Children have, in accordance to the UN Convention of the Child, the right to have influence on matters that concerns them. Children are dependent on the outdoor environment, and they have experiences and knowledge’s concerning their neighbourhood. How can this knowledge be communicated to professionals within planning and management of outdoor environment? The question was a starting point for developing a method aiming at facilitating for children to communicate their use and perceptions of the outdoor environment in a way that is usable for urban planners by using a GI-system. The idea was that children themselves should do the mapping. We customised a standard GIS-software by testing and developing an application that could be used by children 10-18 years of age. The application can be described as a questionnaire that asks the children to answer questions by drawing points, lines and polygons on a digital map together with text information.

In 2008 an investigation with over 600 children participating was carried out by a municipal as part of a comprehensive planning process. Some of the information has been analysed and presented in the planning document. The full potential of the dataset has not been analyzed yet. The question I will put forward in this presentation is if this information can be useful for our understanding concerning the possibilities for children to move around by themselves in their local environment. I will use the information given by the children about the routes used to and from school compared to routes used in leisure time. I will also discuss significant differences according to gender and age.