PlayToday issue 70 - Play England

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Play England in the regions 12 A snapshot of Play England activities across the nine regions in England North East: Play-friendly Northumberland National Park A play-friendly national park for children is set to launch this summer through a partnership of several organisations in the county. The Play England North East team in conjunction with Northumberland National Park, the Northumberland County Council play team, Northumberland children’s centre and Groundwork North East are extending opportunities and provision for all children and young people to play throughout the national park and around the visitor’s centres. The goal for this project is to encourage families to see the wider countryside and parkland as an exciting and stimulating space for children and young people to play. With the help of local volunteers, a woodland site in the national park close to Hadrian’s North West: Welcome to The Witts Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council are celebrating the completion of The Witts, a new play pathfinder funded adventure playground in Witton Country Park. After an extensive yearlong consultation process with children and young people, detailed plans were developed by a group of 40 children. This group worked with the Blackburn play rangers, and artist and designer, Jim Buchanan during the consultation. A 12 week workshop programme allowed the young people to engage in the design and delivery of the Wall is being developed into a natural play space. Groundwork North East and Northumberland County Council’s play team will deliver play sessions at this site which will be informed by consultation with children and young people in the local communities. This will allow the local children and young people to influence the development of the natural play space. In addition, the Northumberland children’s centre is funding ‘play bags’ which will be available at the national park’s visitor’s centres. The ‘play bags’ will be filled with playable goodies, determined by children through consultation, and are intended to enhance children and young people’s play experience throughout the park. For more information about Northumberland National Park, please visit: www.northumberland new playground. They also came up with its name ‘The Witts’, a play on words derived from the park’s history. A range of stakeholders such as community police and representatives from the local neighbourhood boards had direct input into the programme, via the Witton Park Adventure Play sub-group. Sharon Cornwell, a project lead said: ‘As a destination park which caters for all communities in Blackburn with Darwen, this playground is a fantastic opportunity for the team to deliver adventurous and nationalpark.org.uk. To find out more contact: play-ne@ncb.org.uk www.playengland.org.uk/ northeast Below: Having fun whilst exploring Northumberland National Park challenging play which all local families can enjoy. It’s a tribute to partnership working across the borough.’ The adventure playground boasts an eight-metre high tower with a tunnel slide embedded in the hillside, walkways, a zip wire, climbing frames, sculptures and sensory areas. Senior Play Ranger, Christine Preston, said: ‘We make use of the wider park area for den building and fire play. The children really enjoy these challenging activities.’ www.playengland.org.uk/ northwest
East Midlands: Consulting with children in Leicestershire Yorkshire and the Humber: Community spirit – Leicestershire County Council, in partnership with Children’s Links, have been making huge progress in their playbuilder programme by working with a dedicated group of children and young people from across Leicestershire. The council committed to include children and young people in individual project planning, and to create a county-wide panel of children to assess all individual project bids. The Playbuilder Innovation Panel included some children whose behaviour in schools had been previously challenging. The panel considered what can be achieved in a particular space without consulting any existing play areas, and brainstormed the types of things they’d like to do in a play area. To help prompt more ideas, they took ropes, nets and other loose parts to a wooded area and created rope swings, dens, hammocks and even a device for lifting logs. This gave some idea of what can be achieved when natural resources such as trees, slopes and hills are used in play. The children also made a video, and took turns interviewing each other about their own ideas and feelings about play areas. This footage will be made into a DVD to help parish councils become more in tune with children’s views. Play England Regional Development Officer, Catherine Lissaman, said: ‘By putting children at the centre of the process, Leicestershire County Council is maintaining its commitment to quality play areas, and through partnership with Children’s Links, they are making real progress to ensure that children are listened to and valued at every stage of the process.’ www.playengland.org.uk/eastmidlands Below: Two Playbuilder Innovation Panel members In brief Bringing people together through play Play England and Yorkshire Play are jointly hosting an event focusing on community spirit on Wednesday, 29 September 2010 in Sheffield. The event will explore the notion of community and the need to create a sense of pride, ownership and community spirit within neighbourhoods to create safer and more childfriendly environments for children to play. Through strategic and practical workshops, this event will address issues such as community safety, engagement, inclusion, creating playful environments and sources of funding for small community groups. This event is closely tied to the theme of Playday 2010, Our place, and will be a significant follow up event drawing on key themes around play and its role in developing strong community spirit. www.playengland.org.uk/yorkshirehumber South West: Playing with confidence event at the Eden Project In March, the Cornwall play pathfinder project hosted a regional play ranger network meeting at the Eden Project. Facilitated by play development worker Phil Waters, who leads the Mud Between Your Toes project at Eden, the theme for the day was ‘playing with confidence.’ Attracting play rangers from Teignbridge, Exeter, West and Mid Devon, Torbay, Plymouth and Cornwall, the event offered play rangers the opportunity to network, share ideas and concerns, and play with Eden’s new H2O challenge construction kit. The day was an overall success and provided the play rangers with the opportunity to learn from one another and share good practice. www.playengland.org.uk/southwest West Midlands: Sharing skills in Wolverhampton Play England West Midlands recently joined forces with Wolverhampton City Council, SkillsActive, Play Train and KIDS to deliver a skill sharing day designed to support the continuous professional development of playworkers. Over 100 people attended including: playworkers, youth workers, sports workers and managers. Delegates were able to network, share views and develop their skills. In addition, the event featured practical workshops which covered themes such as fire play, den building, creative play and inclusion. The day was hugely successful, demonstrating just how effective strong partnership working can be. www.playengland.org.uk/westmidlands 13 11
Page 1 and 2: Issue 70 Summer 2010 News Coalition
Page 3 and 4: Contents News 4 Coalition task forc
Page 5 and 6: New government signals era of chang
Page 7 and 8: Survey finds parents fear child abd
Page 9 and 10: Playday 2010: Our place Better plac
Page 11: Manifesto aims to keep play on the
Page 15 and 16: shifting power away from Whitehall,
Page 17 and 18: Case study: HMP and YOI Low Newton
Page 19 and 20: cross-generational leisure, sport a
Page 21 and 22: Child-friendly communities Keeping
Page 23 and 24: Play in schools School recess and g

PlayToday issue 70 - Play England

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