“When I’m playing with him, everything else in my life sort of falls away”: exploring grandparents’ and grandchildren’s learning through outdoor play

ABSTRACT

A decline in children’s opportunities for outdoor play was observed during the past decades. Expanding opportunities for outdoor play through intergenerational programs for children and elders could benefit their mental and physical health. This study explores the learnings that Canadian grandparents and their 3- to 5-year-old grandchildren attained through intergenerational outdoor play. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 grandparents from British Columbia, Canada. Using thematic analysis, we identified six themes related to what grandchildren learned, two related to what grandparents learned, and one related to what grandparents and grandchildren learned together during outdoor play. Findings from this study indicate that outdoor play provides a unique opportunity to develop skills that are useful at grandparents’ and grandchildren’s respective life stages and should therefore be supported by educators and other professionals who work with families.

KEYWORDS:

• Outdoors
• early childhood
• environmental consciousness
• sociocultural theory of learning
• ageing

Acknowledgments

We thank the participating grandparents for their generosity with their time. This work was funded by the Foundation DRG. We gratefully acknowledge their generous financial support. MB is supported by a salary award from the British Columbia Children’s Hospital Research Institute.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Foundation DRG.

Notes on contributors

Mathilde Duflos

Mathilde Duflos, PhD, earned her PhD in Psychology at the University of Tours (France) in 2021. She then completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of British Columbia (Canada). Currently, she is a research and teaching fellow at the University of Tours (France) where she teaches developmental psychology. Her current research interests encompass intergenerational outdoor play, grandparenting, and intergenerational emotional closeness.

Hebah Hussaina

Hebah Hussaina is an MSc student at the University of British Columbia (Canada) in the Women’s and Children’s Health Sciences Program. Hebah Hussaina has a strong background in interdisciplinary pediatric health sciences research in a variety of settings and is passionate about supporting healthy child development. She aims to conduct research that promote healthy child development through community action and empowerment.

Mariana Brussoni

Mariana Brussoni, PhD, is Director of the Human Early Learning Partnership, Professor in the Department of Pediatrics and the School of Population and Public Health at the University of British Columbia (Canada). She is an investigator with the British Columbia Children’s Hospital Research Institute. Her research focuses on child injury prevention and outdoor risky play.