Toddler Playground

A: For toddlers and younger kids, you want to have easy things like slides and swings. For older kids, you can add more challenging elements like monkey bars or climbing walls. And for all ages, make sure to include some fun toys like riding animals and activity panels!

A: Important Playground Benefits for Children. Playgrounds are safe spaces where kids develop crucial physical, social, emotional and imaginative skills necessary to gain self-confidence, improve coordination, and advance critical thinking capabilities.

A: Modern playgrounds usually include a combination of swings, slides, climbers, spring riders, spinners, and sensory panels to maximize fun, safety, and accessibility. Many new types of playground equipment will also help improve coordination, strength, and critical thinking (among other benefits).

A: Define Your Objectives
To stay organized and focused throughout the planning and installation process, it’s best to define the objectives and goals for the playground. This step is a great place to start because it helps you envision what you want the playground to do and be for its users. You may consider questions like:
How many students will be playing at the same time?
What ability levels and age groups will use the playground?
What amenities — bathrooms, benches, shade, trashcans — will you need?
Will you use a theme, school colors, or other characteristics of the school or your community in the playground design?
Will there be one playground for all the students or two — one for older grades and one for younger grades?
Will you keep the playground open to the community after school hours or on weekends? What will your budget be, and how will you raise those funds?
Use this time to determine who will be involved with the process. Asking for input from the community or the student body can help you get a better idea of what the users want out of the playground. We recommend asking the head of your maintenance department as well as the physical education teacher or physical therapist to sit on the committee. These individuals can provide valuable insight toward equipment cleaning and maintenance, as well as student health while playing. Analyze the Potential Site
Whether you’re starting from scratch or are replacing an existing playground, you’ll likely have an area designated where you want the playground to be. After you define your project’s objectives, the potential playground site needs to be analyzed. The artificial and natural elements in and around your site can have a big impact on your playground, and it’s usually easier — and more affordable — to work with the existing elements instead of against them.
This time lets you determine how these elements might work into the school playground design or what may need to be removed. When analyzing your playground site, consider the following questions:
Is the site in a location that receives direct sun during the afternoon or high levels of rain, snow, or wind?
Are you able to incorporate existing vegetation into your design?
Will your site’s soil conditions and slope angle provide the playground with proper drainage? Is the site located near existing walkways or buildings for easy access?
With these considerations in mind prior to the design stage, you’ll be better prepared to create an effective playground.
Design the Playground
Now that you’ve determined your school’s playground needs and how a playground will work into your site, you can create a budget and work on the design stage. There are a lot of considerations to make when it comes to the design elements of your playground because there is such a wide variety of school playground equipment. Some things to begin thinking about include:
Will you include inclusive elements like sensory play, parallel play, pretend play, ramps, and music?
What kind of look do you want your playground to have?
Which play elements do you want to be free-standing?
Will you separate areas based on age groups?
How much challenge will you incorporate into each area?
What type of surfacing should the playground have? You’ll need to determine what play elements you want for your playground. For example, will you have swings, monkey bars, slides, jungle gyms, activity panels, a sandbox, or perhaps something entirely different and unique to your playground? The elements you choose will largely depend on the age groups you’recreating a play space for, as well as the size of your playground site and budget. Be sure to consider the layout of your playground and how each component will fit into the site, especially in relation to other components.
Install the Playground
After you’ve chosen the equipment pieces that will become your school playground, it’s finally time to install it! So, who installs your playground? Most of the time, you have some options. The recommended way to install new playground equipment is with a certified installer. Hiring an expert ensures your playground is installed correctly and safely.
Some schools recruit volunteers from the community or school faculty to help assemble and install the playground equipment. Getting help from volunteers can help reduce the installation costs of your playground. Any chance to reduce costs can be extremely effective for your budget. This option can also be a way to bring community members together to show school pride.
Regardless of who installs your playground, it’s best to schedule a safety audit.
Maintain and Play
Before students can begin playing on the new playground, it’s best to schedule a safety audit with a certified playground safety inspector (CPSI). Find a CPSI to conduct a one-time audit to ensure the equipment was put together properly to ensure student safety. After the equipment is deemed safe, your school can begin to enjoy its new playground!
While most commercial playground equipment is manufactured with durable materials, part of your playground planning should include preventive maintenance. Preventive maintenance will help you replace or repair equipment that is wearing down before the damage becomes a safety hazard. The goal here is to catch potential damage before it occurs. This measure also helps prolong your playground equipment’s life so it can last for many years to come.

A: Natural playgrounds are made of natural elements. As the designers of these play spaces can be pretty imaginative and playful folks, the elements they bring in can range from trees, stumps, logs, boulders, water, plants, sand, ropes, bridges, treehouses.

A: Sensory play gives kids many opportunities to engage their senses and develop crucial cognitive skills like memory, reasoning and problem-solving. The more sensory experiences a child has, the more they engage their brain, which may lead to improved spatial and mathematical abilities.

A: Playground environments should be planned for different ages of children.
6 months through 23 months.
2 to 5 years.
5 to 12 years.

A: Experts say that kids between 12 to 36 months old should get at least 30 minutes of structured physical activity (adult-led) and at least 60 minutes of unstructured physical activity (free play) every day.