Abstract

This paper presents the results of ChiPS: Children’s Playfulness in School, a research project investigating the relationship between play and children’s well-being in primary schools. By analyzing 10 narrative interviews conducted with teachers from 4 schools in the province of Bolzano, we investigated how they perceive school environments and the existence of moments that foster children’s well-being. Sampling and data analysis were in line with the Grounded Theory approach. The results reveal that the quality of the relationship between children, as well as between adults and children (Heinzel, 2022), is nourished by the pleasure of being together at school: in the spaces between lessons, during breaks, before and after school and in the group work encouraged by open teaching (Petillon, 1993; Peschel, 2003; Demo, 2016). We have termed such moments ‘liminal spaces’, that is, transitional situations between different places and times within the school institution (Turner in Berti, 2023).