Writing

Blog

“A brilliant blog” Hattie Garlick, The Times, 16 April 2012.

For Tim’s blog posts, head for this website’s home page. Use the ‘search this site’ box, categories and tag links to browse or search. Subscribe using the ‘get new posts by email’ button on the home page to get new posts in your inbox as soon as they are posted. It’s free, and you won’t get any spam. Facebook users can ‘like’ the home page to follow Tim’s Facebook page and join in the conversations with other followers. Follow Tim on Twitter, where he tweets as @timrgill.

Selected journalism

Between 2004 and 2011 Tim was a regular contributor to the Guardian‘s Comment is free website. Read his views on risk aversion, parents, early education, childhood in the UK, traffic and planning, bullying, adventure playgrounds, vetting and child protection and other topics.

The Guardian newspaper has also published these op-ed comment pieces (most are included in Tim’s CiF pages, though not all):

• ‘The end of zero risk in childhood?’ (July 11)
• ‘Cotton wool revolution’ (Oct 07)
• Nature play (Aug 05)
• Children’s moral development (April 05)
• The extinction of the outdoor child (Sept 04)

Selected feature articles:

• Risk and learning in the early years, Early Years Update magazine, reproduced here (Oct 10 – subscription or free trial needed).
• Child-friendly neighbourhoods in Children and Young People Now magazine (Jul 10 – subscription needed).
• ‘We don’t need no supervision’ Ode Magazine (Jan 08).
• Comment piece on child safety, Hello! Magazine (Dec 07) (true!)
• Ecologist magazine cover story on outdoor play (Sept 05). An edited version was published in the Independent. An edited version is also included as a chapter in the book Foundations of Playwork.

Selected academic writing & discussion papers

• ‘Designing Cities for Outdoor Play’ 
  Paper in Encyclopedia on Early Childhood Development (2019 – open access)
• ‘Avoiding a dystopian future for children’s play’ (co-author)
  Paper in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Play (2019). Subscription or payment needed, or email Tim for a copy.
• ‘The Evolution of Policy on Risk Management in Outdoor Play’
  Chapter in The SAGE Handbook of Outdoor Play and Learning (2017).
• ‘A Systematic Review of Research into the Impact of Loose Parts Play on Children’s Cognitive, Social and Emotional Development’ (co-author)
  Paper in the peer-reviewed journal School Mental Health (2017 – online first, open access).
• ‘Play in the good times: the (English) inside story’
  Paper in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Play vol 4 issue 3 (2015) and reprinted in the published collection Play and Playwork: Notes and reflections in a time of austerity (Brown F and Wragg M eds, 2018). Subscription or payment needed, or email Tim for a copy.
• ‘The Benefits of Children’s Engagement with Nature:
  A Systematic Literature Review’
  Paper in the peer-reviewed academic journal Children, Youth & Environments vol 24 issue 2 (2014).
• ‘Children’s Play Space and Safety Management: Rethinking the Role of Play Equipment Standards’
  Co-author with David Ball, Bernard Spiegal and Harry Harbottle; paper for Sage Open (2014). Sage Open is an online, open access, peer-reviewed academic journal.
• ‘Risk, resilience and childhood freedoms: A plea for a balanced approach’
  Chapter in the publication Tussen Kind en Samenleving: Over het sociale actorschap van kinderen (Children and Society: On children’s social agency) published by Kind en Samenleving (2010, chapter in English).
• ‘Keeping it Real: Why and how educators should be expanding children’s horizons’
  Chapter in the publication Born Creative, edited by Charlie Tims and published by Demos (2010).
• ‘Space-oriented Children’s Policy: Creating Child-friendly Communities to Improve Children’s Well-being’
  Paper in the peer-reviewed academic journal Children & Society vol 22 issue 2 (2008). Subscription or payment needed, or email Tim for a copy. A shorter version of the paper in the Smith Institute monograph – see below.
• ‘Children’s well-being in a changing world – are services an adequate response?’
  Chapter in the monograph Advancing Opportunity: Children, rights and social justice published by the Smith Institute (2007).
• ‘Home zones in the UK: History, policy and impact on children and youth’
  Paper published in Children, Youth and Environments vol 16 issue 1 (2006). Available to download in English and Japanese (thanks to Kenta Kubo).
• ‘UK Policy on Children: Key themes and implications’
  Co-author with Di McNeish; paper for  the peer-reviewed academic journal Children’s Geographies, vol 4 issue 1 (2006). Subscription or payment needed.
• ‘Play, child care and the road to adulthood’
  Paper in Children & Society vol 13 issue 1 (1999). Subscription or payment needed.
• ‘Home zones’
  Paper in Children & Society vol 11 issue 4 (1997). Subscription or payment needed.
• Electronic Children: How Children Are Responding to the Information Revolution (editor)
  Edited collection of articles from a 1997 conference organised by the National Children’s Bureau and Children’s Play Council.