leeds
c.burke@education.leeds.ac.uk

In this research project, young children between the ages of seven and eleven years, were the principal investigators and recorders of their own experience within a research framework which enabled them to contribute directly to current debates around contexts and spaces for children’s play. Each child was given a disposable camera with a 24 frame loaded film. After one week of preparation that included a ‘framing’ exercise using a sketchpad and pencil, the children were instructed to show through their photographs the spaces and sites of their everyday play activity. Two contrasting neighbourhoods in East Leeds were chosen and with the help of two primary schools, a rich and detailed visualisation of the contexts for children’s play has emerged.

Rothwell and Seacroft are contrasting communities with similar sized populations. Young people between the ages of 5 –15 make up 14% of the population in Rothwell and just over 19% in Seacroft.

Seacroft is a relatively poor community. As a landscape, it appears bleak and unwelcoming to the stranger. Approximately half of Seacroft residents have no access to a car. Over fifty per cent are council tenants and both health and economic activity are well below the average for Leeds. Rothwell is a relatively more comfortable community with over eighty per cent owning their own homes and with a lower level of unemployment. They are both almost universally white communities.

Research on children as subjects has a long history but only recently, in the decade following the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, have those researching children’s lives come to question the research relationship and have moved towards a position of research with children (James and Prout, 1990). The project undertaken here could be regarded as research with children given that there was an underlying commitment to enable the research process to become transparent to the young participants, to hand to them the principal instruments of data collection and to involve them primarily in the analysis of that data. But since the project was part of a larger effort to identify and document the play opportunities available to children within a sector of the city of Leeds, in order that a clearer understanding of opportunities and needs was made available to planners and policy makers at local government level, the research activity described here could be framed as research for children. It was certainly research by children who readily accepted their role as investigators and recorders of their own experience and relished the opportunity to influence change.

Play is and always has been a necessary part of being a child. Adults can and do observe children at play, argue that play functions as an essential element in the learning process, profit from the production and promotion of manufactured play objects, and occasionally complain that children ‘do not play like they used to’ or that they ‘do not play anymore’. That children construct and communicate their own culture through play was recognised and documented by researchers such as Iona and Peter Opie who noted down the language and lore of play in streets and playgrounds during the 1950s and 1960s (Opie, 1959; 1969).

The notion of children’s spaces is usually associated with formal settings; kindergarten; nurseries; schools; playgrounds; leisure centres and theme parks. Today, the idea or ideal notion of neighbourhood or community has become fractured through a complex cluster of changes in the expectations and lived experience of families and individuals in localities. The informal landscape which children encounter in their neighbourhoods is considered by many adults to no longer belong to children; spaces where the motor car dominates and where adults fear for their children’s safety. To the adult eye, inner city landscapes appear bleak, without colour, harsh and uninviting, spaces to pass through when a necessary journey has to be made. But the child’s view of such landscapes, which is built from direct sensory exposure to it, is rarely sought and their detailed knowledge and rich understanding of such spaces is overlooked. In order that such rich detail and depth of understanding might be made evident, the informal spaces which make up the landscape of play for young children in two neighbourhoods formed the focus for this research study. The visualisation of children’s knowledge was made possible through their construction of a photographic diary over a one-week period by means of a simple camera. Conversations and interpretations of the visual diaries enable the child’s spatial knowledge and understanding of their neighbourhoods to emerge as they discussed their own informal landscapes of play. What follows is a brief summary and discussion of the resulting data.

Spaces and Landscapes: Gathering the Data.

In each neighbourhood, twenty children who were pupils at two participating primary schools participated in the project: forty children in total. Half of these were between six to eight years age; half were between nine and eleven years of age. Out of that group of twenty children, sixteen children in each neighbourhood produced a photographic diary of their own sites of play. For a variety of reasons it was not possible to interview every child. In total, 12 interviews were carried out at Rothwell while it was only possible to interview ten children at Seacroft. All the children’s photographs, however, have been analysed as part of the research.

The children were enthusiastic participants in the research. This was the case equally in the school which had selected individual children to provide for optimum diversity in the group as well as in the school which had simply asked for volunteers. In total, 32 children produced 615 images: the total number produced by children living in Seacroft was 310; the total number produced by children living in Rothwell was 329. The number of images successfully produced by any one child ranged from 4 to 28. There was very little difference in the number of images produced according to age: on average the older children produced 19 images while the younger children produced 20 images. All children appeared to understand the task and carried it out appropriately.

The Results: Indoor and outdoor play

The first and major category of analysis is of the number of images which showed indoor or outdoor spaces. It might have been thought that children of primary school age living in City neighbourhoods might be expected to show more incidence of indoor than outdoor play in the spaces they chose to frame as a reflection of one week of play in November.

However, in fact more children photographed outdoor spaces than indoor spaces. This was true of both sets of children in each of the two neighbourhoods. From the total number of photographs produced (615), 448 or 73% showed outdoor spaces while 167 or 27% showed indoor spaces.

In comparing the two sets of data, slightly fewer children from Seacroft showed outdoor play (70%) than children at Rothwell (75%).

But while five children living in Seacroft showed more images of indoor than outdoor play in their individual photo diaries, no children in Rothwell showed more indoor than outdoor play in their individual photo diaries. When given the choice to talk about one photograph, twice as many children chose to talk about an outdoor space as chose to talk about an indoor space.

The two neighbourhoods in East Leeds, with their contrasting type of housing stock, provide the formal and informal landscape of play. The in-between spaces, squares and roads, greens and car parks all in themselves provide spaces for play. Open spaces, as shown in the photographs, include green spaces within housing estates and public parks and they include wasteland. They do not include squares and roads. The type of housing has shaped the availability of open spaces for play. Seacroft, with its 1950s mix of semi-detached and high rise council stock is a typical landscape of green open spaces and enclosed squares. Rothwell, an old mining town, further developed in the 1920s and 1930s, is more tightly knit and the open spaces shown by the children in this neighbourhood are predominantly those supplied by the school grounds. This partly accounts for the large variance in the number of photographs of school grounds in the two photographic accounts of play spaces: Rothwell children showed 84 photographs of school grounds while Seacroft children showed only 27.

Overall, more children photographed open spaces than any other category: open spaces formed 16.05% of the total number of photographs followed closely by school grounds, 16%. Open spaces also featured highly in their conversation often throwing light in the detailed description of these spaces for play. But there was a contrast in the response from the two sets of children. Almost twice as many children living in Seacroft as living in Rothwell captured open spaces as the main focus of the collections of photographs overall. This could be explained by the architectural lay out of the Seacroft estate which consists of concentrations of housing intersected by large open areas of grass or pathways. There could be a gender dimension to this finding given that there were more boys involved in the Seacroft based group as compared with the Rothwell group (Rothwell, 4: Seacroft 6)

In these in-between spaces are to be found the requirements for play; large open recreational spaces for running around, playing ball games and constructing ‘buildings’ dens or hideaways; high spaces made from hills and mounds where friends can meet, sit, talk and view activities below.

What are these spaces used for and how should they be understood as landscapes for play? Some of the conversations about these spaces are revealing. One child gave an insight into her knowledge of grass and its different types. Commenting on one image which filled the frame with grass she discussed her fondness for,

• ‘different kinds of grass cos I love playing on the grass…cos I can do handstands and cartwheels’

  Grass and its function in play was the subject of another conversation which focussed on its qualities as a material to use in designing play spaces or ‘houses’ especially when newly mown.

  Open spaces might include the school field which was often photographed with and without children playing. When asked why it was good to play there, one child answered,

• there’s lots of space…there’s space to be stupid’.

  Often, in open spaces in the school grounds, very detailed and complex games are played as indicated here by a seven year old girl simply commenting on one open space.

• ‘Right, that’s the nature area near that and that’s the wishing well and people put stuff in it and pretend it’s gonna blow a bubble and a lot of people run around in it and do lots of stuff’

  Not always used for running about, open spaces provide opportunities for meeting and talking with friends. Particular features in open spaces such as prominent spots or lamp posts hold significant meaning and trigger memories in relation to play and friendship.

• ‘sometimes when it gets late at night and it gets dark, me and my friend A go on top of the hill and we just talk about things and we used to run down and we just went down the hill and there were like a fire and the firemen came and it were just a little like a chair and people and some children were putting it on fire and actual firemen came for it.’ (Theo)

  Closed Spaces

  Indoor and outdoor play in closed, intimate or private spaces is an important strand of children’s preferred play experience, as illustrated here. When asked to choose a photograph to talk about many children chose to focus on a closed space. There could be a number of reasons for this but an important element seems to be the sense of enclosure and privacy such spaces provide, whether in a back garden, a bedroom, a cupboard or a car. Bedrooms were the focus of 8% of the photographs overall. And gardens of family or friends amounted to 15% of the total. Ownership and belonging is important to children and the sense of pride in describing own domestic spaces and achievements underlay conversation recorded in the data. Intimate, explorative and dramatic play, such as dressing up could take place in what appeared to feel as safe, private spaces where children were known and loved. Several children photographed the interior or exterior of their family cars. One described how it was an important space for play. When asked why the car was liked as a space for play, the child replied,

• Cos it’s cosy.

• It’s cosy too.

• Q: So…but it’s a place where you play? Yes

• Q: What do you do in there then? I pretend to drive.

  Some of the most expressive comments about the pleasure of playing focussed on family gardens. One child’s photographic collection featured several photographs of plants and structures to support plants.

• Q: So, you like to grow things? Yes

• Q: Do you think that’s a kind of playing? Do you feel like you’re having fun when you’re growing things? Yeah. I’m growing a cactus at the moment.

  A focus on technology and various forms of screenplay formed a part of the collection and was the focus of some discussion. However, one might have thought that the computer would feature more often than it did. Only 22 photographs of computers were produced in total, 7 of which came from one child’s collection. This ties in with the strong indication of a preference for outdoor play.

  The schoolyard or playground played a large part in the children’s photographic collection however there was some variation in the amount of detail between the schools which reflected a far richer environment for play in one. The children who produced by far the most images of school ground spaces were those who had access to a playground, which had seriously considered the promotion of children’s play in its design and redevelopment. It contained many informal, ‘natural’ areas, trees, bushes and rough grassy areas. Parents, friends of the school, teachers and children had constructed a play feature, a ‘Shitara’, and several children were prompted by their photographs to explain the fantasy games that happened daily at this space. The disadvantage with this well considered site for children’s play was that it was not possible for children to visit there after school hours.

  Formal spaces for play: parks and playgrounds.

  These did not feature often in the photographic diaries of the children and in fact amounted to only 3% of all photographs. It was notable that parents, prevented children from going freely to local parks, unless accompanied by parents or older siblings. The equipment in the parks was criticised for being age limited - i.e. the space dictated, through its equipment, the age of child who should inhabit it for play. Skate parks, ramps, hard surfaces, open spaces and tennis courts were the most favoured in conversation prompted by the photographs.

  Meeting and talking with friends outside of the formal landscape of school or the home is important for children to play and to develop their sense of identity. Spaces that are significant in this respect contain important material objects that are known as gathering points. Only certain children will gather there and certain activities will happen. An example here is the lamppost. A lamppost may appear to be insignificant to the adult eye but is meaningful to a child in relation to play and the essential business of strengthening bonds of friendship.

  A quiet road with parked cars on either side would not appear to be a landscape for children’s play but photographs presented here help to illustrate the liveliness of these spaces for children for whom play out of doors is an important part of their lives. This is not random activity but here is evidence of traditional games such as ‘Kerby’ probably named as such and played by generations of children since the construction of roads with raised kerb stones. ‘Kerby’ is well illustrated here and talked about by boys and girls in both communities and by more than one set of children interviewed, Such consistency over time, in spite of the problems posed by motor cars, indicates the well-being of a communicated live culture of play and the importance of informal neighbourhood landscapes for children’s play.

  Use of Natural Materials

  Given that the research was carried out in the context of densely populated city neighbourhoods, it is significant that such a large proportion of the images and discussion drawn from the photographic diaries featured the use and appreciation of natural materials and environments.

  A focus on the different types of grasses for playing on and with, featured in several children’s collections. Young children appreciate grass, its aesthetic, its feel, smell, and function as a building material. They fight with grass and they mark out their boundaries with grass. Grass left after a mowing can transform a landscape into a new play opportunity. Often a photograph revealing little to the adult eye was transformed through conversation into a space offering great riches for play. Here is an example focusing on a patch of open grassy ground.

• Q: The green, you call it the green. Right, ok. So what do you do on there? I do handstands or cartwheels.

• Q:Handstands and cartwheels. And build a house with grass.

• Q:Oh, how do you do that? Cos I start where I want to sleep, yes, like in the middle of it so I go collect some grass and then put it in a line.

• Q: Oh, you put it in a line. Yes like a square house.

• Q: Oh is that like dead grass so it stands out a bit more? Yes

• Q: And what kind of shape do you make? Square

• Q: A square shape. And do you do that with other people? Yes

• Q:You make a house and then what do you do? Nowt, just play in it.

• Q:You play in it. You do housey things do you? Like…? What grown ups do. Like mums and dads Like clean up >Q: Ok and how many of you do that together? Three or four or five.

• Q: Well that’s great. So do you ever have any problems finding enough grass to make a house? No

• Q: That’s good. Do you find any other bits and pieces to help make the house? Yes, grass from my garden.

• Q: What? Grass in my garden and things that are left over in the house.

• Q: Like? Like bottles what are empty.

• Q: Bottles? Yes what my mum were just going to throw away, I sneak in and get them.

• Q: Do you? And you use those for your games? Yes

  Water found along pathways as puddles invites play; the local ‘beck’ attracts; a stream in the park with a pipe allows for paddling and balancing. Water featured in 4% of children’s collections, usually as informal landscapes for play. However, children delighted in describing the importance of bathrooms, baths and showers as spaces for play.

  Spaces featuring trees and bushes were highly important in discussion and significant categories of spaces for play in both neighbourhoods but were far more prevalent in the photographic diaries of children living in Rothwell than in Seacroft. However, children in Seacroft who mentioned the importance of trees in their play had some rich detail to offer. For one child, a tree in a square was of great significance in supporting play of self and others. It became a ‘seat’ for another child and a ‘cellar’ for storing goods. One day, the tree was visited and half had been chopped down causing some distress,

• That bush, we made a den in there, me, A and my sister, we made a den in there but now all that side there has been chopped down so it’s a bit harder and A’s favourite seat what was up here it’s been…that’s half chopped off. (Theo)

  Trees provided raw material for building and construction as is illustrated here in this extract of conversation.

• I go on my bike and we play things like…we get this tree that’s like darish and we take it, kick it cos we can mess about with it.

• Q: With the tree? Yes cos we peeled it all like a potato.

• Q: Did you? Yes and we managed to make loads and loads of paper.

• Q: Did you? Yes

• Q: Off the tree? Yes

• Q: Paper? You made paper? Yes. You put like this juice that comes out of it, you put it on some paper and you flatten it out a bit and I managed to make some paper. I made about 15 pieces.

  Natural materials support imaginative play inside and outside of school grounds. The collection produced some rich examples of the use of natural materials in play. ‘Shops’ were situated along the bushy boundary of one school ground providing leaves, twigs and bark to ‘sell’ to customers. Stones and pebbles were used to decorate special spaces in ways that probably adults were unaware of.

  The children made the photographic diaries during one week in November. However, conversations about the images prompted talk about seasonal games and associated play demonstrating children’s awareness of the passage of time and the seasonal impact on the material conditions of outdoor play. For example, throwing apples into the beck was explained and the use of mown hay in constructing ‘houses’ and dens was illustrated.

  The significance of the photographic diaries of these two sets of children between the ages of seven and eleven is clear. Children are well able to research and reflect on their own lives and the spaces they inhabit. They have a rich detailed knowledge to offer and when provided an opportunity are able to contribute to the contemporary debate on the nature of childhood, the impact of technology on children’s lives, the issue of parental protection and the permanent importance of play in children’s lives. The photographic evidence argues the case that children’s greatest needs are safe open spaces, access to natural materials, freedom to meet, ownership of spaces which harness privacy, intimacy and creativity. Although the two communities were contrasting in terms of relative poverty, economic activity, levels of property ownership and other social factors, the project revealed that children had more in common across boundaries than otherwise.

  References and Further Reading

  • James,A., and Prout, A, (1990) Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood :

  • Opie, I and P. (1959) The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren. Oxford: OUP.

  • Opie, I and P (1969) Children’s Games in Street and Playground. Oxford: OUP.

  • Prosser, J (1998) Image Based Research: a source book for qualitative researchers. London : Falmer Press,