The primary aim of this study is to analyse the perceptions of parents and preschool teachers,
in regard to outdoor play. Veitch, Bagley, Ball and Salmon (2006) define active outdoor play
as “unstructured physical activity that takes place outdoors in the child’s free time”
(Tremblay, Grey, Babcock, Barnes, Bradstreet, Carr & Brussoni, 2015). With previous
studies identifying that there are four primary barriers to outdoor play: screen time, weather
and clothing and the perceived dangers. It is important to gain an understanding of the parents
and preschool teachers’ perceptions of these barriers. A questionnaire was conducted and sent
out to parents of preschool children and preschool teachers. Resulting in a criterion sample of
151 participants were included within this study, between the ages of 18 to 63 years old (37.1
± 11.3). 57% of the participants were preschool teachers; 33.6% of the participants were
mothers.

The results from this study show that both parents and preschool teachers perceive outdoor
play to be an important part of a child’s day to day life. With mixed results, based on the
parents and preschool teacher’s perceptions, identifying some links between (1) an increase
in screen time and distracting a child with a screen, (2) allowing children to play outdoors, no
matter the weather and providing them with the appropriate clothing to do so. However, no
links were found between the parents and preschool teacher’s age and the perceived dangers
to outdoor play.