Obstacles

Here's a game that took place just before the summer holidays at one of the after school sessions. The children just seemed to flow into a game, then within a short space of time more children joined in seamlessly. Not interrupting the dynamic that the children already created, but by simply joining in, things shifted ever so slightly as they fit in amongst the others and the game that had been initiated. Have a look at the images that follow to get a sense of what the children were doing, it was an obstacle course/balancing game made up of bits of wood and old tyres.

We start playing with some scraps of wood. Giant jenga style.

Then arrange them on the floor to create a balancing game.

We run...

...we balance...

...others slowly begin to join in.

The idea is really simple and needs no verbal introduction.

So children and grown ups alike feel they can join in.

Someone decides that something needs to change...

With a few adjustments, it then turns into a team game.

Where the group split in half and race through the course against the other team.

It then ended on a full on race!

It was nice to observe a game where no permissions to join in were sought from children looking to play, and no one was told they couldn't join in. It's important to observe these moments because play isn't always that fair! (Not to say they didn't wind each other up while they were playing as you can see and hear in the video!)

A Bit of Danger

It's good to make things a bit scary sometimes. The children were playing around making ramps out of some odd tyres and bits of wood that they could ride over with their bikes. I played up the 'scared grown up' act for this one too as I could tell the children were excited about doing things that an adult thought was scary.

Gladiators

Today we're sharing some play which involved a lot of skill - balancing, strength and craftiness amongst over things. Some simple rope which started off as a catapult, then went on to be a seat, eventually became a gladiator challenge. Here's what happened in pictures:

Testing out a human catapult

We realised it made a pretty good seat

Then thought it'd be much better to try and balance on

But the rope needed to be tied much tighter

Then with the introduction of some pieces of foam...

...and a willing opponent...

...the gladiator challenge began!

As you can see from all the photos of super smiley/concentrating very hard faces, we had a blast testing our balancing skills whilst hitting our opponent with foam sticks!

Shepherd Manyika: How They Choose to Play with the Pieces

The images in today's post are from an artist project by Shepherd Manyika. A seemingly simple intervention at a summer fun day on Pelican estate in Peckham that was full of interesting moments that highlight some of the complicated elements of being an adult in the world of supporting children's play.

Leading up to the event, Shepherd made forty cardboard sculptural objects. Each was different from the next and had it's own unique qualities. One might have had a cut out, one might be pointed, one you might be able to climb in, one might have balloons sticking out of it... All of this was done in the Shop of Possibilities, but none of this was done with children. This in itself was an interesting way of working for us, as more often than not, artist projects involve some sort of co-creation with the children. We may arrive with a trolley full of loose parts and see how the children and artists might put them together. This time the approach was different, and as reflected in the title 'How they Choose to Play with the Pieces' was all about what children might do with the artists work once it is made.

So we arrived on the estate at noon on a very sunny Saturday, looking quite ridiculous with trolleys and arms full of these colourful cardboard objects, and straight away drew a crowd.

The children were quite frantic in their initial explorations of the objects, moving from one to the other figuring out all the different pieces. There was a quick realisation that the pieces were more delicate than they looked, and whilst not exactly fragile, the children knew that these objects wouldn't last long if they jumped on them, and so they didn't. (Although popping the balloons happened straight away!) The the thing that set the tone straight away was how the artist and the team responded to this. And when asked excitedly by the children 'What are these for? What do we do with them?!' the answers they got were along the lines of 'We don't know yet, you can help us figure it out though!'

These unfamiliar objects became loose parts, the fascination moved away from what they were, to what they could be.

Loose parts naturally occur in playing and not only develop in the individual the capacity to symbolize but, when shared and involving others, create the transitional space, the to-ing and fro-ing of imaginations, through which meanings and relationships are formed.

 - Chris Taylor: Playwork and the Theory of Loose Parts, from Foundations of Playwork, 2008

Using the pieces as building blocks

Realising you can fit inside them

Organising them

Wearing them

Re-organising them