Being and becoming

For her Sociology Masters, Lucy Benson used ideas about children’s being and becoming as a foundation for generating research with children. In this abstract, she suggests that though these ideas are not new, they are worth revisiting as a useful foundation for the playwork approach, and for all those with an interest in childhood, and in how children are constructed and presented.

There are some physiological differences between children and adults which cannot and should not be disregarded. Prout and James describe this phenomenon:  ‘The immaturity of children is a biological fact but the way in which that immaturity is understood and made meaningful is a fact of culture’ (Prout, 2005). Until fairly recently, understandings of children were almost entirely focused on what children’s existence meant to their future adulthood; children were seen as dependent and incomplete humans who were to be invested in because they represented the future, rather than because their lives had meaning in the present. They were considered as human becomings rather than human beings. This is still the dominant standard used to understand UK childhood(s).

In the 1990s childhood sociologists made a strong case for children as complete beings, actors with a capacity to influence their own lives and the lives of others. This understanding of children as complete beings has helped to stengthen the children’s rights movement.

Nevertheless, this concept was shaken up by Nick Lee in his book Childhood and Society, where he questioned the validity of dichotomies such as biology versus sociology, and being versus becoming. Instead, he argued that in an ever-changing world, whose pace of change propels forward with gathering speed, there is nothing stable; humans do not become something and then remain in that same state throughout their lives. Human beings are in a perpetual state of change and, in this light, we can accept the constant becoming and re-becoming of both children and adults. This becoming does not negate the being of either child or adult, we are all beings in a state of becoming. Furthermore, the manner that we come into being does not need to be defined as either biological or cultural,  as these parts of human selves are so utterly intertwined that it would be impossible to separate them. 

If this rejection of dichotomies is accepted, then we can focus on the human as doing.  It is our acts that are important, both to the being and becoming of our selves, and in the creation of conditions which we believe will improve our shared world.

Life is a prolific and open-ended narrative which is always more than the sum of it’s political and social constructs. It is with this spirit that I approach my work with children, considering us all as beings in a state of emergent becoming through our interactions. This, I believe, is a useful consideration for the foundations of playwork.

Children are not our future, they live alongside us in the present. We all make the future together.

Lucy Benson

Photo:James Schaap

References

Gallacher, L – A., & Gallagher, M. (2008). Methodological Immaturity in Childhood Research? Thinking through ‘particapatory methods’. Childhood 15(4), 499 -516.

Good, P. (2017, January 20). Routines. The Cunningham Ammendment, p. 4.

James, A. (2011). Agency. In J. Qvortrup, W. A. Corsaro, M.-S. Honig, (Eds.), The Palgrave Hanbook of Childhood Studies (pp. 34-45). Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan.

Lee, N. (2001). Childhood and Society. Maidenhead, Berkshire: Open University Press.

Nieuwenhuys, O. (2013). Theorizing childhood(s): Why we need postcolonial perspectives. Childhood, Vol.20(1), 3-8.

Prout, A. (2005). The Future of Childhood. Oxen: Routledge.

Ward, C. (1977). The Child in the City. London: The Architectural Press Ltd.

Wells, K. (2009). Childhood in a Global Perspective. Cambridge: Polity.

Lucy Benson is head of adventure play at Islington Play Association in London, where she works with and for children in six adventure playgrounds. She recently co-authored a paper with Dr Rachel Rosen which was published in Children and Society, From Silence to Solidarity: Locating the Absent ‘Child Voice’ in the Struggle Against Benefit Sanctions. Lucy holds an MA in Sociology of Childhood and Children’s Rights from University College London. This article is derived from her dissertation, City Limits: Children’s Perspectives of an Unequal Borough in a Neo-liberal City.

Politics, playwork and neo-liberalism

NO. 1 IN AN ORIGINAL SERIES OF PAMPHLETS BY GORDON STURROCK

In this first of an original series of pamphlets, the UK playwork scholar Gordon Sturrock argues that avoiding the political implications of playwork practice will lead to its continuing, inevitable demise. Nor should we water our politics down to accommodate more dominant discourses. Instead, he argues, the field must vigorously embrace its true ethos, and so offer a vital alternative to the neo-liberal colonisation of education – and the wider public realm – to the rapacious capitalist project.

READ THE FULL PAMPHLET HERE

Gordon Sturrock is a playwork theorist and writer. He is co-author, with the late Perry Else, of The Play Cycle: An Introduction to Psycholudics (The Colorado Paper), and The Therapeutic Playwork Reader.

Photo: Meriden Adventure Playground

Flying the flag for playwork

Report of the chair of The Playwork Foundation, Karen Benjamin, to the charity’s first annual general meeting, held on 8th March 2019.

The Playwork Foundation was officially launched on 8th November 2017 at Goldsmiths College, University of London with presentations from Professor Fraser Brown, Penny Wilson, Adrian Voce and Meynell, who also streamed the event live for those who could not attend on the day.

In January 2018 The Playwork Foundation achieved charitable status and in March 2018 members of the Board held a consultation session at the National Playwork Conference to discuss what the sector wanted from The Foundation creating a wealth of material from which we are continuing to work on as part of our business development plan.

These ‘asks’ also helped focus some of the questions for the Roadshows.

In 2018 we collaborated with Play England to co-deliver on 4 Roadshows around the country.  These were held in Bristol, at Shiremoor Adventure Playground, in Dudley at Sycamore Adventure and in London – as part of a Policy ask for the sector. There is much work to do on the information collated from these events and there have been further talks with Play England about how to take this forward into policy.

There are different areas and actions for each organisation to take forward, as well as collaboration in meetings with key people and specific campaigns for the playwork sector.

Over the past year we have written letters in support of the playwork sector to Bristol City Council and also given written support to the continuation of playwork qualifications, and members of the Board have also been instrumental in supporting the development of a playwork apprenticeship.

We are working on the development of our policies, currently having a Code of Conduct agreement, and a safeguarding and GDPR policy, but there is more work to do and we are grateful to all those organisations who have shared their policies with us for us to adapt or mirror accordingly.

There are challenges ahead for playwork which include the retention of qualifications, endorsement for training courses and funding for playwork services.

The challenge for The Playwork Foundation is to ensure that we are sustainable, that we can generate enough support from members and that we can secure funding to enable us to deliver on a work programme that will meet our overall aim to represent playwork and playworkers.

I would like to thank the Board of Trustees for their commitment and their contributions, in particular Adrian for his work on the website and to Ali for her work with The Trailblazer group.

Moving forward we need to keep the momentum going and we need a strong and dedicated board of trustees who are prepared to work together to develop a business plan, to secure some project funding, to deliver a regular newsletter to our members and overall keep playwork and playworkers at the forefront of local, regional and national thinking.

Karen Benjamin
Chair of the Board of Trustees
March 8th 2019     

Photo: Karen Benjamin and Ali Wood at the launch of the charity in November 2017.


Are adventure playgrounds really under threat from a risk-averse insurance industry?


Simon Bazley, after taking the temperature of this week’s media flurry about insurance companies and adventure playgrounds, decided to do a little bit of his own investigative journalism. He discovered that the picture is not exactly as described by some illustrious newspapers, and suggests that the more serious threats lie elsewhere.

A couple of weeks ago, around 14th January, I learned through social media that Felix Road Adventure Playground in Bristol had been advised, in the words of its manager, Eddie Nutall, that “adventure playgrounds were not economically viable to them anymore … good luck, and sorry.” 

Upon hearing this, I was naturally concerned about the implications for other adventure playgrounds across the UK and I decided to do some digging, getting in touch with some of my own contacts within the insurance industry.  In short, they said “what are you worrying about? It’s only one insurer and there are many others; just speak to a broker”. 

These contacts, quite senior people in the industry, went on to suggest that it is quite normal for an insurance provider to change their emphasis within various portfolios but that, as one company leaves the market, it provides opportunities for others to compete for the business.  

The Times and the Sun

Fast forward two weeks, and I, like many of us in our field, was a little shocked to read the Times’ and Suns’ versions of events.

“Adventure playgrounds in danger of mass closure after insurer Zurich pulls out”? (The Times)

PARK STRIFE : ‘Claims culture’ could force mass closure of playparks as insurer Zurich ‘threatens to end cover’
(The Sun)

These headlines, which appeared on Monday this week, made me sit up and take more notice than I usually do of certain mainstream media. But are they factually correct?  If so, then our sector has a serious problem, a sentiment manifest in the waves anxiety sweeping across social media all week. ‘Is this the final nail in our coffin?’ was one typical comment.

Panic

The trigger for this panic has surely been the Times’ assertion that Zurich, until now, was ‘the only insurer willing to back (adventure playgrounds)’. But my initial enquiries suggested this was not true, and so let’s take a closer look.

Speaking to a friend and colleague yesterday, I learned that the oldest adventure playground in Wales, Wrexham’s The Venture, was insured by Royal Sun Alliance (RSA), not Zurich. RSA also insures my own work as a self-employed playworker and play consultant. 

Further investigation, via my insurance broker, Keegan and Pennykid in Edinburgh, provided more evidence that the problem has been exaggerated, to say the least.  They advised me that they have a number of adventure playgrounds as clients and have successfully negotiated policies for them via RSA and Aviva, two of the largest insurance providers in the UK. According to Keegan and Pennykid, other companies are also amenable.

Bigger picture

From just a little research, it is clear that The Times story is inaccurate. Of course, we need to try and ascertain the bigger picture, and I would encourage all adventure playgrounds to respond to a survey that has been issued by London Play (see below). I am currently trying to find out who insures the other three adventure playgrounds still remaining in Wales and will feed this into the gathering evidence base.

Hopefully, a concerted and collaborative bit of data gathering will tell us whether or not adventure playgrounds across the UK can, in general, get reasonable insurance, with fair terms and conditions at a reasonable price. If not, then, as a playwork sector, we may indeed have a problem.

If, on the other hand, the answer is yes, albeit that some playgrounds may be now looking for new cover, then perhaps we can use this current attention on our work to highlight our value, collaborate on good practice and workable solutions; and maybe even strike some better deals with the insurance industry.

There is more than one meaning to the term ‘a good risk’!

Simon Bazley

Simon Bazley is the CEO of Playful Futures and a trustee of the Playwork Foundation.

London Play has asked for help in collecting some information about insurance and adventure playgrounds. If you run, work for or volunteer at an adventure playground anywhere in the country please complete the survey at the link below soon as possible. Thank you!

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/H9X3M2D

How youth workers can go the extra mile for play

whittling
When Ali Wood enrolled for an event, ‘In Defence of Youth Work’, in Birmingham, she saw that the agenda featured discussions on youth work in different settings and situations. Never being shy about speaking out for play, Ali asked if youth work in adventure playgrounds could be added to the programme. This is a synopsis of her resulting workshop, and Ali’s rationale for it.

I qualified as a youth and community worker in 1985 and worked in a whole range of centres and clubs in Birmingham for a number of years.  Things were changing though –both in the local authority and across the country and it wasn’t hard to see the writing on the wall.  Funding for community work was dwindling fast and youth work as it had been was changing and becoming more issue-based, but somehow in that process we ended up losing numbers of young people – partly due to focussing more on discussion work than recreational activities and young people’s choices.  I ‘defected’ to playwork, which had begun with the introduction of adventure playgrounds in London in the 70’s and over the ensuing decades built up its own theory base, research evidence for play and qualifications for playworkers. I have been there ever since.

Adventure playgrounds

So for those of you who don’t know and have never been to one – what’s an adventure playground?  There aren’t that many left around since all the recent local authority cuts, so you’d be forgiven if you hadn’t come across one.¹  Basically an adventure playground is a community-rooted self-built site for both children and young people, where kids can come and be themselves and do their thing – which often includes the stuff that they can’t do elsewhere like lighting fires, using tools and building, making food, digging, climbing, swinging, jumping off high platforms, managing risk for themselves, playing with water and mud. It’s also a space where they know they’ll feel heard and valued and where spontaneous conversations will likely yield support or information they need.

they know they’ll feel heard and valued and spontaneous conversations will likely yield support or information they need. 

So what’s the difference between playwork and youthwork – or doing youth work on such a site?  In some ways – when you get youth workers who have a real sense of vocation – not a lot necessarily in practice.  But there are givens here that may not be automatically understood or recognised.

First principles

Firstly there is the understanding of the fundamental importance of play in children and young people’s lives. And by play, we mean that as it is expressed in the first two Playwork Principles² – which provide a professional and ethical framework for playwork.

  1. All children and young people need to play. The impulse to play is innate. Play is a biological, psychological and social necessity, and is fundamental to the healthy development and wellbeing of individuals and communities.
  2. Play is a process that is freely chosen, personally directed and intrinsically motivated. That is, children and young people determine and control the content and intent of their play, by following their own instincts, ideas and interests, in their own way for their own reasons.

If you recall some of your own memories of playing (and do this now before you read on!), I can pretty much guarantee that these will consist of being outside, taking risks and being away from adults – and the older you are, the more that will be the case.  Am I right?  And why do those three things feature so widely in people’s memories? Because children naturally long for freedom and independence as they grow; and if adults are around, those adults are likely to try and control, supervise, guide, direct, organise, stop or take over whatever kids are doing. Start watching yourself, and how much you do this when you’re with kids!

gathering on platform 2

So, children seek out time and space away from adult eyes in order to play. However, over the last few decades, kids have had less and less free time away from adults when they can make their own mistakes, be daft, work stuff out and try things out for themselves, be responsible for themselves and each other. Yet it is play as described above that is the natural medium for these things to happen, but opportunities for play have been squeezed, banned, or diluted – often with the supposed best of adult intentions – because we have forgotten how vital free play is and we are bewitched by the spirit of the age of over-protection and structured education of our children and young people. In playwork we call this play deprivation³ and it is a concept that other professions are also recognising as really damaging.

So, youth work really needs to understand what play is, why kids crave it and how to support it and respect it without getting in the way (and that honestly isn’t easy and takes a lot of reflective practice!) instead of planning a load of other stuff that we think is more important and riding rough-shod over young people in the process.  More than ever – because of being more play deprived in their own childhoods – young people need to play⁴.

Understanding risk

Secondly, in playwork there is a different understanding about risk, it’s necessity in young lives and how we can manage it. We use an approach that has been recognised and is promoted by the Health and Safety Executive⁵ for anyone working with children and young people and yet somehow youth work has not taken this on. It is the process of constant risk:benefit assessment⁶, whereby instead of automatically intervening to ‘make something safe’, playworkers observe children and young people in whatever they are doing and dynamically assess the risks of this, but also the benefits –i.e. what kids will gain from doing whatever it is, and also to think through ways of minimising the risks if this is necessary, without taking over and ‘doing it for them’.

Young people don’t have a death wish, they have an inbuilt sense of self-protection and survival that too often we have crushed by not allowing them to use it. 

It takes courage and practice, but it works. Young people don’t have a death wish, they have an inbuilt sense of self-protection and survival that too often we have crushed by not allowing them to use it.  When they know they are responsible for themselves, they really take that on and their skills and confidence flourish. On the adventure playground where I work and where we have unaccompanied children from 7-18 years on site,  we’ve had about half a dozen accidents that have entailed a visit to A & E in ten years, and yet our kids regularly use axes and mallets, hammers and saws, throw themselves off platforms and cook on the open fire.  Youth work really needs to better understand risk-benefit assessment in practice.

Differences

So, the main differences when doing youth work on an adventure playground (and we have youth only sessions at our playground as well as open sessions for all ages), entail youth workers:-

  1. developing a deep understanding of play in all its forms and how to support it;
  2. a profound respect for children and young people that recognises their capabilities and competencies first;
  3. a richer kind of reflective practice⁷ that puts us adults – with all our feelings and motives – under the microscope to examine how our interventions are too often colonial and patronising; and
  4. a commitment to risk:benefit assessment observation and recording.

This takes passion and courage, lots of supportive teamwork and the willingness to regularly go the extra mile. But in many ways, although I have called myself a playworker for the last twenty years, it is much more akin to the youth work I first felt so drawn to in the 80s.

Ali Wood

Ali Wood is a playwork writer, researcher and trainer. She is chair of Meriden Adventure Playground in the West Midlands, and a founding board member of the Playwork Foundation.

Photos: Meriden Adventure Playground

References

  1. http://www.playengland.org.uk/resources-list/adventure-playgrounds/
  2. http://issuu.com/playwales/docs/the_playwork_principles_-_an_overvi?e=5305098/11658290
  3. http://www.playwales.org.uk/login/uploaded/documents/INFORMATION%20SHEETS/play%20deprivation%20impact%20consequences%20and%20potential%20of%20playwork.pdf
  4. http://issuu.com/playwales/docs/building_resilience_?e=5305098/31468341
  5. http://www.hse.gov.uk/entertainment/childrens-play-july-2012.pdf
  6. http://issuu.com/playwales/docs/play_and_risk?mode=window
  7. https://issuu.com/playwales/docs/reflective_practice?e=5305098/62475902

 

Children’s Access to Play in Schools

Children’s Access to Play in Schools ( CAPS ), a University of Gloucestershire project under the EU’s Erasmus programme, is introducing its Play-friendly Schools Quality Criteria to the UK at an event in Gloucester on 5 December.

Download details here.

Unite calls for Labour to reinstate recognition of playwork qualifications

Katie the skateboarder

In its response to the Labour Party’s consulation on a statutory youth service, Unite the Union, which incorporates the former Community, Youth and Playworkers Union, has called for a return to the recognition of playwork qualifications.

Unite’s response says:

“Unite believes that playworkers would also gain from an increased recognition of their professional skills especially since September 2014, when the Government removed the statutory requirement for out of school clubs and holiday play schemes registered on the Ofsted Early Years Register to employ staff with ‘full and relevant’ childcare or playwork qualifications’ “

The deadline for submissions has been extended until the 30 November.

Information about the consultation and how to contribute can be found here

Unite’s full response can be read here

Photo: James Schaap

 

What is playwork under neoliberalism?

In this new paper, Ben Dalbey, inspired by the writing of Wendy Russell and Mike Wragg in the recently-published Aspects of Playwork: Play & Culture Studies, Volume 14 (Hamilton Books, 2018), and quoting extensively from their work, attempts to apply some of their ideas to a US context informed by race and class.

Abstract

The hegemony of neoliberal economic and social policy has had far-reaching cultural and political impacts in the UK and US, including changing the lives of children and governing the ways adults tend to think about childhood. Neoliberalism renders vast numbers of children deficient, devoid of value, or invisible, while encouraging the placement of a wide array of adult political and environmental anxieties in a socially-constructed neoliberal ideal of potential childhood success.

The field of playwork is uniquely situated as a profession working “with” instead of “over” children, but we are not immune to the impacts of this colonization of childhood. By lifting our eyes to see past the trope of the over-scheduled child of affluenza, playwork advocates and practitioners can improve our practice and place our advocacy within a context of revolutionary hope.

Read the full paper here

Ben Dalbey lives in Baltimore, Maryland, and is co-founder of Free For All Baltimore, a child-led community building project.

Photo: Petra Bensted

2nd ‘Playwork Campference’ announced for Houston, Texas, February 2019

A Second “Playwork Campference” has been announced for 15th-18th February 2019 in Houston. The organisers, Pop-Up Adventure Play, say it will  bring together “international experts on children’s play to discuss unconventional approaches to risk and inclusion”

Full details here

Photo: Calgary Community Services

 

Symbiotic homeostatic disequilibrium in playworking interaction

A new paper by Joel Seath and Gordon Sturrock, derived from and following communications at the PlayEd conference in Cambridge, May 2018.

Abstract

Playwork’s key claim is its unique manner of working for and with children. It currently suffers, however, from a lack of consensus regarding the benefits of its application. This paper challenges the dilution of playwork practice in acknowledging the art, grace and wisdom in connectivity of playworking. Drawing primarily on Antonio Damasio’s neurobiological analysis, the homeostatic disequilibrium operation at the core of body/neural intra-action is detected as reflected in the interaction of organisms.

In consideration of some key concepts of social ecology – consociation, mutual aid, co-operativity rather than competition, rhizomatic rather than hierarchical structures – and  the neurobiological study of individuals’ feelings, emotive responses, affect and culture, this paper discusses the evolving phenomenon of the playworking adult and child at play in terms of a symbiotic being and becoming.

Joel Seath and Gordon Sturrock

Download the full paper here

Image: ‘Rhizomatic tree of life’ by jef Safi