Revelers celebrate during fireworks marking the start of the New Year on Copacabana beach on January 1, 2017 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Racegoers during Ladies Day of the 2018 Cheltenham Festival in Cheltenham, England on March 14, 2018. (Photo by Graham Stone/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A man reacts while having a nasal swab sample taken at a testing and screening facility for the coronavirus, in a hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, Friday, August 21, 2020. (Photo by Fareed Khan/AP Photo)

A fruit bat eats lettuce as it hangs from a rope during a behind the scenes interactive live stream from the Oakland Zoo on April 16, 2020 in Oakland, California. Since the Oakland Zoo has been closed to the public during the shelter in place, they are offering a subscription based service that will feature five weekly behind the scenes live streamed interactive programs that will feature animal keepers and their animals. Viewers are able to interact with the keepers by submitting questions to about the animals. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Spectators pose for a selfie before the running of the Melbourne Cup at the Flemington Racecourse in Melbourne, Australia, Tuesday, November 6, 2018. (Photo by Andy Brownbill/AP Photo)

The American singer Jessie Murph shows off her footwear at Variety magazine event in Los Angeles, California on August 8, 2024. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Photo)

Indian artist Sudarsan Pattnaik works on a sand sculpture depicting drowned Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi at Puri beach, some 65 kilometers away from Bhubaneswar, on September 4, 2015. Charities helping refugees saw a surge in donations on September 4 across Europe as people shocked by the heart-rending images of a drowned Syrian boy on a Turkish beach dug deep to help out. The photos of the lifeless body of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi, lying on a beach in Bodrum, Turkey, have triggered a wave of emotion across the continent, despite deep divisions among European governments on how to deal with the crisis. (Photo by Asit Kumar/AFP Photo)

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)