The Influence of School Architecture and Design on the Outdoor Play Experience within the Primary School

Abstract

Since the very earliest times, schools have provided a place (the playground) and a time (playtimes) in which children can have time away from the direct involvement of adults and formal learning. Although the basic design of school grounds has changed in a number of ways over the years, from the subtle to the more direct, what effect these changes have had on the overall education of the child is less clear. Research has identified a number of positive effects on leaning that playtimes and the informal use of school grounds provides, yet it is also clear that schools themselves often greatly under‐use this potential, or even actively restrict access to it, as a counter to what is often seen as the ‘problem’ of playtime. This paper will draw on recent research into ‘what’ happens on school playgrounds and ‘where’ it happens, using visual examples from the UK. The findings from this research will explore the direct links that have been found between school building design and children’s use of the outdoor environment for play.

Notes

The school starting and leaving age in England and Wales has altered a number of times over the years, but a primary school today serves children from about five years of age to about 11 or 12.

Bullying. In Safeway in‐store magazine, July 1998.

Armitage, Marc. “Considering the needs of children: the effect of school playground design on the quality of play opportunities – the British experience.” Paper delivered at the 2nd International Toy Research Conference, Halmstad, Sweden, 1999.

Thompson, Flora. Country Games of the 1880s (1881 – undated reprint Hull Local Studies Library).

Armitage. Considering the needs of children, 1.

Letter, Staffordshire Mercury 40 (1924): 169.

There are many examples of local and national collections of games and play collected from across the United Kingdom, dating mainly from the early eighteenth century onwards. Some of the better known collections include those of Lady Alice Bertha Gomme from the 1890s, Norman Douglas from the period just before the First World War, and Damien Webb from the 1950s. For a more complete list of historical sources see Opie, Iona and Peter Opie. Children’s Games in Street and Playground. Oxford, 1984.

Ibid., 7.

See for example, Play Today in the Primary School Playground, edited by Bishop, Julia and Mavis Curtis. Buckingham, 2001.

Sutton‐Smith, Brian. A History of Children’s Play: the New Zealand Playground 1840–1950. Philadelphia, 1881: 272.

Cunningham, Hugh. Children & Childhood in Western Society since 1500. London, 1995: 100–101.

Sutton‐Smith. A History of Children’s Play, 278.

I am using the term “playground” rather than “school grounds” deliberately here as even where a school has access to a field the author’s fieldwork suggests that children spend much more time on the hard‐surface playground than the field and also tend to record their favourite parts of the site as being close to the school buildings. In addition, the inclusion of a field was not a common feature of schools in England and Wales until early in the twentieth century.

MS: East Riding of Yorkshire Council, Archive Service, School Records Collection, class SB.

Quoted in Seabourne, M. The English School: Its Architecture and Organisation 1370–1870. London, 1971: 65.

Drakeford, Joy and Brian Drakeford. Mr Moody’s Moral Mirror: The Logbook of an East Riding Schoolmaster. Bridlington, 1986: 86.

For a detailed explanation of these games and others see Opie and Opie, Children’s Games, and Opie, Iona and Peter Opie. The Lore and Language of School Children. Oxford, 1959.

A History of Southbrook School: 1890–1930. Available from: http://www.southbrook.school.nz/ about/history2.htm; INTERNET.

Moore, Robin. Childhood’s Domain: Play and Place in Child Development. MIG Communications, California, 1990: 146.

Armitage, Marc. “The ins and outs of school playground play: children’s use of ‘play places’.” In Bishop and Curtis, Play Today in the Primary School Playground, 42.

Armitage. Considering the Needs of Children.

Ward, Colin. The Child in the City. London, 1990: 72.

Playpeople School Audit. December 1994 (H).

Playpeople School Audit, Interviews with Adult Staff. December, 1994 (H).

Opie and Opie. Children’s Games, 162.

Ibid.

Playpeople School Audit. Interviews with Head Teacher. December 1994 (H).

Playpeople/Youth Action/Age Concern. Volunteer Reminiscence Project. Hull, 1995/96: tape 4.

Playpeople School Audit. Interviews with Children. January 1998 (H).

Playpeople, School Audit. Interviews with Adult Staff. January, 1998 (H).

Roberts, Alasdair. Out to Play: The Middle Years of Childhood. Aberdeen, 1980: xv.