This is a blog for Ellen Beate. I am Professor at Queen Maud University College of Early Childhood Education in Trondheim, Norway. The aim of this blog is to share some of my research on children’s risky play and well-being in ECEC, and any other research project or theme that I happen to be engaged in!
I believe that children, all over the world, have the right to free play and that all childhood education should be based on play as a means for development, learning and well-being. I have a particular interest in children’s need for thrilling and risky play in a time when the western society in increasingly becoming even more safety focused, – some call it a society of surplus safety with cotton wool children and helicopter parents…
Feel free to contact me on ebs@dmmh.no
Ellen Beate Hansen Sandseter 
I teach preschool and really fight to keep things play based despite all the pressures from others about ‘kindergarten readiness ‘.I grieve the Ioss of childhood and nature play in our society.
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I teach preschool and really fight to keep things play based despite all the pressures from others about ‘kindergarten readiness ‘.I grieve the Ioss of childhood and nature play in our society.
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Thanks Susan! I am sure you are doing a great job! Keep up the good work 🙂
Ellen
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Hello Dr. Sandseter! I listened to your segment in the Early Year Summit! I am very excited about your work and am trying to read as much of it as possible! I wonder if you have any thoughts about impulse control and how it impacts the safety of risky play. I often work with children whose impulse control is a work in progress! Rough and tumble play quickly escalates to the point of injury. I’m trying to understand how to better manage the interactions so they can experience the benefits of risky play without injuring others.
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Hi Ellen, do you have a list of playground architects/designers you can recommend? I am trying to compile a list for a thoughtful playground project for an elementary school in the U.S.A. Best, Charlie
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Hi Charlie, I don’t have a list of architects/designers, but I recommend contacting or following studio ludo http://www.studioludo.org/ (https://twitter.com/_studio_ludo?s=17) and Megan Talarowski (the founder). They do great work and have a lot of very interesting projects!
Ellen
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Hej Ellen,
Jeg har læst en artikel om dit arbejde og ser til min glæde at du argumenterer for børn mulighed for at lege frit og med deres egen risikovurdering. Du er i Berlingske Tidende (DK) citeret for at legeplads standarderne gør næsten alle legepladser ens, men dette er jeg ikke enig med dig i. Man kan sagtens lave spændende legepladser inden for EN1176-rammen, og jeg mener at fejlen ligger i flere andre ting:
1) Mange producenter mangler fantasi og mod til at designe spændende legepladser. MĂĄske mangler ogsĂĄ incitamentet til at designe disse løsninger – se punkt 2,3 og 4.
2) Der er legeplads inspektører, der er ekstremt rigide i deres fortolkning af EN1176, og de kommer til at sætte standarden, fordi enhver producent frygter at de skal få deres produkter tjekket af disse.
3) Mange indkøbere af legeredskaber kigger på hvor mange faciliteter/funktioner de får for pengene og ser ikke på hvilken fantasi og opdagelsespotentiale et legeredskab tilbyder.
4) Afledt af punkt 3. Kommunerne indgĂĄr i stor stil rammeaftaler omkring indkøb af legepladser hvilket som oftest medfører at der fokuseres pĂĄ pris og antal funktioner. Legeværdi nedprioriteres i denne proces – ikke fordi man ikke arbejder med “legeværdi”, men fordi man fortolker legeværdi som antal funktioner og os der har forstand pĂĄ det ved at begrebet legeværdi rummer meget mere end hvor mange klatrevægge og balanceforløb, der er pĂĄ en legeplads.
Jeg håber at vi en gang kan have en dialog om disse ting. Mit firma deltager for tiden i et udviklingsforløb i Play User Lab (Danmark), hvor jeg har anbefalet dig som ekspert i børns (fysiske) leg. Det kan være at de kontakter dig.
De bedste hilsner, Svend Støvlbæk
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Hei Svend,
Jeg er ikke uenig i det du skriver 🙂 Det er indirekte virkningen av tolkningen av standardene som er oftest er problemet. I aviser kommer ikke alltid nyansene i det man sier frem. Jeg håper også vi får muligheten til å møtes!
Hilsen Ellen Beate
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Hej Ellen,
I´m just about finishing my masterthesis about the phenomenon of Risky Play, of course with your (and others) knowledge as my basis-literature. Too bad, I only found out about this blog just now!
In my research I was observing children´s risky play and their pedagogues reactions, as well as collecting data about their attitudes towards risky play – comparing outdoor and indoor-kindergartens in Austria.
Exciting results!
Best regards,
Karin from Salzburg
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Thanks Karin! Exciting! Please feel free to inform me about any publication you develop about your results. I would love to see them. my email address is ebs@dmmh.no
Ellen
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Hey Ellen! I´m finishing my master degree and your research about risk play was my inspiration and my basis-literature. Here in Brazil, we are starting this discussion, and research about it was not very common. My research was about risk play in preschool with kids 4 and 5 years old. Thank you soo much for your researches! I wish to meet you!!
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Thank you Emanuelle! And good luck with important work in Brazil. Let’s hope we can meet sometime in the future 🙂
Ellen
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