This passage is excerpted from Carly Wood, Valier Gladwell and Jo Barton, “A Repeated Measures Experiment of School Playing Environment to Increase Physical Activity and Enhance Self-Esteem in UK School Children.” © 2014 by Wood et al.
The health benefits of engaging in physical activity (PA)
during childhood include enhanced fitness, cognitive function
and bone health; reduced body fatness, motor skill
development, and favourable cardiovascular and metabolic
disease risk profiles. Being active during childhood can also
improve self-esteem and reduce symptoms of anxiety and
depression. Participation in PA in youth is of great importance
as PA may track into adulthood where adequate levels of PA
are protective against many chronic diseases. However, in the
UK approximately 75% of boys and 80% of girls aged 5–10
years are not meeting the daily recommendation of 60 minutes
of moderate to vigorous physical activity . . .
Unstructured play is also an essential part of childhood
which enables children to develop a relationship with their
surrounding environment and enhances social skills,
coordination and strength. Outdoor environments facilitate play
and are associated with increased levels of PA. Thus, children
should be provided with daily opportunities to play outdoors.
The school environment provides such an opportunity through
the provision of playtime. Playtime normally takes place on the
concrete school playground and lasts for at least one hour per
day. However, universally playtime is reported to make
relatively small contributions to children’s overall daily activity
requirements. In the UK, only one known study has reported
the contribution of playtime to overall activity requirements,
with contributions being as low as 4.5%.
A number of studies have successfully increased playtime
PA through the introduction of interventions such as sports or
games equipment, playground markings, fitness breaks and
playground structures. However, these types of interventions
tend to facilitate structured rather than unstructured PA.
Unstructured PA is essential to childhood development and
therefore needs to be encouraged during playtime.
Natural environments can encourage unstructured play and
may therefore play a role in facilitating unstructured PA during
playtime. Natural environments provide large open spaces
which encourage individuals to be active, whilst areas lacking
nature may restrict PA due to limited space and parental fears
over crime and road traffic. Children report a preference for
play in natural environments, with nature facilitating more
imaginative and inventive play. Furthermore, adolescents
living in urban settings with access to green spaces such as
parks are more likely to be physically active than their peers
without park access, indicating that all forms of nature can be
used as a tool for engaging youth in PA. Thus, if school
playtime were performed on the school field it is possible that
children’s PA levels would be increased. To date, there is a lack
of data quantifying the impact of natural environments on
levels of PA in children, particularly within the school setting.
Performing PA in a natural environment (“Green Exercise”)
has also been demonstrated to provide improvements in self-
esteem in adults, whether participants are simply viewing
scenes of nature or directly interacting with natural
environments. Studies in adolescents and children suggest that
Green Exercise has no such additive effect on self-esteem
compared to exercise in other environments. However, the only
known study in children examined the impact of a green
playtime intervention consisting of orienteering.* The task-
oriented, structured nature of orienteering may not facilitate the
green exercise effect. Unstructured free play in a natural
environment may allow greater interaction with the
environment, thus benefiting self-esteem.
*A competitive sport in which runners have to find their way across rough country with the aid of a map and compass.
The health benefits of engaging in physical activity (PA)
during childhood include enhanced fitness, cognitive function
and bone health; reduced body fatness, motor skill
development, and favourable cardiovascular and metabolic
disease risk profiles. Being active during childhood can also
improve self-esteem and reduce symptoms of anxiety and
depression. Participation in PA in youth is of great importance
as PA may track into adulthood where adequate levels of PA
are protective against many chronic diseases. However, in the
UK approximately 75% of boys and 80% of girls aged 5–10
years are not meeting the daily recommendation of 60 minutes
of moderate to vigorous physical activity . . .
Unstructured play is also an essential part of childhood
which enables children to develop a relationship with their
surrounding environment and enhances social skills,
coordination and strength. Outdoor environments facilitate play
and are associated with increased levels of PA. Thus, children
should be provided with daily opportunities to play outdoors.
The school environment provides such an opportunity through
the provision of playtime. Playtime normally takes place on the
concrete school playground and lasts for at least one hour per
day. However, universally playtime is reported to make
relatively small contributions to children’s overall daily activity
requirements. In the UK, only one known study has reported
the contribution of playtime to overall activity requirements,
with contributions being as low as 4.5%.
A number of studies have successfully increased playtime
PA through the introduction of interventions such as sports or
games equipment, playground markings, fitness breaks and
playground structures. However, these types of interventions
tend to facilitate structured rather than unstructured PA.
Unstructured PA is essential to childhood development and
therefore needs to be encouraged during playtime.
Natural environments can encourage unstructured play and
may therefore play a role in facilitating unstructured PA during
playtime. Natural environments provide large open spaces
which encourage individuals to be active, whilst areas lacking
nature may restrict PA due to limited space and parental fears
over crime and road traffic. Children report a preference for
play in natural environments, with nature facilitating more
imaginative and inventive play. Furthermore, adolescents
living in urban settings with access to green spaces such as
parks are more likely to be physically active than their peers
without park access, indicating that all forms of nature can be
used as a tool for engaging youth in PA. Thus, if school
playtime were performed on the school field it is possible that
children’s PA levels would be increased. To date, there is a lack
of data quantifying the impact of natural environments on
levels of PA in children, particularly within the school setting.
Performing PA in a natural environment (“Green Exercise”)
has also been demonstrated to provide improvements in self-
esteem in adults, whether participants are simply viewing
scenes of nature or directly interacting with natural
environments. Studies in adolescents and children suggest that
Green Exercise has no such additive effect on self-esteem
compared to exercise in other environments. However, the only
known study in children examined the impact of a green
playtime intervention consisting of orienteering.* The task-
oriented, structured nature of orienteering may not facilitate the
green exercise effect. Unstructured free play in a natural
environment may allow greater interaction with the
environment, thus benefiting self-esteem.
*A competitive sport in which runners have to find their way across rough country with the aid of a map and compass.