In the theoretical part of this master's thesis, I defined risky play. Through risky play, children acquire and develop their skills in capabilities. Most commonly, they risk the most when playing outdoors and in playgrounds. Through risky play, they develop the concepts of speed, height, length, force, energy, space and gravitation. In doing so, children come across six dangers: great height, high speed, dangerous tools, play near dangerous objects, rough play and hide-and-seek. Recently, risky play and outdoor play have been strongly restricted, mainly due to the fear from injuries. What a risk a child will take during play depends mainly on the viewpoint and opinion of all adults dealing with the upbringing and education of preschool children (McFarland in Gull Laird, 2017; Sandseter, 2007; Tovey, 2007).
In the empirical part, I carried out two surveys intended for parents and preschool teachers, to study their attitude towards risk and safety in preschool children's play. According to the results, parents and preschool teachers define risky play as play that may result in injuries. For this reason, they avoid it and advise children against it. Parents and preschool teachers most commonly enable risky play to children in form of climbing different climbing walls and/or trees and driving fast by riding bikes and balance bikes. The results showed that most parents and preschool teachers do not allow children to enjoy playground slides with their head first or last or with multiple children at a time. The same applies to walking up the playground slide. Most respondents do not allow children to swing high, to stand on the swing during swinging or have two or more children use the same swing set at once. In addition, most parents and preschool teachers find inappropriate that children play near deep waters, swim in deep waters without supervision, play on frozen surfaces and near fire, engage in rough play (wrestling) and play with wooden rods. They do not allow children to play in an environment where they can get lost and they are not allowed to distance themselves in an unknown environment. Parents and preschool teachers have reservations towards playing with dangerous tools. According to the results, they may offer a hammer and nails as well as rods to children during play, while they only rarely or never offer more dangerous tools (handsaw, knife, axe).
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