Overview and Link
This literature review was sponsored by Sport England and published in October 2021. It is thorough, readable and robust, and covers adult, institutional and child perspectives about the value of play and playtimes.
Whatever the intention of supervising staff, Smith (2010) comments that the more adults control children’s play, the less like play children’s behaviour becomes, adding, ‘We should bear in mind that children do also enjoy and probably get benefits from the kinds of play that adults do not prefer’