ArticleFrontiers in public health2019
Comparing Free Play and Partly Structured Play in 4-5-Years-Old Children in an Outdoor Playground.
Article in Frontiers in public health, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed.
- Results from the PROmoting Early Childhood Outside cluster randomized trial evaluating an outdoor play intervention in early childhood education centres.Scientific reports · 2025Trial
- Effects of Free Play and Partly Structured Playground Activity on Motor Competence in Preschool Children: A Pragmatic Comparison Trial.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Trial
- Are Gross Motor Skill Interventions an Equitable Replacement for Outdoor Free Play Regarding Children's Physical Activity?American journal of health promotion : AJHP · 2022Trial
- Structured Activity and Free Outdoor Play in Early Childhood Education and Care: An OSRAC-P Observational Study of Physical Activity Intensity and Context.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- The impact of learn, exercise, and game structured curriculum model on physical activity in children aged 3-6 years.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Importance, unique aspects and guidelines, and building blocks of early childhood physical activity from a socioecological perspective.Sports medicine and health science · 2025Review
- Motor Skill Development at Preschool Age in Girls and Boys: The Role of Outdoor Free Play.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Structured training on gross motor skills and physical fitness in 4-5-year-old children.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2024Article
- Physical activity and social interaction assessments in schoolyard settings using the System for Observing Outdoor Play Environments in Neighborhood Schools (SOOPEN).The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity · 2023Article
- Effects of Different Teaching Approaches on Proxy Measures of Physical Fitness of Italian Kindergarten Children.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Evaluation of a Proposal for Movement Integration in the Teaching-Learning Process in Early Childhood Education.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Teaching Methodologies and School Organization in Early Childhood Education and Its Association with Physical Activity.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The aim of this study was to compare how the organization of a movement session as partly structured play or free play influenced the physical activity engagement in 4-5 years old pre-schoolers. The partly structured playgroup consisted of 46 children and the free playgroup consisted of 33 children. The playground activities consisted of 10 sessions each lasting 1 h, executed once per week in the period Mars to May 2017 at a specific playground setting. The partly structured playgroup conducted a movement activity session that included a combination of both structured- and free play activities. The free playgroup engaged in unstructured play, only. To detect the intensity of the physical activity each child carried an accelerometer 1 h the first week and last week of the intervention. Results indicate a significant difference in physical activity level between the two groups for the 5-year-old in the favor of the partly structured playgroup. There was a significant difference between the four-and 5-year-old in relation to physical activity level. No significant difference between the activity in March and May for the whole group was found.
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Registered trials
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