It aims to explore:

  • why play is important for children, families and cultural organisations
  • practical ways to plan for play
  • ways to accommodate playful behaviour in cultural settings, using examples and ideas from museums that have improved their provision for play.

For full references and a bibliography, please refer to the Play Wales information sheet.

Why do we need to consider play?

Children play instinctively whenever they are given the chance. But, in museums, families and children may sometimes feel uncomfortable or feel that they don’t always have permission to be playful. According to a DCMS survey, children and teenagers consistently say they want to have more free time to play and to be with their friends, and places to be together and to play. In a Welsh Government Survey, 30 percent of Welsh non-museum visitors say they don’t visit because there is ‘nothing of interest’. Coupled with the DCMS data that the proportion of 5 to 15 year olds visiting museums has been static for nearly a decade, this suggests there is a need to explore new approaches to engagement. Play may be one approach to involve more children, teenagers and families in museums.

There are some key benefits of play which relate to the unique context of the cultural sector:

  • wellbeing
  • visitor engagement
  • doing good business
  • the creation of lively, social spaces that can cultivate the conditions for attracting increased visits, and for play and engagement to emerge.

Play and wellbeing

Enhancing the wellbeing of visitors is a priority for most cultural settings, and so understanding the value of play to the wellbeing of children and to adults alike is imperative. Play is fun, and in play, ‘the production of joyful states creates a sense of optimism in the present and near future, where life is worth living’. According to a Bernard van Leer Foundation working paper, playing and its associated negotiations, rule-making, choices, failures and fallings-out enable children to learn to work things out and to cope with the demands of an uncertain world.

“Families want to be going out and making memories together and sharing experiences and sharing things to add to their own mental family scrapbook. Visitor attractions, museums and galleries provide the backdrop for people’s happiest memories. I think that we almost provide a sort of parallel NHS for the mental health … for the public to come to these really important places, emotionally resonant places … to recover and heal and repair and breathe.”

Bernard Donoghue, Association of Leading Visitor Attractions

Children experience much of the world through play, and as a species, humans are born with an innate playful disposition which drives them to seek out playful opportunities in daily life. ‘Play does not wait to be expressed at the end of the journey in a pre-designated area; it is how children experience their lives and how they express themselves and their agency in the public realm.’

In play, children learn about the world and themselves – imagining, creating and learning whilst playing. Children respond to the people and places around them in play, trying new things, testing social and physical limits, experimenting and finding things out, sometimes alone, and sometimes alongside others. ‘All cultural processes within a civilisation are likewise born in play and nourished on play. From poetry to music, from ritual to philosophy, and everything else besides, all owe key aspects of their original existence and form to certain patterns of play.’

If play can be seen as our in-built mechanism for learning and for being and staying well, providing for play should be central to how museums support children’s wellbeing in the here and now.

Enhancing the staff and visitor experience

Museums, heritage sites and visitor attractions may be significant sites for heritage and art, but they are also social spaces that generate engagement with their collections in the broadest sense. If we take time to observe incidental behaviour, we will observe playful movements and expressions through and within sites and galleries, potentially generated in part by the stories told throughout the spaces, unique objects or architecture.

“It’s more relaxing. If they are happy, we are. [Play] improves the experience of the visit for us.”

Parent at Chester Zoo

Places that support and accommodate play have the potential to help visitors feel welcomed, overcome barriers to visiting and to change how families feel in museum spaces. This enables visitors – children and families in particular – to be more relaxed and to worry less about doing something wrong.

“Inviting play and playfulness into our building has changed our museum for the better! When my post started we made some changes to the Museum to encourage more family interaction with the museum. The Front of House team has been amazing in getting on board. I think there was some hesitancy to start off with as they had been told certain rules in the past about things, but all can see the impact on the museum it has made and taken new ideas on board.”

Participation Curator, Parc Howard Museum

Play is also good for staff wellbeing and job satisfaction. Being able to be more relaxed and playful in their jobs helps staff feel more at ease, and happier in their interactions with visitors. Play can help staff tackle what might otherwise be serious or difficult subject matter and can help generate creative or critical thinking. ‘Play is disruptive. “What if’s” can help people experience ideas for the future. Only play can take us out of business as usual.’ Play creates a safe frame for making connections, building relationships, and can also enliven our imaginations, helping us to develop our ability for empathy and understanding.

Museums can support children’s right to play

In the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child (UNCRC), play is identified as a basic human right. Cultural organisations which provide space, time and opportunity for creativity, exploration and play are helping to support Article 31: ‘The right to relax, play and take part in a wide range of cultural and artistic activities’.

Settings which consider play also help to support the legal requirements of local authorities to deliver the Play Sufficiency Duty included in the Children and Families (Wales) Measure 2010. Staff working in cultural settings with and for children can consider themselves part of the play workforce. There is a role to support the local authority to account for and plan for children’s play similar to those in roles such as town planners, teachers, architects, youth workers and childminders.

Play is good for business

Museum managers and cultural leaders consistently pinpoint play as the reason for increased footfall and repeat family visits. In a recent post-COVID-19 play project with UK museums, 60 percent said that their new play activities helped them to attract new audiences, and that their audiences reported having a better experience as a result of the playful activities. The ‘Play-Work, Exploring the art of working with playing children’ exhibition which re-created an adventure playground staffed by local playworkers in Wrexham, recorded almost 40,000 visits over three months – a significant increase on usual visitor figures for the same period.

Audience segmentation terms – such as ‘funseekers’ and ‘knowledge-seekers’ – used by visitor researchers indicate that fun and exploration is high on the list of needs for a family visit. Through pleasure and enjoyment also comes attachment to place, and attachment to the people that are part of the visit. Good relationships with staff and settings not only builds customer loyalty, but generates recommendations, as well as attachment to the aims or mission of an organisation.

 

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