For the new study, researchers at Tulane University in New Orleans looked at the effects of a pilot program that kept one inner-city school's playground open, and staffed by teachers, beyond normal school hours.

They found that the school yard became a popular spot for students at that school and from others. More importantly, most children were physically active when they were there, the researchers report in the American Journal of Public Health.

The findings suggest an alternative to more complicated, highly structured programs to get children to be physically active, according to lead study author Dr. Thomas A. Farley.

"We might do better by focusing on their environments, specifically by providing them safe play spaces within walking distance of home." Farley told Reuters Health.

The study involved two inner-city New Orleans elementary schools with predominantly low-income African-American students. One school received funding to keep the playground open and staffed after school, on weekends and in the summer. For the next two years, Farley's team monitored the number of children who were outside and physically active in the neighborhoods surrounding both schools.

They found that during the school year, an average of 71 children used the school yard on weekdays and 26 used in on weekends. In addition, the number of children who were outside and active was 84-percent higher in the school yard and surrounding neighborhood than in the comparison neighborhood.

The project was begun before Hurricane Katrina, which put everything on hold, Farley said, but there are discussions underway to make open school yards a city-wide policy.

New York City recently launched a plan to open 290 school yards to the public.

"This study," Farley noted, "suggests that (the New York) initiative will be successful and that there will be important health benefits to the kids."

The New Orleans project cost about $50,000 a year, including salaries for teachers who supervised the playground, with the research project footing the bill. Farley said he thinks the project could be replicated with fewer staff, and be a "minor part" of a school system's budget.

SOURCE: American Journal of Public Health, online July 31, 2007.

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