A bioecological analysis of children draw playing
Background: Children freely expressing their views through innovative research supports the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 13. Children’s perceptions of play were captured through the Children Draw Playing project by the Children’s Voice Centre at Charles Sturt University, Australia.
Aim: Using Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Theory of Human Development and the Person–Process–Context–Time (PPCT) model, the project explored how children represent themselves engaged in play through drawings.
Method/approach: One-hundred-and-eighty-four children (3–8 yrs) from global contexts submitted a drawing in the Children Draw Playing Global Online Gallery. Content analysis revealed how children’s play experiences reflected developmental processes through personal characteristics, social interactions, environmental contexts, and cultural influences. An interdisciplinary research team coded children’s drawings across four domains of PPCT. This guided researchers to interpret the drawings as indicators of how children’s development relates to play and its surrounding social and environmental conditions. The research received ethics approval from CSU HREC (approval number H23498).
Results/findings: Children’s drawings, analysed across the four PPCT domains, revealed characteristics expressed through play, including emotions such as happiness; the people and relationships involved in play experiences; the contexts in which play occurred, such as the use of playground equipment; and time-based perspectives evident in play, including engagement in traditional games.
Conclusion: Children’s drawings highlight play as enjoyable, relational, and contextualised.
Implications for children and families: Understanding the impact and importance of play on children’s development can help you embed play as a health-promoting activity within everyday family life.
Implications for practitioners: Children’s play is contextual, relational, and personal. Developing an understanding of children’s holistic development through their play can help you more effectively nurture and support their learning and development through play-based experiences.
Funding: This research was supported by Charles Sturt University’s Children’s Voices Centre
Keywords: bioecology, children's voices, child development, play, PPCT model
This presentation relates to the following United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: