Calling on local childhood memories of street and playground games with a media twist

24 October 2011

Calling on local childhood memories of street and playground games with a media twist

Former pupils from Ecclesfield Grammar School in Sheffield, who contributed to a national playground games project in the 1950s, are being called upon to cast their minds back to their childhood days and once again help shape a unique project exploring traditional and contemporary playground games and rhymes.

The call for memories comes as part of an ongoing research project involving the University of Sheffield, which is researching into people´s memories of the street and playground games they played which were influenced by the media.

Over and over again we hear reports that children don´t know how to play anymore and traditional games have been replaced by watching television and playing computer games.

But how many adults used to play games in the street or playground that were inspired by or referred to the media? The folklorists Iona and Peter Opie who carried out a UK-wide survey of play during the 1950s-1980s found many games that drew on pop songs, comics, television programmes, adverts, current affairs and films. These included songs with actions such as Keep the Sunny Side Up.

They also found games such as Film Stars, and pretend games of Who and the Daleks or Z Cars. There were also games such as skimming cigarette cards and trading football cards. In addition, there were crazes when commercially made toys and playthings swept the country, such as Roto-Skips for ankle skipping, Tiny Tears dolls and gonks.

Professor Jackie Marsh and Julia Bishop of the University of Sheffield´s School of Education are researching into people´s memories of the street and playground games they played which were influenced by the media. They have recently carried out research into the media-referenced games that present-day children in Sheffield play and are interested in looking at how these compare with the past.

Professor Marsh and Bishop have recently discovered that a local school, Ecclesfield Grammar School, was one of the schools who responded to the Opies´ play and games survey in the 1950s. The information that they sent in has been preserved and is now held by the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

Professor Marsh commented: "We thought it would be fascinating to try and trace these former pupils and others at the school from the same period and find out more about their childhood play and games at home and school. Having recently carried out research on media-related play in nearby Parson Cross, we thought it would be interesting to compare the games of the Ecclesfield children in the 1950s with those of children today."

Professor Marsh and Bishop would like to hear from any former pupils of the school in the early 1950s. They would also like to get in touch with the ones who described their games and rhymes for the Opies. These pupils were in Class 2C at Ecclesfield Grammar School in 1953-54. Their descriptions of games were sent in to the Opies by Linden Huddlestone, a teacher at the school.

Bishop added: "We would love to hear from any of these ex-pupils who would be willing to tell us some more about their schooldays and memories of playing out, including any games or rhymes that were influenced by the media or advertising and commercially made toys and playthings they had."

Examples of media influenced playground games:
I like coffee
I like tea
I like radio
And T.V.
(Skipping rhyme)

Henry Hall in the stable
Making eyes at Betty Grable
Betty Grable in the bin
Making eyes at Errol Flynn