Cricket versus Barbarism

Having just returned from watching the German Cup Final, with all of the diving, playing for fouls, and general gamesmanship that are often just accepted as part of the modern game, I find myself drifting towards one of my perennial ruminations about the place of "sport" in professional sport.  

Then I found an short earlier post about another game.  And it seemed pertinent, somehow.

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I'd like to start with a quiz. Who said this

“Cricket civilises people and creates good gentlemen. I want everyone to play cricket ..; I want ours to be a nation of gentlemen.”

I will reveal the answer at the end of this entry.

The stimulus for my mention of cricket is an interesting article in the magazine All About Cricket. The author, Safi Thind, reports on the emergence of a number of initiatives that have used cricket as a vehicle to combat problems like misbehaviour at school and youth delinquency.

For example,

"StreetChance "aims to increase aspiration, promote mutual respect, and enhance relationships with others, including schools, police and the wider community by providing structured coaching and competitive opportunities for young people."

Another charity - Cricket for Change - gives some clues about the selection of cricket as the means to these ends:

"We see cricket, because of its history throughout the world, as being uniquely able to transcend the major urban racial groups, black, white and Asian and because it's a non-contact game, is also uniquely able to help young people with a disability share in the benefits of competitive team sport.

We believe that cricket can be used to make a positive impact on the lives of individuals and communities and for the last 30 years we have used our unique cricket programmes to help young people, in particular, make positive choices about their lives and to help them feel good about themselves."

Cricket, above all other sports that emerged from Victorian Britain (which is, let's face it, almost all sports) has the reputation for developing decent behaviour.

This was the view of the philosopher David Stove. Cricket, he wrote, “requires gentlemanliness, and teaches it”. And such gentlemanliness is expressed both in the nature of the game (and its often extreme delays of gratification) and its spirit. In other words, cricket teaches decent behaviour by providing an environment in which such behaviour is practiced.

Of course, it is not difficult to undermine a simple equation between cricket and civility: bodyline, ball-tampering, match fixing, and so on. But that the vast majority of cricket matches manage to maintain an over-riding air of good manners and good spirits - even at the very highest levels - does suggest that these schemes are on to something.

And the source of the claim that cricket civilises people that I quoted at the start of this entry? It was that great humanitarian Robert Mugabe.

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And if Mugabe cannot persuade you of the virtues of cricket, take a look at the story of a truly remarkable Cricket club: the Compton Cricket club in California, USA ...

The blog of lists: 101 summaries of important/interesting research into sport (Part 1)

Research is a complex and time-consuming activity.  It can involve years of data-gathering, and its findings are often subtle and difficult to reduce to a few simple recipes.


BUT, if it wasn't ...


This entry tries to summarise some important research studies in sports coaching and related areas like physical education, youth sport and sport development.  I have also included some lists that just seem interesting to sporty folk.  In all cases, the summaries are in the form of lists.


My ambition in doing this is twofold: I hope this lists are useful and interesting in their own right.  But I also hope the reader will go from here to the original research papers, many of which readable.


The lists are not in any particular order.  Why?  Because it seems to me that we come across some of the most insightful ideas when we are looking for something else.


[Oh, I should acknowledge straight away that there are nowhere near 101 lists!]

What are the minimum requirements of sports programmes aiming to foster positive sporting experiences for young people?

1.       a clear mission;
2.       developmentally appropriate content;
3.       a safe and healthy environment;
4.       suitably trained staff;
5.       integrated family and community partners; and
6.       on-going assessments.

Sources: E.g., Bodily, S., and Beckett, M. K. (2005)  Making out-of-school-time matter: Evidence for an action agenda. Santa Monica, CA: Rand Education and Rand Labor and Population.  Coatsworth, J. D., and Conray, D. E. (2007)  Youth sport as a component of afterschool programs.  New Directions for Youth Development, 115, pp. 57-74.  Eccles, J. S., and Gootman, J. A. (eds) (2002) Community programs to promote youth development. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Why were Olympians first attracted to their sport?

1. a love of the sport
2. an intrinsic love of activity
3. early success in the sport

Once introduced to their sport, why did these Olympians continue to participate?

1. the challenge and love of competition
2. fun
3. a desire to be successful

As the level of competition increased, why did these Olympians continue to participate?

1. the challenge and love of competition
2. a desire to be successful
3. the need for a competitive outlet
4. fun

What are the most important qualities of a coach?

1. the ability to teach
2. the ability to motivate or encourage
3. training knowledge
4. skill competence
5. strategic knowledge of sport

What are the least important qualities of a coach?

1. assistance with goal setting
2. management and organisational skills
3. assistance with balancing the lives of athletes

Source: Gibbons, T., Hill, R., McConnell, A., Forster, T., Moore, J. (2002)  The path to excellence: a comprehensive view of development of U.S. Olympians who competed from 1984-1998. Colorado Springs, CO: United States Olympic Committee.

How do Female Athletes Want their Parents to Behave?

The study found three categories of parental behaviour across different phases of competition (before, during, after):

• preparation for competition
• parental support and, encouragement during competition
• the provision of feedback after competition

Source: Knight, C. J., Neely, K. C., & Holt, N. L. (2011) Parental Behaviors in Team Sports: How do Female Athletes Want Parents to Behave? Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 23(1), pp. 76-92.

Why Do Children Want to Take Part in Gymnastics Classes?

1. Being with and Making Friends
2. Developing Physical Fitness
3. Learning and Improving Skills

Source: Wald, J. (2003) Parental Motivations for Enrolling their Children in a Private Gymnastic Program.  The Sport Journal.  6(3).

World's Most Popular Sports (for fans)

1. Soccer / Football
2. Cricket
3. Field Hockey
4. Tennis
5. Volleyball

Source: http://www.mostpopularsports.net/




Highest Paid Sportspeople (2011-2012)

1. Tiger Woods, golf - $75 million
2. Kobe Bryant, basketball - $53 million
3. LeBron James, basketball, $48 million
4. Roger Federer, tennis, $47 million
5. Phil Mickelson, golf, $46.5 million
6. David Beckham, football, $40 million
7. Cristiano Ronaldo, football, $38 million
8. Alex Rodriguez, baseball, $35 million
9. Michael Schumacher, motor racing, $34 million
10. Lionel Messi, football, $32.3 million

Source: http://www.forbes.com

Baby Plays Ping Pong Like a Pro

This video of a baby table tennis protege is going viral.  But just in case you've missed it ....




Please let me know if you know of any similar remarkable early specialisers.

Young Adults and Sport: motives and barriers

I am delighted to tell you that today's is a Guest Post.

It is the first of a series of guest posts, focusing on sports participation, written by some exciting young researchers and academics.

Here, Matthew Reeves talks about the participation of young adults.

“The afternoon of human life must also have a significance of its own and cannot be merely a pitiful appendage to life's morning.  The significance of the morning undoubtedly lies in the development of the individual...” (Carl Jung)

I’d like to start by thanking Richard for inviting me to write a guest blog – something I haven’t been asked to do, nor tried to do, previously.  We’ll see how I get on!

I’m going discuss ideas around the motivations and barriers that teenagers and young adults face with regard to their participation in sport.  Jung’s statement, above, may appear to focus upon the ‘older’ person however, there is one key thing to remember:  the drop out from sport and physical activity is highest amongst adolescents, thus bringing “the afternoon of human life” further forward than we may like to think (at least from a sporting/physically active perspective). 

Before discussing what barriers young adults face it seems reasonable to discuss why young people want to initially take part in sport and physical activity.  The motives young adults and adults have to participate in sport may well be different from those of younger participants.  Sports psychology research has concentrated on explaining motives for participation and adherence, looking at variables such as gender, age and culture.  The contexts for previous research have tended to be specific sports codes, with the sample population typically being youth, adolescents and/or elite level sports people.  However, there are some researchers who have suggested that research on the motivation of adult engagement in sport and physical activity has dramatically increased as the benefits of moderate, regular physical activity have become better recognised.  Such research has tended to approach the matter from a health perspective, especially investigating peoples’ health related behaviour.  Such approaches have created a sizeable gap within our knowledge of adult motivations to participate in sport and phsyical activity.  For the sake of brevity, I wont go in to detail on the studies included in the writing of this piece, I have simply summarised the key findings. 

There are multiple motives as to why adults take part in sport.  The following are the broad motivating factors that adults (18 or 50) or older adults (50+) have cited as reasons why they take part in sport:

• Physical Fitness and Health
• Social Motives / Enjoyment / Relaxation / Appearance
• Personal Challenge
• Mastery Orientation / Weight Loss
• Sense of Achievement / Competition
• Medical Sanction
• More Energy

The categories above have been listed in sequential order as to the number of times they have been found within the research literature.  However, it is important to note that many of the categories overlapped and had a direct interplay with each other.

Unsurprisingly, the picture of demotivation is as complex as its more positive counterpoint.  The reasons offered by one particular study for dropping out and discontinuing participation in sport are equally as varied and include:

·      It was no longer fun
·      No longer interested in the activity
·      I didn’t like the coach
·      I want to participate in other activities

Critically, research has suggested that the majority of reasons for discontinuation are negative and are likely to have a significant impact on future participation decisions.  It is estimated a significant proportion of children drop out of sport each year.  Whilst some drop out of one sport and continue participating in an alternative, others discontinue participation completely.  The literature suggests that adolescence is a period where discontinuation from sport and physical activity is at its peak.  One particular study sampled youth sport participants and found that while over a quarter of children were participating in sport at 10 years of age, this dropped significantly to just over 3% at age 18 years of age.  Females, in particular, indicate that negative physical and emotional experiences in sport led to their decision to discontinue participation. This parallels other research findings, suggesting females drop out of sport because it is too competitive and because they do not see themselves as competent.  Similarly, males suggested that the competitive nature of participation led to their withdrawal (i.e. when they were unsuccessful).  

Adolescents and young adults also describe transitions within education (and from education to employment) as having a negative impact on participation in sport.  However, self-motivation, self-efficacy and self-concept are described as factors between those who maintain participation during such transitions and those who drop out and discontinue.  For example, the young women in surveyed in an American study who ‘never participate’ suggested the transition to secondary school and beyond negatively impacted their participation as they had less time, less energy and their social groups had changed.  Mention was also made that participants felt more self-conscious during this time which also lead to their discontinuation in sport.  Conversely, while the young women who ‘always participate’ experienced similar transitional challenges, they acknowledged that their self-motivation and commitment to sport enabled them to successfully negotiate these key periods of development.

A national study categorised the barriers to preventing adults from taking more exercise into five main types:  

physical

emotional

motivational

time; and

availability.

Although time barriers appear to be important for both men and women, women are more likely to report emotional barriers to exercise (e.g. ‘I’m not the sporty type’).  This is likely to be related to perceptions of competence where individuals avoid participation in activities because of self-presentational concerns.  I feel this is a good time to direct you to the final blog entry I have been asked to write regarding the development of fundamental movement skills during childhood and adolescence – it will close some of the potential gaps developing at this point.

Predicting adult involvement in physical activity is an area which has received cursory research interest over the last 40 years or so.  The dearth of literature associated with this area, an inconsistency of approach and theoretical foundation has left findings somewhat inconsistent and conflicting.  Research, to date, has also tended to focus upon factors associated with participation in ‘team sports’, thus leaving individual participation in sport largely under researched.

The final point to make is that some of the research literature suggests physical activity habits developed in childhood and adolescence may be associated with physical activity levels in adulthood.  These findings are somewhat conflicting and further investigation into this phenomenon is required.  From the individuals’ perspective, understanding the reasons underlying continuation and discontinuation in sport and physical activity is critical and encompasses factors, such as skill competence and psychobehavioural factors, as well as social factors, such as motivational climate.

Well – that finishes my first attempt!  I hope you have found it useful, please feel free to contact me if you have any questions; I will of course check comments posted on the blog.  The reference list contains all research referred to throughout and other pieces which underpin the blog itself.

Further Reading

Bailey, R., Collins, D., Ford, P., MacNamara, A., Toms, M., and Pearce, G. (2010). Participant Development in Sport: An Academic Review. Leeds: Sports Coach UK.

Biddle, S. J., and Bailey, C. I. (1985). Motives for Participation and Attitudes Toward Physical Activity of Adult Participants in Fitness Programs. Perceptual and Motor Skills , 61, 831 - 834.

Biddle, S., Coalter, F., O'Donovan, T., MacBeth, J., Nevill, M., and Whitehead, S. (2005). Increasing Demand for Sport and Physical Activity by Girls. Edinburgh: Sport Scotland.

Butcher, J., Linder, K. J., and Johns, D. P. (2002). Withdrawl from Competitive Youth Sport: A Retrospective Ten-year Study. Journal of Sport Behaviour , 25 (2), 145 - 163.

Davey, J., Fitzpatrick, M., Garland, R., and Kilgour, M. (2009). Adult Participation Motives: Emperical Evidence from a Workplace Exercise Programme. European Sport Management Quarterly , 9 (2), 141 - 162.

Malina, R. M. (2001). Physical Activity and Fitness: Pathways from Childhood to Adulthood. American Journal of Human Biology , 13, 162 - 172.

Seefeldt, V., Malina, R. M., and Clark, M. A. (2002). Factors Affecting Levels of Physical Activity in Adults. Sports Medicine , 32 (3), 143 - 168.

Matthew Reeves is a Researcher and Teaching Support Officer in the Faculty of Education, Community and Leisure at Liverpool John Moores University.  His research interests are sports development and physical education policy and coach education and development.  Matthew has worked on a variety of international, national, regional and local projects.

www.linkedin.com/pub/matthew-j-reeves/28/493/163

Twitter:  @MRSportEdu

Stand up Mr Gove!

Michael Gove has decided that there is not enough competition in schools.

So do many people, you might say, and they all read the Daily Mail. Sadly, Mr Gove is the Secretary of State for Education; I have no information about his reading preferences.

Mr Gove's evidence for his claim is a little unclear, but he seems to have drawn on a mixture of research and personal conviction. His research reports that one in three pupils do not take part in internal school competition.

I have no idea where he sourced this finding, but it does seem a little concerning. But all is not lost as I have seen research evidence that two in three pupils DO take part in competitions, and that seems a rather promising finding! In fact, since the low tide of school sport in the 1980s, two-thirds of young people taking part in intra-school sport is a remarkable achievement.

Nonetheless, Mr Gove thinks/feels/knows that there is just not enough competitive sport in schools. Perhaps competition is like beauty or truth or celery: it is impossible to have too much of it.

Clearly he feels very strongly about this, because he keeps going on about it. And he continues despite the almost total rejection of his views by those who work in sport or education for a living. Physical education teachers, for example, have looked on in open-mouthed bewilderment as their political leader casually hacks away at the progress they have made over the last decade or so.

Well, Mr Gove was recently joined in his campaign to save PE and school sport from those who know what they are talking about by a recent article on the subject. Dr Andrew Franklyn-Miller is a "sports and exercise medicine expert" (which I think means he is a doctor).

Writing for the BBC, Dr Franklyn-Miller also thinks that schools need to push competitive sport. For him, the blame for the current namby-pamby attitude stems partly from our soft society which deems it,

"acceptable to aspire to participate rather than achieve, to hope that vaguely defined skills might maintain fitness rather than test our children against benchmarks".

And partly from the national curriculum for PE with its talk of "aspirations of stringing together movements", floating in a swimming pool and "achievements" of participation and understanding.

What should we do? According to Dr Franklyn-Miller:

"Let it be competitive and let us test our children against each other and identify those who need support from the network of doctors trained in sport and exercise medicine as an existing Olympic legacy."

It is difficult to know how to respond to this article. This is partly because I have a suspicion that 'Dr Franklyn-Miller' is really Mr Gove's more impressive pen-name, so self-preservation is hindering my commentary.

Here are the clues:

1) Both of them talk about the need for 'more competition' in schools, despite the fact that England, at least, has one of the most comprehensive competitive sports structures in the world.

2) They talk about school sport, but neither mention the people who actually run it, and who have made such extra-ordinary progress in recent years: PE teachers.

3) They are disconcertingly vague about the bases of their assertions. Gove just states things as if they were self-evidence truisms. Franklyn-Miller does this too, and adds a few suspicious quotations, to boot (as far as I can tell, the national curriculum for PE never mentions "aspirations of stringing together movements", at all).

4) They both seem to have a faith that competition is inherently motivating for young people, when in fact a huge body of evidence suggests that this is not the case for all. Some like competitive sport; some like dance, or outdoor activities; and some like recreational, but non-competitive physical activities. In fact, an over-emphasis on competitive is routinely given by young people, themselves, as a reason for dropping out of sport.

5) And they both simply assume that the imposition of adult sporting values and practices will drive up participation and performance standards.

Dr Franklyn-Miller says that the curriculum needs to be built on on the "lessons learnt in athlete development, and sport talent identification, not to build potential superstars but to change a lifestyle." What are these lessons? If actual science is to be believed, rather than the hunches of a sports doctor, the first three lessons are:

1. do not treat children like mini-adults
2. do not treat children like mini-adults
3. do not treat children like mini-adults

Both politicians and doctor claim to be bound by the demands of evidence. But neither Gove or Franklyn-Miller show any awareness of the huge body of literature that should inform their pronouncements.

Vitally, there is no evidence to support their guiding assumption that more competition will improve participation or achievement. On the contrary, to the best of our knowledge the most successful curriculums offer a wide range of sporting experiences, including many that are non-competitive. And the underlying character of these experiences ought to be play and enjoyment, especially in the primary years. As even Franklyn-Miller acknowledges, lifelong physical activity is built on a foundation of 'physical literacy', or fundamental movement skills, or 'the basics'. Too much competition too soon undermines the development of these skills.

Does it matter?

Unfortunately it does. I suspect that Mr Gove, Dr Franklyn-Miller and myself would all agree that regular sporting activities are among the valuable experience society can offer young people. We'd also agreed that physical education and sport ought to be part of everyone's schooling, probably as a matter of right. My worries start when they start to talk about turning these nice thoughts into practice.

Sport is a powerful resource for young people and for society. But like all resources, its use is value-free. The value of sport for young people comes not from the activities themselves but from the quality of the experiences offered by teachers and coaches. Provide a variety of positive sporting experiences for young people and we are some way to laying the foundations for lifelong physical activity and love of sport. Mess this opportunity up by playing to the ill-informed calls for 'more competition', or to push adult sport earlier and earlier into children's lives and the least serious consequence is likely to be a generation lost to the incredible potential of sport.

Sport Science - good, bad and bogus

The sport sciences have garnered a huge body of evidence regarding the measurement and improvement of performance. Television programmes reporting on the preparation of elite players for events like the 2012 Olympic Games show them in laboratories, where scientists in lab coats connect them to tubes and cables and the ubiquitous machines that go 'ping'.

The scientific foundations of modern training and measurement are simply taken for granted by those involved in sport. Personally, I am not so sure.

Dave Collins (formerly Performance Director at UK Athletics and now Professor at the University of Central Lancashire) and I have recently written a paper for the International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics called 'Scienciness' and the allure of second-hand strategy in talent identification and development. We argue that senior sports coaches and administrators are too quickly impressed by apparently 'sciency' looking strategies and practices which, on closer inspection, are really not very good science at all.

Of course, not all sport science is dodgy; the great majority is perfectly respectable. A problem, though, is that the people who actually use the research are rarely able to distinguish between good and bad science.

Without an understanding of science, most of us turn to good-old-fashioned common sense, which is probably a good bet most of the time, but occasionally is paradoxical and surprising and quite the opposite of common sense. And there are countless examples of bogus ideas in sport that seem common sensical; consider talent identification: the importance of spotting talent young; the need to identifying children with the correct body shape for specific sports; the necessity of focusing on one sport early. All of these ideas are widely believed to be true, because they seem like common sense. Yet they are all, more or less, nonsense.


One of the most fascinating examples of the battle between science and non-science is reported in Michael Lewis' Moneyball, which has just been released as a film starring .. [drum roll] .. Brad Pitt. The book / film focuses on Major League Baseball, possibly the most evidence-laden sport in the world, and its reliance on a combination of the wisdom of aged insiders and common sense-based, sciency statistics. According to Lewis, the statistics used by even the most elite teams to evaluate player success and, vitally, to identify the most talented recruits, were simply not relevant for the modern game.



Moneyball also tells of the remarkable success of the Oakland A's, a relatively poor team that somehow managed to compete successfully against much wealthier and established teams. Their secret? They used informed statistics to identify the real key predictors of playing success. So, while their opponents continued to assess players' potential and performance using common sense measures like batting averages, the A's turned to on-base percentages and slugging percentages. These scores were not only more valid predictors of playing success, but they also allowed the team to buy much more economically.

The events told in Moneyball took place some years ago, and the other Major League teams were forced to change, albeit reluctantly. It may be the new film will stimulate interest in the issue of good, bad and bogus sport science, and - who knows - perhaps it will contribute to the sport science education of coaches and administrators.

[A recent issue of the Financial Times has a fascinating discussion between Michael Lewis and Billy Beane, the man behind the A's statistical revolution]

Lessons of the Great Outdoors

We live in a world in which more and more things are viewed as risky: food, drink, trains, aeroplanes, roads, sex, other people. And nowhere is this culture of fear more evident than in schools.

As a frequent visitor to schools, I am routinely confronted with security cameras, swipe cards and intercoms before even entering the building. Once inside, I find that many trainee and newly qualified teachers are so overcome with anxiety at potential risks that they adapt their lessons or even seek to avoid whole areas of the curriculum; gymnastics, design/technology, science, outdoor activities, all cause apoplexy. Many, given the choice, would steer clear of all of these activities. The children might not learn very much, and they might be bored to tears, but at least they would be safe.

Of course, schools are bound by law to be concerned with children’s safety. The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s motto, ‘That which does not kill me makes me strong’, is catchy, but it makes poor childcare advice. But the culture of fear has rarely resulted in reasonable policies and accurate information. In fact, reactions are likely to prove more harmful to children’s development and education than the risk from which they are being protected.

For example, in the early 1980s the TV programme That’s Life ran a series of stories on the risks of school playground surfaces causing head injuries, showing films of china plates smashing on the floor. But children’s heads have little in common with china plates, and serious head injuries from falls do not appear at all in the statistics on playground injuries.

When a 15-year-old boy tragically drowned in a pond in 2000, a national newspaper launched a campaign, backed by politicians and other public figures, urging parents to fill in their garden ponds. It is indeed true, as TV presenter Esther Rantzen solemnly put it, that ‘toddlers can die in the shallowest of water’. But should one accident lead us to abolish water from children’s experiences?

Meanwhile, UK's ex-chief inspector of schools David Bell caused fury when he claimed that children are missing out on potentially life-changing activities because of schools’ concerns that they will end up in court if things go wrong. Outdoor and adventurous activities, part of the physical education curriculum, are disappearing from schools across the country.

Some schools point to disasters like that which occurred at Stainforth Beck in Yorkshire a few years ago, when two young people died. Teaching unions claimed that the public outcry following the incident was another case of ‘blame culture’ gone mad, and one union has advised its members not to participate in future outdoor trips. But what is overlooked is that, in this specific case, the expedition leaders made fundamental mistakes. Schoolchildren should not have been led into a fast-running stream. Outdoor activities were not responsible for the turn of events - error of judgement was.

Writing shortly after the incident, London Times journalist Libby Purves suggested that events at Stainforth Beck might actually strengthen the case for quality outdoor and adventurous activities:

‘Enough came out of the inquest to make onlookers feel angry at the sheer geographical illiteracy displayed by the party leaders. If future action makes it clear, publicly, that this is an aberration from what is normal and expected of schools and teachers, then there is a better chance that parents in the future will allow their children on outdoor adventures…. If there is blame it must be placed on the right shoulders, if only to underline the value and dignity of the many, many teachers and instructors who do know what they are doing.’

Researchers and policymakers are only just beginning to recognise the damaging consequences of the culture of fear on the quality of children’s lives. For fear of possible dangers from an unpredictable and hostile world, parents restrict their children’s freedom to be outdoors, to play without adult supervision, and to do the sorts of things that many of us took for granted as we were growing up. A report published by the Children’s Play Council claimed that children had become virtual prisoners in their own homes.

There is mounting evidence that increasing numbers of children are being denied the freedom to move around their local environment. For example, 30 years ago, almost all schoolchildren were free to walk to school unaccompanied; now, most are not. There has also been a reduction in the proportion of children of all ages allowed by their parents to cross roads, cycle, go out after dark, and access leisure facilities by themselves. Even in the years between 1990 and 1998, there has been a significant reduction in 10- and 11-year olds who walk to school, and an increase in those who are driven (despite the fact that these are primary school pupils who usually live close to their school).

Evidence suggests that a major contributory factor is parental fears. And these fears transfer to their children, who come to view the outside world, and especially other people, as menacing and best avoided. ‘I feel safe when I’m sitting in my house at night by the fire with my family’, said one 10-year-old girl from Scotland. Another 13-year-old boy said: ‘The further away you are, like, there’s a lot more things that could happen to you, like, on the way…. But if you’re local, just around the estate and you get hurt you can just go along to your home.’

There is a danger that adult preoccupation with risk can remove experiences that are important in children’s social and psychological development. Research carried out in Scotland showed that children’s playtime has been reduced by an hour each day. It is during play that children learn to test their limits, make decisions, play different roles and imagine different possibilities. Children are much more creative when adults are not interfering or monitoring their behaviour. One study found that adult participation reduced children’s experimentation and willingness to make mistakes.

An overcautious approach makes for dull environments. Such environments present too little challenge for children, and some children respond by looking for other opportunities for adventure, sometimes with much greater risk of personal injury.

No environment will ever be completely safe and risk-free, and even well-supervised children manage to hurt themselves. But by speculating on what can possibly go wrong rather than on what children might learn from experiences, we are in danger of creating anxiety in some children and recklessness in others. Children who are fearful will not be able to learn, and those who are overconfident will be unable to make sensible judgements about risk, because their learning environment has become sanitised and over-managed.

This is why the threat to outdoor and adventure activities is so disturbing. Aside from the obvious benefits of taking children into the countryside - the greater awareness of the natural world and our place within it - outdoor and adventurous activities are ideal vehicles for many of the types of challenges and learning opportunities that are necessary for their development. These activities are physically active, and depend upon shared understanding, cooperation and trust. They also force children to draw upon their inner resources to address real problems, presenting children with challenges and perceived risks, and providing a framework for coming to terms with them.

Anxieties over children’s safety and wellbeing are understandable, and it is only right that parents and teachers are mindful of potential dangers. But children need to be able to take acceptable risks in an environment that allows them to extend their abilities and confidence. If children are deprived of these experiences they will not learn to handle the risks that they are certain to meet as they make their way through life.

The Harrogate coroner presiding over the Stainforth Beck case spoke of the ‘exhilarating experiences’ of outdoor adventure, and of the need for all children, especially those from cities, to encounter and learn from the outdoors. Much the same could be said for risk experiences in general.