”Affordances in outdoor environments and children’s physically active play in pre-school”.

The purpose of this study is to examine the activity level of children's outdoor play and to examine whether, and to what degree, the environment plays a role in how active children are. This study examines children's play outdoors in a Norwegian kindergarten playground and a natural outdoor environment.

The study shows that children explore and use the playground for different activities.  Among other things, the children ride their bicycles, dig and climb. When out in nature, in addition to climbing, walking and running on the beach, the most frequently observed activity was gathering natural materials which they used to play with and to build things. When data from the three days are compared, the analysis shows no significant differences in the average levels of physical activity. Children have about the same level of activity in both environments. When the children's levels of activity are compared there is high correlation between the level of activity from day to day. This means that the children seem to have almost the same level of activity regardless of the environment in which they play.

Sixteen children, seven girls and nine boys, aged three to five years took part in the survey. In order to measure levels of physical activity, an accelerometer was fastened to a belt and fastened around the waist of each child. An accelerometer is a small, one-dimensional measuring device that does not interfere with the play of the children. It measures all vertical physical activity except for activity solely involving by the upper body (such as throwing and lifting), as well as cycling and swimming. Each measurement lasted 102-136 minutes and was performed at the same time each day. Over a period of six months, two days were measured in the kindergarten playground (winter and spring) as well as a play day in nature (spring). In addition, to the measurements with the accelerometer, observations were conducted at the same time. All play situations were initiated by the children.

Storli, R. og Hagen, T.L. (2010). ”Affordances in outdoor environments and children’s physically active play in pre-school”. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 18(4), 445-456.