Concerned about children being left out of games, including soccer and basketball during lunch and recess and in afterschool care, the (some would call) drastic action has shone a light on the dilemma faced by many schools as increasing enrolments crunch already tight spaces – an issue felt by many inner-city schools in particular. 

UNSW City Futures Research Centre research fellow Dr Fatemeh Aminpour is an expert in school playgrounds and what works – and doesn’t work – for students, and says stories of schools trying to adapt to overcrowded and often poorly designed play spaces are everywhere.

“Banning activities would be unnecessary if school grounds were better designed and managed. And it’s also time to consider the strategic use of nearby public spaces,” she says. 

Aminpour’s PhD was on ‘in between spaces’ – those “not-designed spaces” that are valued by children.

“So the aim of my PhD was to understand their perspective on these spaces that they like to use, but which we don’t design, and it became a very interesting project overall in terms of how our view as adults, designers, etc is different from children.”

Aminpour says despite having abundant resources and “fantastic outdoor environments” that we can use all year round, as a nation we have very much “a cookie cutter” approach to our school playground designs.

“In the layout of schools we can accommodate very beautiful natural features, but at the moment, the layout mainly supports specific forms of games, like soccer, basketball for example.

“They’re called ‘outdoor learning areas’; they’re usually paved by asphalt and the children usually sit – but it’s not comfortable for sitting,” Aminpour says.

“Authorities are now realising that it’s not a fair design, and not everybody is interested in ballgames.”

Dr Aminpour, pictured abobve, says in many cases, instead of increasing available space, schools are making areas that are attractive to students out-of-bounds.

What cannot be argued, whether it involves balls or not, is that time and space to play at school is important.

“Self-directed play in particular is broadly valued in childhood sociology as it enhances children’s self-esteem, problem-solving skills and experiencing the joy of self-discovery without the fear of failure,” Aminpour explains. 

Physical play is particularly important in the context of school days where Australian children spend about 30 hours per week at school and 20 per cent of this time on recess (morning tea and lunch break), on average. 

“We know that our children don’t meet the recommended level of physical activity, which is one hour per day,” Arminour says.

“Only about 20 per cent of our children reach the recommended level of physical activity.”

The NSW Department of Education recommends 10 square metre per child for outdoor play, but inner-city schools and schools in newly developed parts of Sydney often have much less space per student.  

Play at school, Aminpour says, can be roughly divided into two categories: physical play (involving gross motor activities, running, ball games and similar activities) and quiet play (involving fine motor activities, chatting to friends, playing cards, reading).

Ideally, schools should offer distinct zones for different activities as active play can disrupt quiet play activities. 

The academic's research has shown that children prefer to engage in diverse types of physical activity in the playground, which means there needs to be more than one designated space to prevent conflict. 

As our cities grow denser, so do our schools, and in order for many to accommodate more students, demountable classrooms are often being constructed at the expense of playground space.

Newly built schools are smaller and as are new playgrounds, and in most schools staff shortages also mean less adults on duty, resulting in more ‘out-of-bounds’ areas cropping up.

Aminpour hopes that in future, one possible solution might be that local parks and open spaces, co-designed by schools, local councils and urban designers, will be utilised by policymakers to help ease playground overcrowding.

“But schools need to have easy access to the neighbourhood open spaces and parks,” Aminpour explains.

“Encouragingly, the education departments of New South Wales and Victoria have set some recommendations to be considered at the planning stage – to make sure that these urban corridors, and how schools are connected to open spaces, are thought about from the beginning of the planning stage.”

Solutions need to involve policymakers and urban planners working with educators to make use of all the space, both at schools and nearby in the community, to ensure that playtime remains a time for fair, inclusive, and active play for all. 

But it’s not enough. Simply providing access to parks is only part of the answer, she adds. 

“We need to design public spaces for children’s use during school recess and lunch time – and that means suitable toilet blocks, we need shade, we need litter bins, comfortable seating, and sports fields.”

Aminpour suggests the most problematic or controversial catch to this ambitious future solution is the question of maintenance.

“I’ve engaged a council, for a study on this topic of sharing open spaces with schools, and they believe that this increased demand, which is kind of imposed by schools, should shift the onus of management responsibility from the local government to state government, because they believe it’s something that the Department of Education should take care of.

“So it’s not just involving schools and students to design parks, but also at the government level, how can local government and state government come into agreement, sharing facilities?

“It’s very important that it’s something that I think councils, especially those with schools that are using their open spaces, are recognising the need to consider.”

For now, Aminpour advocates that schools need to rethink how they manage outdoor play and look to re-design the available space they currently have.

“So, for example, if you don’t have a large area or multiple zones, how can you create proper spaces where you can accommodate different types of play without them coming into conflict.

“Instead of just having one grass area open, how can you plant trees or put some furniture or barriers or raised edges to make other spaces around them, so that different types of play can happen?

“Instead of restrictive rules, we should be designing spaces that allow all children to engage in active social and inclusive experiences.”

The best thing she says we can do is to talk to children.

“Don’t make decisions without including them.”