• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.203-214
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• 2010

This study will examine the current condition of outdoor play in child care centers and the overall perception of teachers on outdoor play in regards to its related programs and children's reaction to them. Through examining such issues, this study will provide the basic data that can be applied in planning appropriate outdoor play activities, programs and environments. For the study, we surveyed teachers and directors of child care centers using a structured questionnaire. The objects of the survey were 22 child care centers in Daejeon and Seoul, who agreed to conduct the survey. The survey was conducted from August 1 to September 30 2006; 220 copies were distributed, and 188 copies were collected. The results of the study can be summarized as follows: 1) The number of outdoor plays per week were on average 1~2 in most cases, although teachers believed the play should be done everyday. Outdoor play time was mostly 21~30 minutes, while teachers thought 31~40 minutes as appropriate. Children's reaction scored the highest when they played outdoors for 30 minutes every day with their teachers involved in the play. As a result, we have concluded that the appropriate outdoor play should be conducted everyday for 30~40 minutes. 2) Outdoor play was mostly conducted as part of the overall educational plan rather than a separate plan. Since outdoor play affects children's development as much as indoor play, there is a need for development of a specific and separate plan for various outdoor play programs. 3) The outdoor play program that was most often conducted was equipment play and sand play. This indicated the monolithic nature of the outdoor program. Given the fact that children enjoy outdoor plays a lot (M=4.71), various programs including adventure play, sensitive play, and carpenter play should be developed. 4) In outdoor play, the teacher's role included supervising and interacting with children. According to the survey, teachers had a good understanding of the importance on safety and supervising issues in outdoor plays. However they seemed to overlook the importance of having better programs and improving teacher's participation to the play. Despite the importance of outdoor play to children's development, the result shows that teachers have tendencies to limit and obstruct outdoor plays by emphasizing supervising and safety issues instead. 5) Children's safety should not be the only consideration for outdoor plays; teachers ought to better understand that children's development can be maximized by the play. Furthermore, there should be emphasis placed on the program development and teacher's participation; teacher's participation should actively encourage the interactions between a child and a teacher, as well as among children.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.209-225
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to research the actual condition of environment and management of outdoor play at child care centers in Seoul, and to present a planning guideline for outdoor play environment. For this purpose, data were collected by a structured questionnaire and subjects were 164 directors of child care centers located in Seoul. The contents of the questionnaire were composed of general facts about the respondent and facility, environmental condition, managerial condition, and director's understanding about outdoor play. The data were then analyzed using the frequency, percentage, mean and crosstab. The major results have shown the following: 1) Most child care centers in Seoul had some space for outdoor play. 62% of them used front yard and 11 % a rooftop. 2) The space usually included fixed play instruments such as slide and complex unit structures, sand play area, and open area. It also had many natural elements as shrubs and earth. 3) 78% of the centers had a schedule for outdoor play. The schedule operates flexibly according to each center's own day schedule. Generally, a time for outdoor play was 21 to 30 minutes. 4) The directors of child care centers thought highly of outdoor play for it contributes to the balanced development of children. They answered that equipments and spaces, program devices, and teacher's understanding are some of the important factors for active outdoor play. 5) Most of them wanted wood-working area (construction activity area), water play area, and cages.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.855-875
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• 2007

The purpose of this study is to suggest a guideline for outdoor play settings in child care centers. From March to July, 2005, data were collected from 223 directors at child care centers through a structured questionnaire, field measurement survey and non-participatory observation in seventeen child care centers in Seoul and Daejeon. The statistical methods for analysing data were frequency, percentage, mean, $X^2$ and F-test. The results showed as follows: 1)the existing outdoor playground area in child care centers should be expanded more than $4\;m^2$ per child. 2) Outdoor play facilities should be equipped with two structured play sets, a play facility for unstructured play and an adventure facility to make child's various activities possible and to promote child development. 3)flooring materials for outdoor playground should be required to use more than three kinds such as solid coverings (cf. asphalt, standard concrete), wood, lawn, soil or sands. 4)to let children enjoy various activities, outdoor playground area should be composed of various play facilities like indoor play gyms and should be independent but have good connections between play facilities depending on characteristics of play activities. 5)Play spaces of outdoor playground should be composed of physical play space, unstructured and dramatized play space, rest space, space for nature and adventure space. In addition, appropriate play equipments should be provided in respective play space.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.919-935
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• 2006

The purpose of this study was to analyze the relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors. The data were collected by field measurement survey, and non-participatory observation from 9 child care centers in Daejeon. The field measurement survey were conducted from June 20 to July 20, 2004, whereas non-participatory behavior observation were conducted from September 2 to October 10, 2004. The major results showed the following. 1) The characteristics of outdoor play environment in child care centers showed that most of them were too small and did not use the adequate surfacing to play various activities. In many cases, outdoor play settings was made of play equipment setting, play props and manipulative settings, and tree/vegetation. 2) Child's play behavior has been focused on functional play activity and construction play activity. 3) The relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors showed that small outside play environment with monotonous construction and multi-complex play equipments produced functional play behaviors on children. On the other hand, where various play areas were put together, we could observe relatively diverse play behaviors. However, in some cases, despite the small and monotonous play area, diverse play behaviors were observed. These playgrounds at least differed from others in that they provided the place where multi purpose play was possible. This finding shows that multi purpose play areas can be an alternative in small playground environment.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.775-794
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• 2010

This study is to provided a basic model to encourage environment and outdoor play programs. The study was based on the analyses of actual activities performed in two child care centers in Daejeon area and the way in which the programs for outdoor play were related to the environment of the centers. Data were collected through 'The Daily Report of the Outdoor Play Programs: Plan and Evaluation' paper conducted at each center performed from 2007 to 2009. Following Mockwha Choi et al., (2007), the play observed and described by teachers was analyzed to classify play areas and play activities within each area. The places, equipment and, playthings using in each play period were also examined as well as the limitation and inspiration caused by the environment. The results of the study are as follows: 1) Empty and unfilled space tended to generate more types of non-structural play and role-pretend play 2)Adventurous play was rarely observed. More thoughtfully designed physical environments need to be provided for children to experience challenge and adventure through physical activities 3) Outdoor play environment should be suitable for the overall developments of infants and toddlers depending on their activities. A child care specialist should support the design such environment 4) Naturally, the programs of outdoor play will not be identical for all child care centers. Rather, they should go along with the programmatic characters and environmental attributes of each center. Therefore the awareness of teachers and parents as to the importance of must realize of outdoor play should be further increased.

• Journal of Fisheries and Marine Sciences Education
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.309-322
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• 2008

The purpose of this study is to investigate actual environment and operation of outdoor play at day care centers in Jeju area and differences in recognition of outdoor play among teachers and provide basic data to develop an outdoor play program for infants. For this purpose, data were collected from 207 teachers form about 100 day care centers in Jeju area. The results of this study can be summarized as follows: first, there were statistically significant differences in the actual environment of outdoor play mostly by the types of establishment and national, public, or corporate centers had better environment than private ones did. Second, the majority of day care centers in Jeju area were including and operating outdoor play in a daily schedule. Third, there were no significant differences in recognition of outdoor play among teachers.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.91-102
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to analyze the relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors. The data were collected by this study included field measurement survey, and non-participatory observation from 8 child care centers in Seoul. The field measurement survey were conducted from February 20 to March 20, 2005, whereas non-participatory behavior observation were conducted from June 15 to July 10, 2005. The major results showed the following. 1) Most of child care centers were too small, did not use the adequate surfacing to play various activities, and were made of play equipment setting. 2) Child's play behavior focused on functional play activity and construction play activity. 3) The relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors showed that small outside play environment with monotonous construction of play setting produced functional play behaviors on children. However, in some cases, despite the small and monotonous play area, diverse play behaviors were observed. These playgrounds at least differed from others in that they provided the place where multi purpose play was possible. This finding shows that multi purpose play areas can be an alternative in small playground environment.

• Proceeding of Spring/Autumn Annual Conference of KHA
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.432-437
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• 2006

The purpose of this study was to analyze the relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors. The data were collected by this study include field measurement survey, and non-participatory observation from 8 child care centers in Seoul. The field measurement survey were conducted from February 20 to March 20, 2005, whereas non-participatory behavior observation were conducted from June 15 to July 10, 2005. The major results showed the following. 1)Most of child care centers were too small, did not use the adequate surfacing to play various activities, and were made of play equipment setting. 2)Child's play behavior focused on functional play activity and construction play activity. 3)The relationship between outdoor play environments and child's play behaviors showed that small outside play environment with monotonous construction of play setting produced functional play behaviors on children. However, in some cases, despite the small and monotonous play area, diverse play behaviors were observed. These playgrounds at least differed from others in that they provided the place where multi purpose play was possible. This finding shows that multi purpose play areas can be an alternative in small playground environment.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.14 no.6
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• pp.777-788
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to assess physical activities and activity coefficient of preschool children and was to give some concrete information to activate outdoor play and to probe the suggestions to activate outdoor play. 42 preschool children (17 boys and 25 girls) were included. Body weight and height were measured and one-day activity diaries were collected by interviewing with their parents and kindergarten teachers. To measure physical activity during outdoor play, this study was researched the current conditions and content of outdoor play activity in daycare centers, and teacher's perceptions of that outdoor play. The average age of the subjects was 5.0 years. Average height, weight, body fat and body muscle of subjects were 108.9 cm, 18.9 kg, 17.7% and 26.8%, respectively. The subjects spent about 10 hours 39 minutes sleeping; 4 hours 16 minutes personal hygiene and computer working. They spent 88.2% of 24 hours (one day) in "very light activities" and 11.3% in "light activities". Activity coefficient (1.34) of weekday was significantly higher than that of weekend (1.21). And in this study, it was found that most of daycare centers (87.7%) have outdoor play space, 95.2% of them were garden. The teachers recognized that have a outdoor play frequency everyday (48%), three or four times (46%) in a week but they have three or four times (38%), one or two times (30%) because of various indoor program. Also, they recognized that have a outdoor play expending time 21-30 minutes (48%), 31-40 minutes (26%) but they have 21-30 minutes (64%). They answered that have frequency and expending time less than their recognition of outdoor play. Most of daycare center teachers perceived outdoor play to be as important as indoor play, and the teachers believed outdoor play supports children's physical, cognitive, social, and language development. The results of this study may be used to utilize as a basic data for estimate physical activity for preschool children and developed that exercise program to increase physical activity of daycare center outdoor play.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.45 no.10
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• pp.97-111
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• 2007

This study examined the actual conditions of outdoor facilities and evaluated safety evaluations levels in playgrounds based on types of kindergartens. The samples for the survey were 100 kindergartens in Seongnam city Gyeonggi-Do province. Most outdoor facilities consisted of playgrounds with sand area and complex playing equipments, while wood-working area, sensory playing area, and mud playing area were less equipped than other facilities. In the case of outdoor playing facilities there were meaningful environmental differences within kindergartens. The public has less diversity in play areas and equipments and providing safety guidelines in playgrounds than privates. The score for the safety evaluations in the outdoor play environment was higher than average. As the range outdoor playing facilities increased, safety was dually considered, while kindergartens with a higher ratio of child-teacher numbers exhibited less consideration to playground safety.