By Paul Schober, GeSoB
For 40 children – GeSoB together with 8 pedagogues (and many parents involved) organized these workshops with the following aim:To raise awareness in society on the subject of "freely chosen game”
Places and Ways of Playing
We have further expanded our knowledge and experience of children's play in the two Erasmus projects CAPS (Children's Access to Play in Schools) and ARTPAD (Achieving Resilience Through Play And Drama). After the relaxation of the Corona regulations, it was time to offer a special workshop.
In smaller groups we invited children aged 6 - 12 years to explore, play and create new play areas together with pedagogues.
In these workshops we were able to make perfect use of the final project results of the CAPS project and supported the children - divided into smaller groups - on their journey of discovery. Numerous parents were involved in the preparations.
Aim of the workshops:
[RE]discover the existing playgrounds - find and discover NEW playgrounds in the city and then present the results in theatre, film and dance.
As tourists equipped with cameras, mobile phones and city maps, we look at the existing playgrounds and ask what, how, who, how many, where exactly, what could be played with here. We reinvent them NEW!
Disguised as "elderly people" we take "old-fashioned" notepads and search for the forgotten places of play from the stories of our seniors and check if and what we can still play there.
How do you discover again!
All the material is recorded in sound and vision with smartphones, artistically prepared and presented by the children.
Another result of the workshop was the creation of a “play city map” with all possible options (graphical and/or digital presentation).
Objective: To raise awareness in society about “freely chosen play”
Time frame: The workshops took place from July to August (divided into small groups)