School climate is crucial for understanding everyday school life. For pupils, breaktime seems to be associated with how they feel about their school climate. To better understand school climate and what social processes pupils address, this study explores pupils' perspectives on school climate with attention on how they perceive their breaktimes.…

Contrary to previous studies, the present qualitative ethnographic study focuses on free play during primary school recess with an emphasis on the significance of the interaction between play and the socio-cultural environment and the active role of the children in their play. The aim of the study was to investigate children's perspectives about…

The aim of this study was to explore how teachers and parents experience and reflect on participation and interaction with and between less active fifth-grade pupils in physically active academic lessons, in the school playground and during physical activity homework. This study formed part of the Active Smarter Kids study investigating the…

School recess as a valued component of school life is under challenge. The present study aims to investigate the pupils' perspectives about the role and the meaning of play during school recess recognising the role of the children as agents in their own development and considering play as a socio-cultural activity undertaken, developed and…

Background: School initiatives aimed at increasing physical activity (PA) may improve the health of children in low-income communities. Methods: Assessors completed 5909 observations of students' PA during leisure periods using a validated instrument in 19 schools in low-income Latino communities. We examined relationships between school…

This study aims to investigate the perception of games in students who study in the elementary school period through the pictures they draw in the context of social powers. In this study, the phenomenology design, one of the qualitative research designs, was used. The study group of the research consisted of a total of 1,818 students, who studied…

This article outlines a small-scale research project that attempted to involve primary aged pupils actively in the redesign of their school playground. The project stemmed from concerns raised by school staff regarding the frequency of problematic behaviours during unstructured times, particularly lunchtimes, and the decision to redesign the…

Background: The extant literature demonstrates that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often have difficulty interacting and socially connecting with typically developing classmates. However, some children with ASD have social outcomes that are consistent with their typically developing counterparts. Little is known about this subgroup…

Children's physical activity (PA) is increasingly restricted by the fast pace of modern life. Schools are the opportune setting in which to increase PA during daily recess. The purpose of this study was to record the degree of PA of 6th grade primary school students during recess and determine whether the playground size and available equipment…

Background: Physical activity (PA) is decreasing among children, while sedentary behavior (SB) is increasing. Schoolyards seem suitable settings to influence children's PA behavior. This study investigated the associations between schoolyard characteristics and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and SB of children aged 8-11 years at…

This paper is based on an ethnographic study conducted between 2012 and 2014 with a group of 64 boys and girls aged 6-10, all attending the same township primary school in South Africa. The paper explores how the young children construct gender "boundaries" and "police" gender "transgressions" on the school playground…

The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to determine the degree that creative and playful learning (CPL) in a technology-enriched playground influences academic achievement of students and what factors are responsible for successes. The participants were 276 students from 12 elementary classrooms in the Netherlands and Finland. The…

This study aims to enhance awareness of what young children want to do outside and their preferences regarding their outdoor environment. Views of children as active participants, the affordance of the environment and the importance of place for children's learning constitute the theoretical background of the study. The study was part of a…

Physical activity in school playgrounds has changed considerably over recent decades to reflect a climate of "surplus safety". A growing culture of surplus safety can be attributed to a desire of parents and teachers responsible for children to protect school students from danger. The aim of this research was to examine students'…

The overall aim of this study was to assess the diversity of primary school children's physical activity (PA) during outdoor recess. The study was grounded in a mixed method approach, assisting in the identification of multifaceted predictors of children's PA, including insights to social behaviours during break time. Data were obtained from…