Following the 2017 presentation about the children perspective on Active Cities (Edward, Tsouros-WHO Europe, 2008; Borgogni, 2012; SUSTRANS, 2015) this paper presents the results of the research-intervention about active mobility to school and a conceptual model originating from the discussion of the results.
The research had been carried out in Cassino (Lazio Region, Italy) and was based on a walk to school intervention (named Pedibus in Italy).
The research hypothesis was that the activation and the implementation of a walk to school action, jointly with teachers’ training and parents’ sensitization, could influence children active mobility and lifestyles.
How a community-based action promoted by the university involving children, parents, teachers, local associations, the municipality, could influence children behaviors in a setting, as showed in previous researches (Pompili, Borgogni, 2013; Arduini, Borgogni, Capelli, 2016), oriented to inactive lifestyles and to children’s dependency?
According to comparative researches, children in Italy are about three to four years behind the first-ranked countries on their independent mobility (Shaw et al., 2015): only the 7% of the children aged 7-11 are autonomous (Renzi, Prisco, Tonucci, 2014) and the 28% (aged 8-11) are active (OKkio alla Salute-ISS, 2017) on the route to school. These data are also factors influencing the low rate of moderate and vigorous physical activity (PA) among the Italian 11 years old children (WHO-Europe, 2016) and aerobic PA among adolescents (Eurostat, 2017).
Referring to the overall Active City approach, the interpretation and discussion of the results opened the way to the development of a conceptual model aiming to embrace the typologies of PA performed by children considered from the point of view of their independent mobility and autonomy. Focusing on health, walking to school, going autonomously to meet friends or for small errands, playing, are routine actions greatly contributing to reach the PA recommendations; focusing on education, the same activities are crucial to learn competences and the written and unwritten intrinsic rules of the urban environment; thinking at social aspects, they allow children to create acquaintanceships and friendships building relationships without adults’ supervision.
Reflecting on the Ecological model of health behaviors (Sallis et al., 2006), it is evident that organized physical activity or sport are merely included in the Active recreation and Occupational activities domains and, within them, few are the settings in which educators or coaches lead or train groups or individuals (PE classes, walk to school programs, sport, fitness courses). Therefore, there is plenty of available time, mostly for commuting, leisure or play, and venues, predominantly public spaces, in which to deploy – not organized or supervised – PA. Regarding children, these times and spaces are strictly linked, in general, with their autonomy, and, in particular, with their independent mobility and roaming that, in Italy, entail a somehow unique situation. Due to legal limitations, in fact, it is not permitted for a child under 14 to roam independently (under questioning and actually applied until primary school). These normative restrictions have been incorporated in the primary schools’ regulations leading to an overall prohibition to exit school without being picked-up by an adult. This implies, for the outdoor education, to play an impossible game caused by the negation of the learning value of the public space, of the risk as pedagogic dispositif (Massa, 1989; Farné, Agostini, 2014) and, eventually, the disappearance of the childhood from the public space.
