Tag: play

Will Cardiff Bay speak up for play after election day?

Tomorrow is set to be a bumper election day in Great Britain! 

In England alone, there will be local council elections, mayoral elections, Mayor of London elections, London Assembly elections and Police & Crime Commissioner* elections. Some of these are elections that were postponed in 2020 due to the outbreak of COVID-19. 

*Police & Crime Commissioner elections will also be taking place in Wales. Did you know that Wales and England share a single jurisdiction but have two legislatures? Something unique in the world. 

As if that wasn’t enough elections for one day, there will also be a Senedd Cymru/Welsh Parliament election and a Scottish Parliamentary election. This article will look at the Senedd elections – fellow Trustee, Ann-marie, has written a piece on the Scottish Parliamentary election which you can read here. If you’re unfamiliar, this short video explains the powers of the Senedd. 

This year’s Senedd election is nothing short of historic! Thanks to the ‘Senedd Election Act 2020’, 16 and 17 year-olds will be able to vote for the first time as well as an estimated 33,000 foreign nationals gaining the right to vote – this represents the biggest expansion of the franchise since 1969, when suffrage was extended to 18 to 21 year-olds, and will undoubtedly impact on the results of the election. 

So, what do the parties say about play and playwork for #Senedd2021?

Whilst a number of parties have progressive manifesto promises for children and young people, only the Wales Green Party and Welsh Liberal Democrats specifically reference “play”, albeit in the context of early years education in both cases. Questions to Plaid Cymru leader, Adam Price, on play, also returned responses linking to education and early years. Despite no mention of it in their manifesto, it could be argued that, as it was a Welsh Labour Government that produced The Children and Families (Wales) Measure 2010, that gave us the Play Sufficiency Duty, and their record in supporting play in recent years, that Labour will likely continue this commitment.  

Whatever the party-political make-up of the new Welsh parliament and government next week, a number of organisations have made it clear to all of them what they believe should be done to protect the rights of children in Wales, including their right to play.

First, we look at our national play board, Play Wales, and their manifesto “Wales – a play friendly place”. The headline asks are for the continuation of the Play Sufficiency Duty and for the opportunities for children to play to “increase and improve”. The dominance of the motor vehicle is addressed, with recommendations for default 20mph speed limits in built-up areas and government-mandated guidance for street play projects. Looking at schools, Play Wales propose a mandatory minimum time for “play breaks” within the school day and also ask for consideration, wherever practical, to making outdoor school grounds available for play after school and at weekends.  Play Wales also call for a public campaign that not only explains what play is but also communicates the health and wellbeing benefits for children and wider society. 

The Children’s Commissioner for Wales’s Manifesto briefly mentions play, asking for “more youth and play services that anyone can use, for free”. However it does go a little further by giving a vision of the future with “free adventure playgrounds all over the country”! This year will see the end of the current Commissioner’s tenure – we hope that the next Commissioner will be just as welcoming to play and playwork as Sally has been. 

Clybiau Plant Cymru Kids’ Club appear to be the only organisation making very specific representations on behalf of playworkers. Specifically, they call for: the “continued investment in professionalisation of the sector” via funding, CPD and access to training and qualifications; recognition of playworkers’ influence on children’s lives and the Welsh economy to be “recognised in all government communications and policy decisions”; parity with Early Years workers through an “active and effective sector skills council”; and a call for more initiatives that support fair remuneration for playworkers (e.g. tax-free childcare, the childcare offer and 100% rates relief). 

The Play Sufficiency Duty and legislation like the world-first Well-being of Future Generations Act, are indicative of how progressive governments can make a real difference to children and young people’s lives in a meaningful and sustainable way and on a national scale. However, any incoming Welsh Government will still be restricted by the allocation of funding set by the UK Government and by the reservation of powers over aspects of media, health and safety legislation, employment and regulation of charities. 

In the coming months, The Playwork Foundation will be revisiting ‘A Manifesto for Play: Policy proposals for children’s play in England’ that was written in partnership with Play England and IPA England ahead of the 2019 UK General Election. Taking into consideration the composition of the new parliaments and governments in Wales and Scotland following national elections, and the shifting of the political map in England as a result of local elections, we hope to present a vision for the future of playwork that can influence and encourage each nation of the UK to not only recognise the profession but utilise our expertise and practice to the benefit of children and young people in every corner of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. 

If you’re living in Wales and wondering who to vote for, the BBC have put together this guide, or, for those in Scotland and England voting this Thursday, you can find out about all the elections, candidates and parties by visiting https://whocanivotefor.co.uk/

Siôn Edwards

Researching playfulness on the streets during lockdown

By Alison Stenning and Wendy Russell

A bit of background

This research is part of a larger project that Alison was working on, funded by a Leverhulme Research Fellowship, focused on how organised street play sessions using the Playing Out model were remaking relationships between people and places on the street. Fieldwork on this project was just about to begin as Covid-19 emerged and as the first lockdown was announced in the UK, meaning playing out sessions swiftly vanished as did Alison’s fieldwork sites.

Yet just as swiftly, we witnessed the flourishing of all kinds of other activities that connected play, neighbours and streets: mutual support networks emerged; traffic levels dropped; residents took to the streets. We saw the emergence of all sorts of playful acts – rainbows in windows and Thursday night claps to thank NHS and key workers, teddy bear trails, and the proliferation of pavement chalking. These emergent spaces seemed all the more important in the face of the closure of other public spaces of play and connection, including playgrounds.

With the restrictions on movement, debates emerged around access to public space, especially for children, and particularly for those without private gardens. Pressure on public parks led to threats of closure and the media reverberated with testy discussions about what were legitimate reasons to be outside. Within these debates, children’s right to play outdoors was challenged at times by police and by vigilant neighbours, and families expressed anxieties about the safety of outdoor play.

The research study

In this context, together we worked with other play activists and researchers to present a case for outdoor play on streets, arguing that this was a space which needed protection and advocacy. But we also wanted to do some research to get a better sense of what was going on in terms of play and playfulness on streets. We wanted detail: to get at the ‘granular’ connections people were making with their streets in lockdown.

We developed a qualitative survey to gather data about playful activities, and changes in the material environment and feel of the street. The survey was circulated through social media and networks of community groups, play organisations and beyond. We received 78 responses from across England, Scotland and Wales. Reflecting the limits of online research and of our own networks, the majority of respondents were White, well-educated owner-occupiers. More than three-quarters of the respondents were women and two-thirds were aged 35-54, but more than a quarter of respondents did not have children under 18 living with them. We followed up the survey with 13 online video interviews. In these interviews, we explored participants’ survey responses in more detail but also explored the sites of play through drawing maps, using Google Maps on-screen, and sharing photos and videos. We also invited respondents’ children to participate and in 5 of the interviews a total of 12 children aged between 4 and 11 years joined for all or part of the conversation.

It is relevant to note that playworkers and community activists were disproportionately represented amongst our respondents; in part, this reflects our recruitment strategy but also, we feel, reflects the desire and willingness of such people to recognise and engage in playful acts in their communities.

What we present here in terms of ‘findings’ are very much preliminary, as we are still analysing the detail of the rich data we gathered, and we have focused on what might be of particular interest to a playwork readership.

Time, space and permission to play

We know that if conditions are right, children will play; these interdependent conditions have been categorised as time, space and permission, and as a matter of spatial justice. One thing that most children did have during lockdown was time, given that most stopped attending schools and other organised activities. Nationally, although time spent outdoors did not appear to change significantly for primary aged children, socialising was of course greatly reduced. In our research, not all parents had extra time, but several respondents did comment on the time available to spend chatting, at a distance, with neighbours. Many talked of spending more time with their children, and of children spending more time playing with their siblings if they had them, more time exploring and playing in local streets and green spaces, more time inventing their own ways to play.

Time, space and permission to play intermingled in various and sometimes contradictory ways. All had witnessed a number of changes on their streets, the most common being less traffic and more people walking in the road, reflecting widespread narratives of street life during lockdown. More people were using their street for walking, running or cycling, or to linger in front gardens, yards and pavements. This suggests a real shift in the presence of people on streets, with a sense of much more connecting with neighbours.

Just over half felt their streets were quieter during lockdown, both in terms of activity on the street (particularly traffic) and noise. Only 12% reported that traffic was slower whereas over a quarter reported seeing speeding vehicles, reflecting what has been reported elsewhere. Many also noted that the reduced traffic levels were short-lived, lasting only until lockdown started to be relaxed.

Although 60% reported that they had seen chalking on roads and pavements, a clear sign of the presence of children on streets (even if at times it was adults chalking), just 35% saw more children playing on the street. Additional responses suggested a mixed picture: on streets where children ordinarily played out, some reported that there was a reduction when lockdown started, as families followed government guidance to “stay at home”:

“I have really missed the sound of children playing … during lockdown. At first I found this eerie and sad.”

Others suggested that children were playing out more of the time as they weren’t at school. On streets where children ordinarily rarely played out, some saw no change, but some did witness a significant increase:

“For the first couple of weeks, there was no traffic at all and we could see children playing on the street corners – this has never happened before”.  

There was a temporality to all these patterns – as there was for much of what was reported – with a peak lockdown period (from 23 March to 13 May) marked generally by higher levels of street activity, but in some instances lower levels of children’s presence as parental anxieties and unclear rules restricted children’s access to outdoor space.

The kinds of activities respondents reported, in addition to simply seeing and talking to more neighbours more of the time (something significant in itself), included bingo, doorstep discos, music (live and recorded), dancing, singing, sports (including street marathons for charity), cycling and scooting, chalking, nerf wars, chalk trails and hopscotch, nature trails and bug hunts, rock snakes, rainbow trails, teddy bear trails and tea parties, toy and book swaps, football, kerby, hula-hooping, and more.

In some instances, play was animated or curated by activists, working from home or furloughed, and shifting their professional playful and community practices to their streets. In each of these instances, these playworkers and community workers opened up spaces for other neighbours, of all ages, to engage in a process of play, stepping back, in the tradition of playworking, to enable children and their families to occupy the playful environments created, but often linking this to other forms of support for those who needed it.

These diverse forms of play were experienced in all sorts of ways but a few common themes emerged. Some talked of a simple joy in seeing children playing:

“the sound of laughter and general buzz really does lift the spirits … It has been nice to see the street come alive again.”

This seemed to resonate with hope in the context of the pandemic and also the opening up more spaces for neighbours to connect:

“Seeing kids playing with each other, despite the situation, brings a smile to my face. The children may be aware of what’s going on, but being able to play without any inhibitions brings back memories of playing when I was young too. It makes the street inviting for families and brings more children out to play.”

This sense of playfulness creating a space for connection appeared in a number of responses:

“I love it. We can connect. I love the creativity, the generosity, the community spirit that it engenders. The opportunity it offers for us as older neighbours to be playful with the children/families nearby.”

For some, especially those more vulnerable and shielding, this was translated into an increased sense of security and comfort:

“They mean so much to me. I feel safer knowing my neighbours.”

“Being creative and playful felt comforting”

Much of this was connected directly to changes in the materialities and atmospheres of the street itself, created by these playful acts, such as chalking and planting, which shifted not only these respondents’ relationships to their street, but more broadly.

“Planting in the street makes me feel hopeful. And I felt really proud, sharing footage with friends and family to show them what a great street I live in! And how a sense of community can be fostered.”

Of course, these experiences were not all joyful; the pandemic and the rules of lockdown encroached on street life and on playfulness in sometimes difficult and painful ways. Respondents were aware of diverse attitudes to the rules, sometimes unsure of what was and wasn’t permitted, wary of upsetting their neighbours but also anxious that their own attempts to be playful might be watched and shamed from a neighbouring window or doorstep. Others, including those shielding or with vulnerable family members, oscillated between the comfort and security offered by seeing their neighbours animating the street and the fear that too many connections might exacerbate the pandemic and extend the lockdown. One interviewee noted how, as time went on, the rainbow pictures were still up in windows, but they had faded: she felt this was a kind of dystopian image and that the NHS, where she worked, had been forgotten, adding “they all clapped, but they broke the rules”.

Maps and materialities

A changed relationship with their most local environments was a recurring theme in our follow-up interviews where respondents described and mapped in different ways their playful practices through lockdown. Through this process, the very detailed material geography of streets – and its remaking during the weeks of lockdown – came to the fore, showing how differently streetscapes are experienced by children, and the ways they perceive the possibilities for playing.

One 8-year-old talked about how all the parked cars meant she couldn’t balance along the kerb; her 11-year-old brother marked his map with the section of the street where the kerb was particularly high, making it good to jump off on bikes and scooters. A 7-year-old talked about there being lots of rocks in the street – there was brick paving and many of the bricks were loose. A 9-year old recalled dancing across the street with her friend, from facing pavements that allowed them keep a two-metre distance.

Many people talked about staying hyperlocal. The maps reflected this, for example, showing the small spaces of the local park, discovered and explored during lockdown, and the route there through snickets, alleyways and side roads, peopled by neighbours with rainbows in their windows, hammocks in their front gardens, and chalk on their pavements. Others talked of playing in the nearby woods because they felt less watched over. One mother of a 4-year-old talked about how, because the playground was closed, her daughter “learned how to be in the woods. Now she will make up her own games, do more self-directed play”. “Sticks,” the daughter informed us, “are not toys, they’re animals”.

The importance of play and street geography

In many ways, lockdown opened up spaces for play and connection for our respondents and remade streets and neighbourhoods in multiple and positive ways, but these playful transformations took place in the shadow of Covid-19. This meant that play on streets was also at times restrained and restricted, conditions potentially antithetical to play. As official guidance on outdoor play and children socialising remains opaque and contradictory and as we face more lockdowns over the autumn and winter, the need to advocate for and make space for play on our streets and in our communities continues.

This is especially the case for those children for whom conditions for play are more restricted than for our comparatively privileged and fortunate respondents, including those in overcrowded, temporary or sub-standard accommodation and those whose access to outdoor space is limited. These are perhaps the children more likely to be those that use open access playwork services, suggesting there is a need for further research in this area and perhaps for a broader think about playwork in the community.

Alison Stenning and Wendy Russell

‘Come into play’ in Torbay

As one of our local organisations said ‘We may be all in the same storm at the moment, but we are not in the same boat’. 

Children and young people have lost so much, and in the places we work large numbers of them are on free school meals, with no access to the internet and some of them have no paper or basic art and craft materials at all. Given all that is happening, art, creativity and the opportunity to express yourself becomes more important than ever.

In Torbay our local play organisation joined forces with colleagues from Imagine This… a partnership of 43 voluntary sector children and young people’s organisations in Torbay, and we developed and provided Let’s Create and Play Packs for children and young people across ALL age ranges 0 – 19 years including treasure and sensory baskets for little ones and acrylic paints, sketch books and opportunities to take part in on-line sessions for teenagers.    

Play Torbay is providing Packs for children aged 5 – 12 which included a range of scrap and craft materials that would usually end up as waste, along with instructions of fun things to make and do.  Participants can access a weekly virtual session led by experienced playworkers, who talk through ideas of how to use the pack to its full potential, as well as providing opportunities for the young people and their families to engage with each other.  If any families would prefer not to join the online session, the playworker can contact them directly instead with ideas of how to get the most out of the pack. We are also offering support to families who may be struggling to cope, with signposting and referral to other services where that’s required. 

With support from a number of different funders, since March we have developed 4 differently themed packs and jointly delivered over 1,000 packs with over 80% going to families who are disadvantaged in some way. We have a waiting list so fund-raising is continuing because we would really like to ensure the service can carry on through these difficult times.  Anyone who feels they may benefit from being involved in the Let’s Create and Play Pack project can contact Play Torbay by emailing admin@playtorbay.co.uk

To get an idea of the different things the packs offer, in the ‘Winter Play Pack’ there are separate bags for 8 planned sessions where you can try out different skills.  There are detailed instruction sheets, so you make can things in a similar way, or you can use the materials in lots of different ways including making your own ‘fidget board’, ‘creating a plastic planter and growing seeds’ and designing your own ‘tree decorations’.  

The exciting news is that we are now planning a fifth Play Pack with an eco-theme.  This new pack is currently in design phase and subject to funding, will be available from January and run till the end of March 2021. The aim of the Eco Play Pack is to develop creative and playful ways for young people to actively be involved and take their share in protecting the planet.  We are working with Torre Abbey and the Trove Scrapstore, a resource hub providing materials to re-make, recycle and re-use; and with Torbay Climate Action colleagues to develop opportunities to explore how solar panels work, re-using plastic and creating eco bricks, the importance of insulation and zero carbon solutions, passive house building, supporting  natural habitats, permaculture and plants, etc. 

Building on the success of weekly Zooms with Play Packs, where we can host as many as 20 families in a session, we are now planning to invite different presenters to join to talk through and demonstrate an idea, such as building a mini solar-powered boat, or planting winter salad leaves and then discuss further possibilities with young people.  One of our ultimate aims is to explore the possibility of developing an inclusive, eco-friendly, people-powered, carbon-neutral adventure playground and we hope that the Eco Play Pack will support and encourage young people and their families to contribute to the future design of the playground. 

Play Torbay

Academics highlight children’s need for street play during lockdown

There are growing calls this morning for governments and local authorities to urgently look at steps to allow more children to use their local streets for outside play.

A new paper by Prof. Alison Stenning and Dr. Wendy Russell explores the issues around children’s access to space during government restrictions, within the context of the vital importance of play for their wellbeing and resilience.

The paper suggests that rethinking the purpose of residential streets may hold a key to making the lockdown less harmful to children, more bearable for families, and, therefore more sustainable for communities.

Read the full paper here.

(reblogged from policyforplay.com)

Colleagues, community and commons – our vital triumverate

In this critique of Voce and Sturrock’s A Situated Ethos of Playwork, Simon Rix suggests that community should be integral to playwork practice, and the central focus of the field’s fightback.

Thanks are due to Gordon Sturrock and and Adrian Voce for their recent paper, A Situated Ethos of Playwork. It rightly acknowledges that the internal debate, about what playwork is, should at present be laid aside in the face of the urgent issue of what playwork should do. This is not to say that what playwork is is not important; it is to say that what playwork may be is being shaped, and in such circumstances, to do is to be. Doo-be-doo-be-doo!

In this response, I will first discuss some of the paper’s main points; then I will add some comments that I think are relevant. I won’t comment on the preliminary descriptions of playwork in the first section, because I cannot argue with what’s written there. Nor do I dispute the principle that playwork is, at present, a necessary part of the ludic ecology – an ecology that is inevitably linked with, overlapped by and overlapping into other parts of the totality. Currently, this is dominated by an economic hegemony under the control of very narrow interests, only aware of their own needs and assumptions. This can be described as both the ‘integrated spectacle’, and the ‘no alternative’ dialogue, favoured by crisis capitalism.

A story of recuperation?

The historical section of the paper reads as both a story of development, response and endorsement; and a story of recuperation. As Voce and Sturrock rightly point out, the elements with the greatest capacity (wealth) and / or affinity with the current hegemony, tend to have the greatest sway; and also tend to harvest those elements of and from playwork that suit their agenda. So, we find landscape architects presenting projects designed by playworkers as their own, and bit players from our field taking selected elements of the playwork approach into other, more lucrative fields.

Mutual aid and class

So, to resist recuperation and to develop itself as a discreet discipline, it is proposed that playwork should return to the totality, which was at its genesis (in a critique of the totality). The paper pronounces: “where the subordination of children is no longer accepted, everything can change”, The critique of social Darwinism, rightly identified as a way of justifying and promoting practices of domination – from race to class to gender – in fact goes back to 1902 and the publication of ‘Mutual Aid’ by Kropotkin. It’s not new; it is a longstanding heresy, which playwork has been allied to explicitly and implicitly, to varying degrees, forever.

I feel that here is a call for a period of more explicit aligning with that critique, an alignment which, in my opinion, is long overdue. Playwork has been cowed since the beginning of the neo-liberal assault on the critics of social Darwinism, an assault which has had the effect of altering the totality for most, even playwork, into the ‘no alternative’ narrative – of placing all value into the market and so forcing participation in the market at the expense of everything the critique stands for.

Marxian critique still holds sway

In support of that call, we are introduced to the precariat class as an ally. In the context of the critique of the totality, the Marxian critique based on class division still holds sway and hasn’t been superseded; but this critique is also of the totality. While the emergence, (or discovery) of the precariat class is appropriate in the face of the effects of the current neo-liberal crisis, in terms of the totality, how different is being a member of the precariat class any different from any other way of being a landless peasant?

I also wonder how different the discovery of the precariat is to the discovery of the ‘underclass’ in the 1980’s, and how successful any hopes pinned on this section of landless peasantry will be? The pinning of hopes on the underclass – which, for similar reasons, was forced to make a life outside the norms of capitalism and develop ‘post-work’ social structures – didn’t produce change. It didn’t make a significant contribution to playwork, other than providing playwork with a number of volunteers from ‘outside the system’ (a significant number of whom then dropped out of playwork too!).

This is not to denigrate those who find themselves identifying with the precariat as a class, and share playwork’s analysis. I would caution, however, that a significant part of the gig economy is made up of aspirant, slightly arty entrepreneurs whose wish is to find fame, be discovered and float on the stock market. The role of playwork is not to develop class consciousness among the precariat, nor to facilitate the advancement its aspirant element, nor to develop class consciousness among children.

‘The dialectic process demands the negation of oppositions, the creation of something new, not a mere realignment of the forces it contains’.

As Anslem Jappe points out in his recent book of essays, capitalism, class structure and its ideology – currently called neo-liberalism – reproduces itself as a social relationship, as well as reproducing countless throwaway consumer items. It’s the social relationship which is at the hub of the arrangement. How far, then, Jappe asks, is basing change, as well as our critique, on this social relationship, likely to be successful? Is not change, as a departure, dependent on the formation of new social relationships, yet to be decided, but based in other qualities: human ones. This echoes the paper’s point “The struggle we need to commit to, then, is not between different alignments of people, but between people and non-human entities”, but I wish to escape from relying on the existing social relationship as a basis for that. The dialectic process demands the negation of oppositions, the creation of something new, not a mere realignment of the forces it contains.

This is alluded to in discussion of a situated practice. I can’t disagree with the utopian picture painted. I can’t fault the likelihood that a playful approach seems a route towards it, and that playful environments will be a contributing crucible.

New organisations and methods

In pursuit of the establishment and maintenance of crucibles, the paper seems to go into two points. The first is the unification of playwork and the escape of its story from the recuperated, possibly watered down alliances that it’s had. I am a trustee of the Playwork Foundation along with Adrian (declared, though as a burden, not an interest: trusteeship has no personal benefit) and I do see this as a developing vehicle for a playworker controlled, and owned, narrative and solidarity.

There are a number of other, more local, initiatives developing as well – a coping mechanism in the face of neo-liberal denial of any but its own social system. These initiatives are about delivery through new sororal groupings, and new relationships with the state and other funders. There is an opportunity there to develop solidarity and mutual aid among playworkers and our organisations. There is opportunity through this to build local, regional and national networks of playwork delivery. Whether this is additional to, affiliated with, supported by, or any other relationship with the Foundation remains to be seen, as appropriate, but whichever route is taken, care must be taken at this development stage to have due regard to maximising direct democracy in the structure which is set up.

In both cases, Foundation and delivery, the membership is the critical mass, and the source of strength. There has been much written on organisational structure, group dynamics, meetings, consultation and decision-making. In this case, I think the choice to be be made is one which emphasises the human relationship, and tries as hard as possible to enshrine that in the structure. That means a principle of grass roots localism and autonomy, under the auspice of the agreed narrative and structure, which will, as far as possible reflect those principles and narrative. At all costs, the fallacy of democratic centralism must be avoided; as must elitism (another class issue), a tendency which the precariat seems to be susceptible to.

Policy of relationships

Secondly, we have a discussion on rights and policy. I have the greatest admiration for those who are able to sit down with the suits, jackals and other creatures that inhabit the corridors of power; and are able to both endure it, and be understood. I’m certainly not that person, but I have seen the impact it can make, and I appreciate it. The paper goes into, as I have above, the dangers of recuperation, and that any honey pot attracts flies. But, in addition to the corporate squatters and ideological heathens who gathered around the Play Strategy, I feel that the social relationship I criticised above also raised its head here. This was in the decision that the roll out should be by a managerial, and not a playwork organisation.

The idea that management is a generic skillset, and that managers need not know anything about what they are managing was a problem, both for the strategy and for playwork. Skilled and experienced playworkers found themselves leading astonished managers around events and projects; managers who in some cases had no idea of the magic that playwork can unleash. Some playworkers, whose influence had apparently been crucial, didn’t even find out their influence had been there until years after the strategy had been rolled out, never mind have a conscious input.

This is a caution to the Foundation, to the imagined delivery federation and to the field. If it is to be the Foundation that makes the policy approach to Government, if it is to be a delivery federation, if either have a role in a new phase of growth, then the medium is the message. The human relationships, enshrined by the principles of localism, autonomy and direct democracy, must be held dear by these organisations, and their structures must reflect that.

It’s the community, innit?

This leads me on to the glaring omission, the third point.

The paper contains several mentions of the word ‘community’, it talks of a community of practice, and it makes mention of the communities playworkers serve. But, in human terms, I consider community to be the most important constituency in every way. The paper speaks of a national campaign that will “listen to the voices of those on the front line, and in their communities.” Although this speaks of consultation, it doesn’t speak so strongly of participation. It speaks of building support, as traditional politics does, towards a particular goal, which can and may be forgotten as the campaigning mode subsides and the programme lost in recuperation, but it doesn’t speak of love. Love is what sustains the communities that gather around good playwork provision, retains them and facilitates their participation. Playworkers have a service role in this community, but they are not its leaders or its voice. If anything, playworkers should be a conduit based on shared skills, given freely.

‘to build a community around provision and to mobilise that community in times of threat, means everyday playworking in campaign mode’.

This is both relevant to campaigning and to everyday playwork, because to build a community around provision and to mobilise that community in times of threat, means everyday playworking in campaign mode. This shouldn’t sound extraordinary. Observation, knowledge, response, relationships, attention to detail and sometimes individuals, large affective interventions, and small effective facilitations – these should be common to both.

Everyday playworking should be able to concern itself with issues that impact on children’s lives, and affect their ability to play, just as much as it should be able to concern itself with the play environment. It should be able to make a connection with the totality of the community and respond to that, both as an acknowledgement that these issues have an impact on children’s ability to play, and because the play environment has a place in that totality. To attempt to campaign in the face of threat without having the groundwork of a position in the totality of the community renders the community an afterthought, a position nobody will respond to.

I consider this to be a more valuable mode, in the local context, than playwork organisations regarding themselves as managerial and relying on relationships with power, which have already proved fickle. I consider that mode to be as much to do with playworkers positioning themselves in the redundant social relationship that is class society, a symptom of the aspirant precariat, and we will see them by the number and strength of the communities around them and how quickly they accept their recuperation, or die.

Colleagues, community and commons – a vital triumverate

The question of how to develop this element of the triumvirate of playwork defence and development is a little more problematic, given that playwork is about relationships. If I may quote myself, “The adventure playground is not a physical thing. It’s a community. The physical appearance of the site is the hook, if you like, but it’s the social and emotional that gets people to remain”. Community should come as second nature to playworkers, but evidence shows that this is not always the case. Why? Are some tired, some resting on their laurels, some not recognising the connection, some subsumed in the status that policy mistakes of the past have dubbed them with?

Should playwork training have more emphasis on community and relationships, should it contain a unit on campaigning? Should emergent playwork organisations take it upon themselves to take this training out, as a separate piece of work? Who should it be delivered to? Should a model be devised on the hoof, as organisations develop, with due regard to the principles of localism, autonomy and direct democracy at its core? Who is going to join in?

These are questions for debate, and prompt the prequel question of, how and by whom is this debate to be organised? In that spirit, I call upon the field to engage with the Foundation and with the policy roadshows currently underway; and I call upon the roadshows and those debating at them to consider the triumvirate of colleagues, community and commons as an adage:

Colleagues – a unified workforce, building solidarity among us;
Community -meaning both those we serve, whose totality we are a part of, ­­and a community of practice; and
Commons – meaning the wider social and political environment and institutions that we need to have an oversight of, and facilitate in that environment.

If we lose sight of any part of this triumvirate, we will miss the mark.

Simon Rix

Image: Jacqueliine Pallesen

Simon Rix is a practising playworker and a trustee of The Playwork Foundation

 

Thousands of children expected for Playday 2016

Tomorrow, 3 August, tens of thousands of children and young people from across the United Kingdom will be out playing, celebrating Playday – the national day for play, when hundreds of local and regional play events are taking place to promote the importance of children’s right to play.

This year’s Playday theme, ‘Play Matters…’ celebrates the many benefits of outdoor play: climbing trees, making dens, jumping in puddles, making mud pies, rolling down hills, playing with water, chasing, hide and seek, climbing.

Playday national coordinators, Play England, Play Scotland, Play Wales and PlayBoard Northern Ireland issued a statement, saying:

“It will be no surprise to learn that when children talk about their preferred play experiences, they more often than not cite outdoor play as their favourite activity. This makes sense; the outdoors is the very best place for children to practice and master emerging physical skills. Frequent and regular opportunities to explore and play in the outdoor environment are essential for children’s … well-being, health, happiness, learning and development”.

To mark this year’s Playday, publishers Routledge, part of the Taylor and Francis Group, have made a selection of play-related academic papers and articles available free of charge for the duration of August. Visit their site here to view the selection.

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About Playday

Playday was originated by a small group of playworkers in London in 1986 as a response to threatened cuts and closures to adventure playgrounds and play schemes (Plus ca change!)

It has become the national day to celebrate children’s play in the UK, traditionally held on the first Wednesday of August. As well as a coordinated annual event, Playday continues to be part of the campaign to highlight the importance of play in children’s lives and their right for this to be provided for within the public realm.

For more information see www.playday.org.uk

Follow #Playday2016 on Twitter

or visit the Playday Facebook page

Steering group plans take shape

The steering group for the new Playwork Foundation has met for a two-day residential workshop to develop its plans and resolve outstanding administrative issues associated with the organisation’s imminent launch.

The meeting, on 5-6 July, made substantial progress towards establishing the body as a new charitable organisation, and on its first programme of work. The steering group also reaffirmed its commitment to engage with other national play organisations to explore potential collaborations, ensure the foundation’s work is complementary to existing activity and avoid possible duplication.

More details of the Foundation’s plans will be published soon on this site.