affordances of plants and animals in gardens for children’s performances ismail bin said...
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AFFORDANCES OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS IN GARDENS FOR CHILDREN’S
PERFORMANCES
Ismail Bin SaidUniversiti Teknologi Malaysia
2007
INTRODUCTION
• Children perceived outdoor spaces as a playscape affording a variety of functional properties.
• Play in outdoor environment enables children to roam far distant places.
• Playing is motion. Motion permits a child to locate himself freely in space, create his own boundaries, have access to diverse territories, manifest power, and explore his abilities.
What elements a child play in the outdoor?
• Plants and animals are the most recognizable natural elements when children play in the outdoors.
• Plants and animals also afford multi-functional affordances in constructive, functional, and symbolic play (Fjortoft, 2004).
• Play is a child’s natural medium for self-expression, experimentation and learning.
• A home garden of rural house is composed of front yard, side yard, back yard, and orchard. A home garden of urban house is a fenced or walled space in front of building and its typical spaces are car porch area, side yard and back yard. Like the rural outdoor spaces, they provide space for children to play.
Home Gardens
Neighborhood Gardens• A neighborhood garden of urban setting is a
composite of playgrounds, parks, paved open spaces, and abandoned open spaces affording more and larger spaces for children to discover, to explore and to socialize with peers in their play.
Purpose and Method of Study• It investigates children sensorial and motoric actions
with plants and animals in home and neighborhood gardens in two settings: an urban terraced house community and a village.
• Perceptual responses of 120 children were elicited using survey questionnaire and open-ended interview. The children were interviewed in the gardens or at their schools.
Measurements and Data Analysis• The survey elicited children range, properties
categorization and affordances of the gardens for cognitive, physical and social functioning.
• The interview elicited children ‘s definitions of home and neighbourhood gardens, their interactions with plant and animals in their play, and the places that they regularly visited.
Results
• The results are divided into three categories: 1. actual places in the home and neighborhood gardens,
2. categorization on plant and animals, and 3. categories of affordances including levels
of affordances, taxonomy of affordances and types of affordances.
Results: Places of Experience
2312
1523
25
2612
826
302
1222
0 10 20 30 40
terrace home gardenplayground-green spaces
road cornerstreet reserve
open draintrees
vacant lotnearby forest
streetsstream and river
orchardbushes area
farmbarn areas
nearby forestP
lace s
ettin
g in r
esid
ential
response percentage
1. The result suggests that rural children were exposed to more variety of spaces than urban ones.
2. Home and neighborhood gardens in both settings afforded an array of functional properties for the children to play and enjoy.
3. The rural children seem satisfied experiencing in the bushes and orchard areas whereas their urban counterparts preferred to play in nearby forest and home garden.
Results: Places of Experience
23
36
26
15
2
26
8
42
22
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
terrace home garden
green and abandoned spaces
nearby forest
paved spaces
farm
orchard
river and stream
home garden
nearby forest
Pla
ce s
ettin
g in
resid
entia
l
response percentage
It suggests that the rural children felt safe and comfortable playing within accompanied by parents or adults and felt familiar spaces. Inasmuch, they felt the orchard setting offered more familiar attention because the vegetation are seem familiar for them as home garden such as trees of rambutan, durian, and guava.
Results: Categorization of Plants and Animals as Play Tools
37
28
19
11
5
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
branches,sticksand twigs
fruits and seeds trees leaves flowers andbuds
Categories of plant part
Ch
ild
ren
re
sp
on
se
s (
%)
The children played with plants as play tools in the gardens and the analysis categorized the tools into five categories: (1) branches, sticks and twigs, (2) fruits and seeds, (3) trees, (4) leaves, and (4) flowers and buds.
Stick is symbolically represented a sword in
pretend play Betel nuts are play tools for village children that turned to topBetel nuts are play tools for village children that turned to top
Results: Categorization of Plants as Play Tools
The process of the top making involves at least six affordances: search-nut-able-to, collect-nut-able-to, cut-husk-able-to, cut-bamboo-into-stick-able-to, punch-stick-into-nut-able-to, and spin-top-able-to.
The children perceived trees and shelter as properties affording them with physical competency to play with peers.
Results: Categorization of Plants as Play Tools
Results: Categorization of Animals as Play Tools
35
42
8
15
0
10
20
30
40
50
birds insects spiders smallanimals
Domain categories of animals
Affo
rdan
ces
Children preferred to play with insects (42%), followed by birds (35%), small animals (15%) and spider (8%) suggesting that insects such as ants and birds were plentiful in the garden and attracted their attention.
Results: Taxonomy of Affordances
34
53
1
6
2
45
13
1213
98
9
6
9
15
109
18
31 1 1
0 0 02
10 0
20 0 0
10
21
21
002
468
10
121416
1820
Flat relativelysmooth
Non-rigidattachedobjects
Graspableobjects
Attachedobjects
Climbablefeatures
shelter Vegetation Animals Microclimate Affordancesfor sociality
Affordancesfor nature-link
or cross-modal matchand children
cross-speciesinteraction.
categories of affordances
quan
tity o
f affo
rdan
ces
Positive affordances urban
Positive affordances rural
Negative affordances urban
Negative affordances rural
Affordances of the urban and rural home gardens
Results: Levels of Affordances
1322
2
39
58
22
0
1020
30
40
5060
70
perceived utilized shaped
level of affordances
quan
tity
of a
fford
ance
s
urban rural
The result suggests that the properties of the rural home gardens offered the children more functions than the urban home gardens.
The utilized affordances were performatory and exploratory activities involving play performances. Thus, it means that children were actively performed motoric actions through sensorial actions.
ConclusionMiddle childhood children in urban and rural settings preferred to play with plants and animals as their play tools.
The home and neighborhood gardens afforded different plants and animals for symbolic and constructive plays.
In summary, home garden and neighborhood gardens in urban and rural communities were places for children to perform their physical and social activities. These activities were triggered by cognitive (sensorial) performances, and in turn, generated more motoric and social actions.