Performers wearing traditional outfits demonstrate the Coopers' Dance on Marienplatz square on January 7, 2012 in Munich, Germany. The Coopers' Dance, known in German as the Schaefflertanz, is performed only every seven years and dates back to 1702. (Photo by Johannes Simon/Getty Images)

A Chinese couple take pictures in an interactive installation art work named “You and Me” on Valentine's Day at 798 Art Zone on February 14, 2012 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Feng Li/Getty Images)

Revellers partied the night away in Leeds, UK on September 5, 2020. Leeds has been added to Public Health England's coronavirus "watchlist" and could be hit with lockdown measures after a rise in coronavirus cases in the city. (Photo by NB Press LTD/The Sun)

A girl lights a candle during an Easter service in the Volodymyrsky Cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, on May 4, 2024. (Photo by Alina Smutko/Reuters)

A pedestrian holds an umbrella to protect from the sun in Bangkok, Thailand, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Photo by Sakchai Lalit/AP Photo)

“Bruciamo tutto” (Let's burn everything) activist is removed by police after she poured red paint on the Spanish Steps to protest against femicides in Rome, Italy, on June 26, 2024. (Photo by Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters)

A man drinks at a "colored" water cooler in a streetcar terminal in Oklahoma City, July 1939. (Photo by Reuters/Library of Congress)

In a simpler time all a child or an adult needed to enjoy the outdoors was a ball and a stick. Or maybe an old tire tied to a high branch to fashion a swing. And the only instruction given to children was to “be home before dark”. Now there are iPads and computers and television screens and shrinking safe public spaces. But despite the distractions and limitations of space, these images show the charm of kicking a ball or skipping rope endures. Sometimes with modifications as a nod to changing times. Here: in this Saturday, June 20, 2015 photo, a boy runs while playing with a motorcycle wheel in Samugari, Ayacucho, Peru. (Photo by Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo)