Children and Young People's Play Strategy 2007 - 2010

1. Introduction

1.1 Purpose

This document sets out the Draft Children and Young People’s Play Strategy for Thanet. Its purpose is to establish a strategic framework and direction for the next three years for all matters relating to play for children and young people. It sits within the wider context of matters relating to children and young nationally and regionally. It is intended to be responsive at a local level to the key policies at a county level.

This document is intended to achieve the following:

• To acknowledge the importance of play for children and young people both for themselves and for communities in general;
• To ensure that children play is recognised and embedded in the work of all agencies and is embedded within key strategic plans and initiatives of all relevant agencies;
• To identify the work of all agencies involved in providing play opportunities for children and young people to assist in developing a co-ordinated approach, identifying gaps in provision and reducing duplication;
• To make effective use of funding, including but not limited to that available through the Children’s Play initiative;
• To ensure that sustainability is built into children’s play provision in the longer term;
• To improve children’s access to safe places to play and socialise;
• To provide more and better local and inclusive play opportunities where they are most needed, evidence by the results of audits and community engagement;
• To improve public open spaces as an environment for play;
• To use the strategy to develop a portfolio of children’s play projects to support a funding application to the Big Lottery Fund under the Children’s Play Initiative;

The strategy has been developed and agreed by the Thanet Children’s Play Partnership and has been informed by discussion with a range of key partners and a range of consultation involving the general community, children and young people. The organisations invited to the Thanet Play Partnership are detailed in Appendix A.

Consultation approaches, findings and outcomes can be found in section 5 (Review of Community Engagement and consultation).

1.2 The Approach

In order to develop this Children and Young People’s Play Strategy a range of organisations and agencies involved in providing for children and young people were invited to join the Thanet Play Partnership. The Partnership comprised representatives from the public, voluntary and community sectors and a not-for-profit organisation. Members were invited to represent their organisation, share and contribute their expertise and agree the scope, vision and priorities for action. Terms of reference for the Partnership were agreed.

Thanet District Council through the Portfolio Holders facilitated the Play Partnership for Housing and Community and Commercial Services and the Senior Leisure Officer.

1.3 Scope

The Strategy has encompassed four stages of development:

1. An audit of the opportunities for Children and Young People’s play that are provided within the Thanet District Council area providing a benchmark standard of provision in terms of quality, quantity and accessibility, and the identification of gaps thereby ensuring that new initiatives and projects delivered as a result of this strategy fill a strategic need.
2. A review of consultation involving key partners, the wider community and children and young people to ensure that the views are reflected in this strategy and in subsequent action plans;
3. The production of Key Policy Statement, with a supporting Action Plan, including a set out outcomes and outputs with defined timescales for delivery, against which the delivery of the Play Strategy can be reviewed, monitored and evaluated.
4. The establishment of the Thanet Play Partnership with representatives from the public, private and community / voluntary sectors who will direct and steer the development and delivery of the Play Strategy over its lifetime.

The Strategy recognises the role of the public, private and voluntary / community sectors in providing play opportunities for children and young people. However its focus is in ensuring a cohesive approach to free, accessible opportunities for children and young people to engage in play.

It is recognised that play can take place almost anywhere. This strategy focuses on the provision of designated play areas, play provision and open spaces for use by children and young people within the 0 – 18 age group. This Children and Young People’s Play Strategy applies to all children and young people under the age of 18. References made to either ‘children’, ‘young people’ or to ‘children and young people’ should be taken to include this full age range.

Children and young people’s play opportunities within this scope must conform to the ‘ 3 frees’, namely they must be free of charge, children and young people must be free to come and go and the activities must be freely chosen by the children and young people.

Formal sports provision, whether targeted towards children and young people or not, is considered to be outside the scope of this strategy; it is dealt with in the developing Thanet Sport and Active Recreation Strategy.

In developing the Children and Young People’s Play Strategy the Partnership is mindful of the limited resources (people and revenue and capital funding) that are currently available to Thanet District Council and its partners, a situation that is unlikely to improve in the near future.

1.4 What is Play?

Different people have different definitions of play. For young children play can involve cognitive, imaginative, creative, emotional and social aspects which all contribute to a child’s learning and development. Play is the means by which children express their impulse to explore, experiment and understand. Children of all ages play. Some children however may need support to play and their needs must be taken into account. Part of the Action Plan specifically addresses this key issue. Older children and young people are not likely to describe what they do as play. For them they need space, time and freedom to do what they want. This may involve positive activities, challenge and / or the enjoyment of reaction provision where this is appropriate. For all age’s groups however play is what children and young people do when they follow their own ideas, in their own way and for their own reasons.

The Children’s Play Council states that the following definition of play is widely accepted within the playwork sector: “Play is freely chosen, personally directed, intrinsically motivated behaviour that actively engages the child… Play can be fun or serious. Through play children explore social, material and imaginary worlds and their relationship with them, elaborating all the while a flexible range of responses to the challenges they encounter. By playing, children learn and develop as individuals and as members of the community” (From Best Play – what play provision should do for children NPFA / PLAYLINK / Children’s Play Council (2001).

The Thanet Play Partnership therefore supports this definition. The Partnership also concluded that its understanding of Children’s Play was of activity that was freely chosen, freely directed, free to access

and most of all fun.

Play provision can also mean different things to different people. For the purpose of the Children and Young People’s Play strategy play provision is considered to be a space, facilities or equipment or a set of activities intended to give children and young people the opportunity to engage in play, as defined above.

Play provision may include play areas or playgrounds, usually unstaffed. Other provision may be staffed by adults offering guidance and supervision including adventure playgrounds, holiday play schemes, parent and toddler groups and mobile play projects or play buses, some of which may be open access. Other provision includes stake parks, BMX tracks, basketball courts, multi-use games areas (MUGAS) and teen or youth shelters. Formal childcare may offer opportunities for play, however this is considered to be beyond the scope of this strategy. School facilities also include space for play, although not all are freely accessible to children and young people outside of school hours.

Play is different from organised sports, groups, clubs and classes, which are clearly defined by external rules and definitions, and usually controlled by adults.

1.5 Types of Play

There are many types of play and these may include the following:

• Exploratory Play which can be handling, throwing, banging or mouthing objectives eg stacking bricks;
• Fantasy Play is play that rearranges the world from the child’s perspective in a way that is unlikely to occur eg to pretend at being a racing driver or a pop star;
• Imaginative Play where conventional rules do not apply eg imagining you are an object, eg a tree or a ship
• Locomotor Play where movement is applied eg chase, tag, hide and seek etc
• Mastery Play which uses the physical ingredients of our natural environment eg digging holes, altering the course of streams, building dams, constructing shelters, building fires etc
• Object Play uses an infinite and interesting sequence of hand eye manipulations and movements which could be examining and use of any object eg cup, cloth, paintbrush etc
• Role Play explores ways of being for example brushing with a broom, using a telephone or driving a car.

Play is therefore not simply about playgrounds at the local park or open space. It can and does take place anywhere.

1.6 Our Vision for Play in Thanet

To provide a range of quality, inclusive and accessible play opportunities for every child and young person in Thanet which are available throughout the year and which are informed by the views of children and young people.

To deliver our vision the Thanet Play Partnership will work in partnership with all relevant agencies and communities to ensure play opportunities provided are realistic, deliverable and sustainable.

1.7 Mission Statement

Every child and young person has a right to engage in play and to have access to appropriate play provision. The play needs of children and young people will be identified through consultation with children, young people and their communities and agencies, met by working in partnership with public agencies, voluntary and private organisations and local communities and at all times directly contributing to the 5 outcomes of the Children Act (2004).

Next: Making a Case for Play

• Introduction
• Making a Case for Play
• Context - Setting the Scene
• Current Provision for Play
• Review of Community Engagement and Consultation
• Play Policy Statements
• Local Standards
• Action Plan
• Evaluation Plan
• Appendix A - Membership of the Thanet Play Partnership
• Appendix B – PPG17 Maps
• Appendix C – Audit of facilities and opportunities for children and young people on ward basis

Chris Tull

E-mail:

chris.tull@thanet.gov.uk

Tel: 01843 577528