Children's playground games and songs in the new media age

Project start date: 2009-04 Project end date: 2011-03
This project will update, analyse and re-present three important collections of children's playground songs and rhymes: the Opie Collection of Children's Games and Songs, and selections from collections at the National Centre for English Cultural Tradition (NATCECT) and the Leeds Archive of Vernacular Culture (LAVC). The project will work in four ways: firstly, it will digitise material from the collections as a new digital archive at the British Library, and design an interactive website available to educators, researchers, children, parents, and the wider public.; second, it will carry out a two-year study of playground culture in two primary schools, one in London, one in Sheffield; third, it will make a documentary film of children's play; and finally, it will explore how traditional games like this are making their way into forms of new media by developing a suite of games for the Nintendo Wii. The project aims to preserve this important aspect of our national culture; but also to explore how it continues to be a part of the lives of children living in the age of computer games and the internet. What does this oral tradition borrow from the media; and how might it connect with the entertainment and information technologies of the age of new media?
Era(s): 
Country/region(s): 
Methods usedCategory
Motion captureData capture
General website developmentData publishing and dissemination
Manual input and transcriptionData capture
Funding sources: 
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
Content types created: 
Dataset/structured data, Moving Image, Sound, Spatial, Still Image/Graphics, Text
Software tools used: 
Quicktime, JW Player
Source material used:  
The sound archive of Iona and Peter Opie in the British Library's National Sound Archive; digital video, sound recordings, photographs and observation data from two primary school playgrounds.
Digital resource created:  
Digitised material from the collections will be available as a new digital archive at the British Library and there will be an interactive website for researchers, children, parents, and the wider public. Digital film documentary of childrne's play. Game adaptation for a physical interface (eg Nintendo Wii) of games found in the research.
Access to digital resource:  
Open Access
Data Formats created: 
Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF), Apple QuickTime Movie (MOV), JPEG File Interchange Format (JPG)
To be added as project completes.
Publications:  
To be added as project completes. See website for draft papers.

Institutions affiliated with this project: 

UK HE institutions involved:
University of Sheffield
University of London
University of East London
Institute of Education
UK HE institutions involved:
British Library

Project staff and expertise: 

Principal staff member:Professor Andrew Burn, Professor Jackie Marsh, Dr Rbekah Willett, Ms Grethe Mitchell, Mr Jonnie Robinson, Dr Julia Bishop, Dr Chris Richards, Dr Jennifer Sheridan, Ms Laura Jopson
Other staff:Postdoctoral researcher(s) / Research assistant(s)
External expertise:


Metadata on this arts-humanities.net record
Author(s) of recordAndrew Burn
TitleChildren's playground games and songs in the new media age
Record created2010-09-01
Record updated2010-09-01 14:11
URL of recordhttp://www.arts-humanities.net/node/3703
Citation of recordAndrew Burn: Children's playground games and songs in the new media age.
<http://www.arts-humanities.net/node/3703>
created: 2010-09-01, last updated 2010-09-01 14:11