Low Levels of after School-Hours Social Interaction and Physical Activity of 5-7 Year Olds

As part of a cluster randomized controlled trial (Bundy et al., 2017), the after school-hours activities of 5-7 year old children were recorded by parents and other adult carers on four consecutive weekdays between 3:30pm-7:00pm. Records of time use showed most time was spent indoors in activities involving low levels of physical activity. The most-frequently-recorded activity was screen time, accounting for approximately one quarter of all activities. Higher levels of physical activity were reported when children were outdoors (19.5% of time) and/or with peers (9.58%). If an adult was present, highest activity levels of children occurred when the child was with a teacher/carer (6.07%). Although concern is frequently raised about children spending too much time in organized activities, these structured forms of out-of-school choices accounted for only 8.09% of recordings. The results of the current study strengthen the evidence base, supporting the need to optimise out-ofschool times with more developmentally important social and physical contexts. We discuss ways in which context may support or inhibit opportunities physical activity in after school-hours activities

The Sydney Playground Project: popping the bubblewrap - unleashing the power of play: a cluster randomized controlled trial of a primary school playground-based intervention aiming to increase children\u27s physical activity and social skills

Background In the Westernised world, numerous children are overweight and have problems with bullying and mental health. One of the underlying causes for all three is postulated to be a decrease in outdoor free play. The aim of the Sydney Playground Project is to demonstrate the effectiveness of two simple interventions aimed to increase children\u27s physical activity and social skills. Methods/Design This study protocol describes the design of a 3-year cluster randomised controlled trial (CRCT), in which schools are the clusters. The study consists of a 13-week intervention and 1 week each of pre-and post-testing. We are recruiting 12 schools (6 control; 6 intervention), with 18 randomly chosen participants aged 5 to 7 years in each school. The two intervention strategies are: (1) Child-based intervention: Unstructured materials with no obvious play value introduced to the playground; and (2) Adult-based intervention: Risk reframing sessions held with parents and teachers with the aim of exploring the benefits of allowing children to engage in activities with uncertain outcomes. The primary outcome of the study, physical activity as measured by accelerometer counts, is assessed at baseline and post-intervention. Additional assessments include social skills and interactions, self-concept, after school time use and anthropometric data. Qualitative data (i.e., transcriptions of audio recordings from the risk reframing sessions and of interviews with selected teacher and parent volunteers) are analysed to understand their perceptions of risk in play. The control schools have recess as usual. In addition to outcome evaluation, regular process evaluation sessions are held to monitor fidelity to the treatment. Discussion These simple interventions, which could be adopted in every primary school, have the potential of initiating a self-sustaining cycle of prevention for childhood obesity, bullying and mental ill health

Impact Assessment ans Evaluation Tools

This handbook provides tools for evaluation / impact assessment of any project/initiative involving interactive innovation

The Sydney playground project- levelling the playing field: a cluster trial of a primary school-based intervention aiming to promote manageable risk-taking in children with disability

BackgroundProviding children and adults with opportunities to engage in manageable risk taking may be a stepping stone toward closing the gap in life conditions currently experienced by young people with disabilities. We aim to demonstrate the effectiveness of a simple, innovative program for 1) changing the way parents and teachers view manageable risk-taking for children with disabilities and 2) increasing the level of responsibility that children take for their own actions, as seen on the school playground.Methods/DesignWe will employ a cluster repeated measures trial with six Sydney-area primary-school-based programs for children with disabilities. The intervention comprises two arms. 1) Risk-reframing- teachers and parents will participate together in small group intervention sessions focusing on the benefits of manageable risk-taking; 2) Introduction of play materials- materials without a defined purpose and facilitative of social cooperation will be introduced to the school playground for children to use at all break times. A control period will be undertaken first for two school terms, followed by two terms of the intervention period. Outcome measures will include playground observations, The Coping Inventory, qualitative field notes, and The Tolerance of Risk in Play Scale.DiscussionNew national programs, such as Australia’s National Disability Insurance Scheme, will place increasing demands on young people with disabilities to assume responsibility for difficult decisions regarding procuring services. Innovative approaches, commencing early in life, are required to prepare young people and their carers for this level of responsibility. This research offers innovative intervention strategies for promoting autonomy in children with disabilities and their carers.Trial RegistrationAustralian and New Zealand Clinical Trials Registration Number ACTRN12614000549628 (registered 22/5/2014)

Everyday racism in the west of Ireland

Everyday life might be described as a rhythmic flow of routines and practices that frame social life’s multitudinous interactional episodes. Everyday social life is also punctuated by various types of racism that can be mapped along a continuum, from racist physical and verbal abuse to more subtle practices and discourses of racialized exclusion. Combining qualitative interviews with (auto-) ethnography, this thesis explores everyday racism in the City of Galway in the West of Ireland. The last census (2011) recorded 19.4 percent of the city’s resident population as ‘non-Irish nationals’, making it the most ‘multi-cultural’ city in the Republic of Ireland. As this thesis demonstrates, everyday racism is very much a feature of multi-cultural Ireland, evidenced for example when the rhythm of everyday praxis, such as walking a dog on a local beach is ruptured by a violent racist assault, as was the case with one of my informants. At the other end of the continuum are banal racist episodes which generally exist beneath the radar of reported (and reportable) actions and experiences. The everyday is theorized using six core concepts: the social, social space, practices, scripts, flow and temporality, drawing on the work of Bourdieu (1977, 1989 and 1990), Giddens (1984) and Pink (2012). The methodological journey describes how reflexivity was key to addressing incumbent methodological and ethical challenges facing a white female researcher interviewing and volunteering with people from various multi-ethnic backgrounds. The research findings are divided into three parts: episodes of overt racism, including physical assault and verbal abuse; everyday racism, comprising discourses and practices of exclusion which occur in fields of social life including education, work and leisure; and everyday racist discourse which occurs without the presence of the Other and yet remains an intrinsic part of the process that constitutes racialized difference. These three areas describe how overt racism disrupts yet also shapes the lives of those impacted, while more banal episodes become part of everyday life and practices, with both underpinned by racist discourses which circulate and change over time, configuring and re-constituting us/them relations in Irish society

The European Union and the Northern Ireland Peace Process in the shadow of Brexit

This report is based on a symposium at the National University of Ireland Galway in April 2018 that bought together several of the architects of the European Union peace programmes in Northern Ireland for the first time in twenty years, to reflect on the role the EU played in the peace process. They were joined by academic experts on the EU, and key figures active in cross-border cooperation to explore the significance of the EU role in the peace process and discuss the future of the Good Friday Agreement and the Irish border. The symposium discussed the challenges posed by Brexit twenty years after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, at a time when EU involvement in the peace process and cross-border relations in Ireland are at the centre of public debate. The event included an exhibition of original documentary evidence on the peace process from the private papers of Hugh Logue and the papers of intermediary Brendan Duddy held at NUI Galway (details in Appendix III)

Emerging Beef Producer Organisations (POs) in the Irish Beef Sector: An Analysis of Media Coverage in the Context of Nationwide Beef Producer Protests

International literature acknowledges benefits of the legally recognised Producer Organisations (POs). Successful leveraging of these benefits depends on two forms of cooperation: horizontal integration among the producers for more effective functioning of the POs; and vertical integration of POs with other actors in the production chain to facilitate processes of co-creation and interactive innovation. In 2016 PO legislation was first introduced in Ireland, and in 2019 Ireland’s first two beef POs emerged at a time when primary producers in the beef sector mobilised en masse, protesting against poor prices and seeking changes in supply chain relationships. Throughout this period, significant and detailed media reporting of the beef sector surrounded the protests, which takes the focus of our analysis. Building on an existing but limited literature on institutional conditions in the Irish beef industry and international accounts of factors influencing the success of POs, we analyse media coverage in order to shed light on the nature of emerging new forms of horizontal and vertical cooperation. In this regard, we focus on horizontal integration of producers into PO and associations of POs (APOs); and vertical integration of POs into Inter Branch Organisations (IBOs) and value-based supply chains (VBSCs). Our analysis shows that the media representations of the Irish beef sector evidence significant challenges to the establishment and successful operation of POs, in any form. The analysis suggests that current constellation of relations in the Irish beef sector represents an environment that is partially resistant to horizontal co-operation and significantly hostile to vertical co-operation. Interactive innovation involving different chain actors seems not to be imminent, at least in the short term, unless there are strategic public and/or private interventions introduced to support it

The Sydney Playground Project: A playful approach to promoting health and wellbeing

If you needed to change your lifestyle to increase physical and mental wellbeing, you would probably prefer that the change involved an increase in doing something you enjoy and would like to do more often. To make the lifestyle change even more appealing, wouldn\u27t it be great if all your friends and peers were involved, not just others who had been identified as at risk for problems? In this chapter, we examine the role of play in promoting children\u27s wellbeing, particularly in terms of increased physical activity