Over the past decade, I’ve had the privilege of working with educators, early childhood practitioners, community organizers, and outdoor play leaders across Canada. Together, we’ve tried to create more space for children to explore, rest, imagine, take risks, and be themselves. In that work, I’ve listened to people navigating complex systems—from early learning to housing, planning, public health, recreation, and grassroots community work. I’ve heard how much they care about children’s play, and I’ve also heard how constrained they feel by the systems around them.

Families describe barriers that have nothing to do with their children’s interest in play: cost, transportation, work schedules, neighbourhood safety, and access to green space. Practitioners talk about licensing rules, staffing ratios, funding restrictions, inaccessible built environments, and bureaucratic processes that make it hard to follow children outdoors even when they know it matters.

Across all of this work, one pattern has become impossible to ignore: children’s right to play is siloed across multiple systems, none of which take full responsibility for it. Housing holds a piece, childcare holds a piece, education holds a piece, planning holds a piece, health holds a piece—but no one system holds the whole child, or the whole experience of play.

That fragmentation shapes children’s lives.

I know this both professionally and personally. I grew up as a white, settler, cisgender queer child in social and cooperative housing in Newfoundland. The outdoors gave me freedom, imagination, and escape. It also existed alongside instability, safety concerns, and the sense that my presence outside was watched differently than others’. Those early experiences taught me that the conditions surrounding play—not the play itself—determine who feels welcome, who feels scrutinized, and who feels free.

This is why I’ve become increasingly interested in how we talk about, plan for, and invest in children’s right to play. And it is why I’ve begun developing the concept of Play Security.

What Is Play Security?

Play Security is a way of looking at children’s right to play through the conditions that shape their daily lives. It recognizes that play is not simply an activity children do; it is an experience made possible—or restricted—by the broader systems around them.

Play Security asks a different set of questions than we usually ask. Instead of focusing on whether children are playing enough or whether programs offer play, it asks:

Are the systems surrounding children creating the conditions where play is possible, dependable, and equitable?

Play Security surfaces something we feel in practice but rarely name: children’s opportunities for play depend on place, policy, identity, history, design, safety, access, and relationships.

A child experiences Play Security when they can count on safe, culturally relevant, developmentally meaningful opportunities for play in their everyday environments—schools, childcare settings, neighbourhoods, housing complexes, parks, and natural spaces. Play Insecurity occurs when these conditions are inconsistent, inequitable, or unstable. And this insecurity is not about individual families or practitioners—it’s about systems.

The Play Security framework includes five conditions: availability, accessibility, cultural relevance, stability, and agency. Each one shapes how children experience play.

1. Availability: What Play Children Can Actually Access

What it means:
Children regularly encounter diverse, high-quality spaces for play in the places they already spend time.

How it shows up:

• Safe parks, schoolyards, natural areas, hallways, gyms, courtyards, and shared outdoor spaces
  
  

• Play woven into schools, childcare, housing, and neighbourhood design
  
  

• Opportunities for movement, curiosity, sensory exploration, and imagination
  
  

What gets in the way:

• Green space concentrated in more affluent neighbourhoods
  
  

• Underfunded public parks and aging infrastructure
  
  

• Indoor spaces designed without children in mind
  
  

• Development decisions that prioritize cars and convenience over children’s needs
  
  

2. Accessibility: Who Can Actually Use What Exists

What it means:
Children can reach and use play environments without barriers created by cost, transportation, inaccessibility, discrimination, or surveillance.

How it shows up:

• Free or low-cost access to programs and spaces
  
  

• Transit routes and walkable neighbourhoods that work for families
  
  

• Universally designed environments
  
  

• Public spaces where racialized families feel safe, not watched
  
  

What gets in the way:

• Gear requirements families can’t afford
  
  

• Transportation deserts or unsafe walking routes
  
  

• Inaccessible washrooms, uneven paths, lack of adaptive equipment
  
  

• Over-policing or stereotyping of Indigenous, Black, and racialized children
  
  

3. Cultural Relevance: Whether Play Feels Like It Belongs to You

What it means:
Play reflects children’s cultures, languages, identities, and community histories.

How it shows up:

• Culturally grounded stories, games, materials, and relationships
  
  

• Land-based play connected with local Indigenous Nations
  
  

• Environments where children see themselves and feel they belong
  
  

What gets in the way:

• Standardized programming that assumes neutrality
  
  

• Environments that erase identity rather than reflect it
  
  

• Adult assumptions about the “right” way to play
  
  

• Lack of cultural safety
  
  

4. Stability: Whether Play Is Dependable Over Time

What it means:
Access to play is predictable and reliable—not disrupted by unstable housing, underfunding, neighbourhood inequities, or shifting program conditions.

How it shows up:

• Play integrated into the rhythm of daily life
  
  

• Consistent opportunities across childcare, school, housing, and community spaces
  
  

• Environments maintained and resourced over time
  
  

What gets in the way:

• Housing insecurity or frequent moves
  
  

• Short-term funding cycles
  
  

• Caregiver stress tied to economic precarity
  
  

• Unsafe neighbourhood conditions or environmental hazards
  
  

5. Agency: Whether Children Have Freedom in Their Play

What it means:
Play is self-directed, meaningful, and chosen—not overly controlled by adults or systems.

How it shows up:

• Time and space for free play
  
  

• Adults who trust children’s capacities
  
  

• Opportunities for risk-taking, imagination, and leadership
  
  

What gets in the way:

• Fear-based rules and risk-averse policies
  
  

• High-surveillance environments
  
  

• Over-structured learning expectations
  
  

• Inflexible schedules
  
  

Why Play Security Matters Now

In the past few years—and especially as communities across Canada engage with new investments in outdoor play—there has been a surge of attention to children’s play. Much of this attention is hopeful, grounded in research and community stories about the deep benefits of play for learning, health, identity, and belonging. But at the same time, families, practitioners, and community partners consistently tell me that the systems surrounding children haven’t caught up with this enthusiasm.

Play continues to live in silos, each sector carrying only a fraction of the responsibility. This fragmentation means children’s experiences of play depend more on geography, income, identity, and policy constraints than on their natural inclination to explore and imagine. Play Security matters now because it offers a way to name those system-level conditions, connect them across sectors, and work toward a more coherent and equitable approach. It helps us shift from relying on individual champions or exceptional programs to building environments where play is a dependable part of childhood—not an accidental one.

Ultimately, Play Security helps us look beyond whether children are simply playing, toward whether our systems are creating the conditions for children and families to thrive—because when children can play, they thrive, and when they are thriving, play naturally follows.

*Thank you to artist and illustrator, Rebecca Roher for this beautiful illustration. Rebecca can be found at: https://rebeccaroher.com/