We Speak Playground

Young children are incredibly impressionable. Part of the reason they are so prone to fall in love with creative characters and over the top story lines—whether those are colorful puppets or clever puppy-dogs or princesses and pirates that are off to save the world.

Many Americans live, work, and play in areas prone to flooding with some estimates that 41 million people are exposed to flood risks on a yearly basis.

According to the Columbia Climate School, “In the past 20 years, flood-related disasters have cost the United States more than $845 billion in damages to homes, offices, and other infrastructure.”

Some of that infrastructure which can be flooded includes local parks and playgrounds.

When communities consider building parks and playgrounds, they may naturally focus on the environmental benefits of creating green spaces or highlight the human aspect of projects that promote physical activity, social interaction, and mental well-being.

If you have been thinking about upgrading a playground at a school or park, right now is the perfect time to do so. There are many benefits associated with updating your playground in the summer, as well as updating at this specific point in time. Learning about these benefits can help you to see why now is the perfect time to move forward with your playground updating and replacement needs. 

If your school has designed and built an amazing playground, accessible to all ages and abilities, then the reward is the smiling faces of students as they play on it.

One of the many things that students and parents missed last spring was the cancellation of memory-making events such as Field Day due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We think every DAY should be “Mother’s Day” but for over 100 years we have been officially celebrating moms on the second Sunday in May.

If you are in charge of building a new playground or ordering playground equipment for a daycare or school, one of the decisions you may be facing is deciding whether to order a shade structure to go over the playground. A shade structure helps to block out the sun's ultraviolet rays, shielding kids and playground equipment from the sunlight.

Learning about the benefits that shade structures have to offer can help you decide if it is worth investing in one for your playground equipment. Here are a few of the benefits. 

Childhood is a time for learning and developing skills that will benefit kids as they grow up. For many kids, the playground serves as their very first classroom, giving them a chance to learn social skills and gain excellent problem-solving abilities. Beyond that, each type of specialized play equipment helps kids develop fine and gross motor skills of all kinds. Here’s how that works.

Children and playgrounds have gone hand-in-hand since the first playground appearance in the United States in 1886. Unfortunately, today, kids are opting for more screen time than in-person play, some spending as much as seven hours a day on tablets or smartphones once they reach the teen years. Some children even as young as six months are using screen time in place of physical play.

Unfortunately, this propensity to replace physical outdoor play with inside screen time means kids are not getting their recommended 60 minutes a day engaging in physical activity—based on the United States Department of Health and Human Services daily recommendations. Thankfully, there is a way to make playgrounds more appealing, even to the modern generation and break them away from electronic play, getting them outdoors.