PLAY PARTICIPATION OF ADOLESCENT SCHOOL GOING CHILDREN

Play is a spontaneous, creative, pleasurable and normal activity of the child. It is an integral part of children's everyday experience, from the earliest days of life through adolescence and into adulthood. Through play the child attains fullness physically and mentally. When the body and mind are alert and fresh, life is full of joy. The aim of the present study is to study the overall statuses of participation of adolescent school going children in play activities and to compare participation of adolescent school going children in play with respect to their gender, family structure and district. The sample of the study consists of 400 Upper Primary and secondary adolescent school going children from six schools of Paschim Medinipur and South-24 Parganas district in West Bengal. The sample was drawn on the basis of non-probability convenient sampling technique. To measure the overall statuses of participation of adolescent school going children in play activities, a three point Likert type Play Participation Scale was developed by the investigator. Collected data were analyzed using the statistics- Mean, Standard Deviation (SD) and Percentage analysis. t- Test analysis was conducts with SPSS programme. Hypotheses were tested at probability level of 0.05. Results of the research showed that most of the adolescent school going children i.e. 92.5% average participation in play activities. Most of them i.e. 67.25% opined that they have low participation per day in play activities and almost negligible percentage i.e. 5.5% of them opined average participation in it. Significant differences in the play participation were found among adolescent school going children with relation to their gender and district. No significant difference in the play participation was found among adolescent school going children with relation to their family structure.