14 | Play for Wales | Spring 2022
A new app that allows children and teenagers to rate and help improve communities has been developed by the National Centre for Population Health and Wellbeing Research (NCPHWR) team, alongside Play Wales.
Research undertaken by NCPHWR projects, ACTIVE and HAPPEN, shows that children and teenagers report that they want to be active in their local communities, but they feel there is a lack of facilities that they want, they cost too much or that they feel unwelcome to spend time in these spaces. As well as this they say there is too much traffic, too much rubbish and that sometimes they don’t feel safe. In response to these findings, ACTIVE has recently been co-developing, alongside teenagers, a mobile app which can be used by children and teens to review their local neighbourhoods. The app has been developed in collaboration with Play Wales. The app aims to give children and teenagers a voice to make change to their local communities to overcome the barriers. Using the app, children and teenagers can review their local areas to help empower them and advocate for their wants and needs to help make changes to the places they live, play and go to school. It allows children and teenagers to get involved in mapping their community by letting them rate, recommend, upload photos and add locations of places they want to see change happen.
Once the app has been downloaded, reviews can be added in six different categories: •
play/physical activity
•
safety
•
green spaces
•
meet friends
•
pollution/clean
•
accessibility.
Local communities are important contributors to a healthy childhood. In particular, access to green space, active travel infrastructure, opportunities for play, physical activity opportunities and safety have been linked to better wellbeing and mental health. Older children typically spend a large proportion of their time within their communities due to lack of independent mobility, so, local community design is significant in supporting their mental health. Momentum is gathering for calls and guidance around involving children in community planning policy and practice. However, this momentum has yet to be facilitated by existing research methods.
