Hirschi 1

Tren Hirschi

Writing 2010

Professor McKenna

March 31, 2019

Making playgrounds more dangerous

Respectable people don’t often give much thought to playgrounds, which is both a

shame and a danger for the children using these playgrounds. Often, adults demand that a

playground is safe first and fun second, which is a reasonable, though ironically unsafe stance

to take. In this context, an “Adventure Playground,” (a park filled with nails, hammers, wood, and

other implementations of creation) seems like a safety nightmare. Adventure playgrounds are

actually better for children than traditional playgrounds, however, because they help children

play somewhere they want to play, as well as learn to be cautious, creative, gives them a space

to explore and invent safely.

The first adventure playgrounds were built in 1943 during the German occupation of

Copenhagen by Carl Theodor Sorensen because he thought that constructive play could help

reduce the rise in delinquency that the German occupation had ensued. While there is no

discreet evidence from the time to suggest it did decrease delinquency, upon visiting

Copenhagen in 1945, Marjory Allen brought the idea to London and created two “Adventure

Playgrounds” in bombed out buildings, drawing international attention and sparking a debate on

the importance of play.

Play as an activity is incredibly important in child development. Around 90 percent of

schools in the U.S. have some sort of recess time (Pellegrini 2), which shows that if recess or

playtime were any less important than it is, far fewer schools would support it. Playtime is so

important in young children because it allows them to invent and interact with the world and their
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peers (Teague 1). This means that a productive and enjoyable playtime involves creating things,

exploring new places or ideas, and doing it with friends. Playtime in this way, if done well, can

be as beneficial, if not more beneficial than school time because it lets these kids take charge in

solving their own problems as a part of a kind of team.

Nowhere in the description of play does it mention safety. In almost any activity children

take on (especially outdoor activities), at least minor injury is possible simply because they don’t

yet know what will hurt them. This is one of the overlooked benefits of play: getting hurt.

Effective play atmospheres will not only try to minimize the chance that a child gets hurt, but

also anticipate the inevitability of a child getting hurt and have resources available to help. While

traditional playground designers do attempt to minimize injuries, they seem to assume that once

they’ve made it as safe as possible, injuries won’t happen.

Traditional playgrounds are unsafe because they do not safely satisfy one major aspect

of play: exploration. This lack of exploration stems from the very basic traditional model of a

playground, which has a slide or two, a bridge, perhaps a domed roof, and a ladder or stairs.

This structure can be engaging at first, but soon children will run out of places to explore. An

observational study in Wales found that 65% of serious injuries observed on playgrounds were

due to falling (Mott, 2). This despite the fact that landscape architects are continually trying to

minimize the chance of falling off of a playground structure by using stairs, very tall handrails,

and soft surfaces. Children still manage to fall and hurt themselves because there is only so

many times a child can go down the same slide before they get bored and wonder if they can

climb up higher, or get somewhere their friends couldn’t. This often leads them to climb

somewhere not designed for climbing, resulting in sprains, fractures, and concussions (Mott 3).

Large open parks have more opportunity for exploration, but still are generally just an open field

with trees without very much room to explore.

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An adventure playground, on the other hand, is a large field filled with nails, hammers,

reclaimed lumber, and other creative junk. In a place like this, there is enough space to explore

for hours. And once the current playground has been explored as much as it can be, it’s time to

tear it down and build a new one, completely kid powered. While this would solve unsafe

climbing related injuries, it would not stop injuries altogether. This is why attendants, or

“playworkers” are a necessity in the playground to ensure the safety of the children.

Playworkers are attendants who “[facilitate] interactions between groups and individuals in

building and playing together safely” (City of Berkeley, 1). Essentially, their job is to help kids

work together and to help them understand what might hurt them before they actually get hurt.

Traditional playgrounds also generally fail to allow kids to be creative. The ridgid,

formulaic equipment of a traditional playground “[engages] the child through a bodily pleasure

that is essentially kinetic,” (Kozlovsky 4). The most creative a kid can really get while using a

playground is to go down the slide on their stomach instead of their back. It is not uncommon,

however, to see children on a playground making up some imaginary game or adventure. This

is a fantastic method of play, but the playground is just a landscape that the children are

creating their own play on, and isn’t contributing anything to the play more than a construction

site, or an office building would, which is actually what prompted the initial creation of adventure

playgrounds.

Adventure playgrounds are designed specifically for extensive creativity. By giving

children serious tools and materials that they aren’t typically able to experiment with, they can

invent structures and create new ideas that they can’t virtually anywhere else. This is important

because “delinquency is generally a form of rebellion against thoughtless, unimaginative

treatment,” (Allen 196). In essence, when children are told that they can’t do something that

adults do because they are too young or it isn’t safe, they will try to prove otherwise because
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they see themselves as competent and invincible. This leads them to experiment with unsafe

tools and activities such as fire and graffiti without supervision or specifically to escape

supervision. By giving them the trust and chance to experiment with many of the same tools and

activities in the supervised environment of an adventure playground, it teaches them to be

cautious with danger and to trust that adults know what they’re talking about.

Traditional playgrounds are also not conducive for positive social interactions among

children. Because traditional playgrounds are so boring, no child wants to go to one by

themselves. Whenever they go, they go with their siblings or friends so that they have someone

to play and imagine with on the dull, brightly colored structures. This means that at the

playground they are less likely to try to make new friends or play with other children they don’t

know. When children do interact with those that they don’t know, it is generally very positive and

constructive. It does not happen very often, however.

In an adventure playground, not only can lone children go on their own (with supervision)

and find something to do, imagine, and build; they also can also have the same positive

interactions on a traditional playground but instead of collaborating to play a game, they are

collaborating to build and solve problems, similar to what one might see on a construction site.

This will help them become better leaders, followers, and team members as they realize that

everyone has something to contribute and that many hands make light work.

Traditional playgrounds are designed with two things in mind: adults and aesthetics.

Adults want somewhere they can send their kid during playtime and let them run around without

having to think too much about it. This is one reason why playgrounds are small, “safe,” and

transparent in that a child can be seen no matter where they are on the playground. In addition,

if money and space is going to go into something so superfluous as a playground, it must be

aesthetically pleasing with bright, childish colors and a nostalgic, traditional playground look. It is
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this nostalgic idea that has kept traditional playgrounds around so long, despite them being

inherently not fun. One of the early pioneers of adventure playgrounds, Marjory Allen called

these traditional playgrounds “an administrator’s heaven and a child’s hell,” (Fusselman 73).

It isn’t a stretch to assume that playgrounds built by children wouldn’t be very attractive

structures because children don’t care much for aesthetics at an early age. This is the cost for

playgrounds that are actually built for children and not adults. Carl Sorenson said that “of all the

things I have contributed to realize, the junk [playground is] the ugliest, for me, however, it is the

most beautiful and best of my works," (Dighton 3). Sorenson is saying that while adventure

playgrounds may not be very physically beautiful with their wooden pallets, old tires, and shotty

paint jobs; their ingenuity, changeability, and childness makes them beautiful and exciting to the

child in everyone.

Adventure playgrounds may require a lot of resources, but they use them much better

than a traditional playground would. Carl Sorenson first thought that adventure playgrounds

could be filled with “ branches and waste from tree polling and bushes, old cardboard boxes,

planks and boards, ‘dead’ cars, old tyres and lots of other things, which would be a joy for

healthy boys to use for something.” (Dighton 3). All of these materials are close to useless to an

adult, and are close to invaluable to a child. While there would be lots of materials used, nobody

would even notice they were being used. Even if it does turn out to be expensive, it’s worth it to

redesign playgrounds that children actually want to play on.

There would also have to be several Playworkers on this kind of playground. It turns out

that these playworkers may not be so hard to find, however. Robert Dighton, who has worked

as a playworker since 1989, says that “It's a magical profession, unlike any other, and I hope

that we can find a way of recording all the knowledge gained from the early years of adventure
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play before it is lost,” (Dighton 9). Perhaps all it would take is for someone to start a volunteer

organization with the goal of creating adventurous, constructive play.

The model of the traditional playground with its stairs, ladder, bridge, and slide is not

only immensely boring for children on a playground, it is also unsafe because it does not allow

them to explore, create, and experiment with new and hazardous things. By giving children the

chance to try these new things in the supervised environment of an adventure playground, they

will become more creative, more cautious with dangerous things, and more collaborative with

their peers.
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Works Cited

Pellegrini, Anthony D. “School recess and playground behavior : educational and developmental
roles.” Albany : State University of New York Press, 1995, ​EBSCO.

Fusselman, Amy. ​Savage Park: A meditation on play, space, and risk for Americans who are
nervous, distracted, and afraid to die. ​Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015.

Howard, Andrew et al. “The effect of safer play equipment on playground injury rates among
school children.” ​Canadian Medical Association, ​2005. ​EBSCO.

Kozlovsky, Roy. “The Junk Playground: creative destruction as antidote to delinquency.” 1 April,
2006.

Teague, Karen. “​RESTRAINTS ON DESIGN:ADVENTURE PLAYGROUNDS AND LANDSCAPE

ARCHITECTURE.​” ​ProQuest.

Mott, A. et al. “Patterns of injuries to children on public playgrounds.” ​Archives of Disease in

Childhood, v​ ol 79, 1994, pp.328-330. ​NCBI.

City of Berkeley. “Adventure Playground Job Announcement.”

https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Parks_Rec_Waterfront/Marina/Adventure%20Play
ground%20job%20description%20March%202019.pdf​.

Allen, Marjory. Memoirs of an Uneducated Lady. London: Thames & Hudson, 1975.

Dighton, Robert. “British Adventure Play.” ​http://www.adventureplay.org.uk/carlsorenson.htm​.