Playground Designs to Increase Physical Activity Levels During School Recess: A Systematic Review

• Published in: Health Education & Behavior Vol. 41; no. 2; pp. 138 - 144
• Main Authors: Escalante, Yolanda, García-Hermoso, Antonio, Backx, Karianne, Saavedra, Jose M.
• Format: Journal Article Book Review
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.04.2014; Sage Publications; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Biological and medical sciences; Child; Child, Preschool; Children; Classification; Control Groups; Databases, Bibliographic; Educational Research; Elementary school students; Environment Design - standards; Exercise; Experimental Groups; Female; Game theory; Games; Humans; Intervention; Interventions; Literature Reviews; Male; Medical sciences; Miscellaneous; Motor Activity; Physical activity; Physical Activity Level; Physical Education and Training - standards; Play and Playthings; Playgrounds; Preschool Children; Prevention and actions; Primary Education; Public health. Hygiene; Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine; Recess Breaks; Review; School Recreational Programs; Schools; Systematic review; Time Factors; school; accelerometer; break time; physical activity; Physical exercise; Goal; Break; Accelerometer; Systematic review; Increase; Health education; School environment; Public health
• ISSN: 1090-1981; 1552-6127
• DOI: 10.1177/1090198113490725

School recess provides a major opportunity to increase children's physical activity levels. Various studies have described strategies to increase levels of physical activity. The purpose of this systematic review is therefore to examine the interventions proposed as forms of increasing children's physical activity levels during recess. A systematic search of seven databases was made from the July 1 to July 5, 2012, leading to a final set of eight studies (a total of 2,383 subjects—599 "preschoolers" and 1,784 "schoolchildren") meeting the inclusion criteria. These studies were classified according to the intervention used: playground markings, game equipment, playground markings plus physical structures, and playground markings plus game equipment. The results of these studies indicate that the strategies analyzed do have the potential to increase physical activity levels during recess. The cumulative evidence was (a) that interventions based on playground markings, game equipment, or a combination of the two, do not seem to increase the physical activity of preschoolers and schoolchildren during recess and (ii) that interventions based on playground markings plus physical structures do increase the physical activity of schoolchildren during recess in the short to medium term.