A four-legged robot dog called SPOT patrols a park as it undergoes testing to be deployed as a safe distancing ambassador, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Singapore on May 8, 2020. (Photo by Edgar Su/Reuters)

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)

Aenne Schwarz as a “daughter” and Anna Sophie Krenn on Thursday, September 8, 2017, during the photoprobe of “Paradies flood / Lost symphony / Part one of the klimatrilogie” in the Akademietheater in Vienna, Austria. The piece premiered on September 9, 2017. (Photo by Georg Hochmuth/APA)

People visit the art installation “Machine Memories: Space” by Turkish artist Refik Anadol in the exhibition at Pilevneli Art Gallery in I​stanbul, Turkey, 22 March 2021. The exhibition runs until 25 April. (Photo by Sedat Suna/EPA/EFE)

Spain's #02 Tania Moreno Matveeva digs the ball in the women's round of 16 beach volleyball match between Spain and Netherlands during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at the Eiffel Tower Stadium in Paris on August 5, 2024. (Photo by Aris Messinis/AFP Photo)

A giant sinkhole in Guatemala City, on May 31, 2010. More than 94,000 were evacuated as the storm buried homes under mud, swept away a highway bridge near Guatemala City and opened up several sinkholes in the capital. (Photo by Casa Presidencial/Reuters via The Atlantic)

A Palestinian girl watches from the balcony of her house as Israeli soldiers conduct a security operation in the village of Aqraba, east of Nablus in the occupied-West Bank, on May 3, 2021. Suspected Palestinian gunmen carried out a drive-by shooting at a nearby junction the previous, leaving three Israeli civilians wounded, one of them in critical condition, with a manhunt underway. (Photo by Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP Photo)