SaPHIRE Project
and The Lets Play Alabama Preschool Parks Partnership
About the
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The "SaPHIRE" study (Starting Physical Health Interventions Really Early) is a community-based pilot project partnered with local child care providers to explore how they implement outdoor physical play curriculum.
The original study was conceptualized by Dr. Alisha Farris, a nutrition specialist, now at Appalachia State University, and Dr. Vilches. The goal was to explore applications of the Child, Adult, Community Food Program, which provides nutrition subsidies to child care centers and requires healthy physical play curriculum. Both Dr. Vilches and Dr. Farris were interested in working with and learning from child care providers to explore best practices, teacher support needs, and family engagement, which are all important to the CACFP program. This exciting blending of interests led to a successful application to the Auburn Internal Development Grant (IDG) program, and the project launched with an exploration of the concept with Kiddie Kollege, in the Valley, Alabama. Notwithstanding the interruption of the pandemic, which stopped all community-engaged projects, the project resumed in partnership with the Harris Early Learning Center in Birmingham. Although not a participant in the CACFP, the HELC provided their space to students enrolled in a course centered on Designing Young Children's Play spaces. Students used a rubric to conduct field observations of design features. Later, they observed children playing at the Auburn Early Learning Center. This data is currently in process of analysis. Dr. Amy Serafini (Education) and Professor Pindyck (Architecture) co-led this course, and we are now working on the concept of physical literacy in child care spaces. Many thanks to Hart, Katie, Claire, and Liza Jane for collecting data, and to Arianne for her insights on the urban Birmingham space. An Extension off-shoot of this work is the project "Lets Play, Alabama" - a preschool parks partnership challenge. Child care centers (and any other kind of caregiver, after school program, or school) can adopt the parks challenge to encourage health movement. The focus is on supporting optimal learning and growth of young children’s physical health in way that connects us to the physical environment. This orientation is more than just movement - it is the experience of place and the connection with identity. |