The Magic of Play: Types of Play That Support Early Childhood Development

I think it was Aristotle who said, “Give me a playground until age five, and I will give you the adult.” 

Or maybe that was just something my uncle made up after his third cup of coffee. Either way, there's a profound truth in it.

BCI Burke recently released an updated early childhood catalog with innovative designs and new products specifically created for our youngest explorers. Let's dive into why different types of play matter so much in those formative early years.

The Wonder of Early Childhood Play

Play is how children make sense of their world. The Harvard Center on the Developing Child notes that play in early childhood effectively supports brain development through complex interactions that help children build resilience. Those giggles and games are actually building neural pathways!

Three Essential Types of Early Childhood Play

1. Physical/Functional Play

This foundational type of play begins in infancy. The National Institute for Play explains that babies start playing very early, discovering how their body movements work and establishing the basis for all future playfulness.

Burke's graduated climbing elements provide the perfect opportunity for little ones to build coordination, strength, and body awareness at their own pace.

2. Symbolic/Pretend Play

Have you watched a child turn an ordinary object into something magical? That's cognitive development happening before your eyes. According to research on Jean Piaget's developmental stages, symbolic play begins around 18 months and is considered the most sophisticated play activity during preschool years, fostering social skills and academic development. 

 

3. Constructive Play

When children manipulate objects to create something new, they're engaging in valuable constructive play. This play type promotes development across physical, cognitive, emotional, and social domains simultaneously. 

Burke's NaturePlay collection offers nature-inspired elements that encourage hands-on learning and problem-solving while fostering a connection to the natural world.

Early Childhood Play Environments

Quality early play experiences help children refine motor skills, develop social interactions, and build language abilities—all crucial components of cognitive development. 

Burke's early childhood playground equipment was specifically designed with these developmental milestones in mind. Each component works together to create a cohesive play journey where children can freely explore different developmental experiences.

Let's embrace the world of early childhood play. It's where the magic of childhood and the science of development come together beautifully.

 

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Want to explore how Burke's new early childhood equipment can enhance your play space? Check out the Early Childhood Catalog here or contact us today to learn more.

The Science of Successful Playground Designs

Raising the Bar on Effective Playground Equipment Design

Raise the bar? Seriously, the only time I want the bar raised is if I'm in a limbo contest.

The origin of this phrase comes from literally raising the bar in the track and field high jump.
You've cleared the last height, so it makes sense to raise that bar to see if you can clear the next height and so on. Outside of track and field, we often see this concept get misused and mis-strategized throughout many industries.

"We're going to raise the bar, because you didn't clear the last one." That … seems counterproductive. "Try harder" isn't much of a strategy. "Jump higher" isn't a plan. Instead, let's find out why and work together on elevating the skills, techniques, mindset, focus, physical requirements, and whatever else is involved in a given sport, skill, course, or occupation.

Custom Playgrounds Designed for Development

Raising the bar also refers to raising standards or expectations. Expecting more of others or even ourselves isn't a strategy either. By itself, it's just an unrealistic expectation, backed by nothing. What are you going to do about it is really the question. When it comes to the science of playground design (yes, there's a science to it), the good ones are created with developmental continuum in mind. What?

Age-Appropriate Play Space Considerations

Most playground designs are broken into age groupings. The two most common are systems designed for 2-5 year olds and 5-12 year olds. Most of the biggest differences here are in the height of the playground components. Obviously, the 5-12 year olds can have much higher play activities than those of a 2-5 design.

Other playground design differences are in the individual play activity products where the developmental challenges are age-appropriately designed. To "raise the bar," a well-designed system will incorporate a continuum to challenge abilities as a child progresses through and with that playground.

How Children Balance Play and Growth

Children are very fast at leveling up, but there are still individual paces in which this happens. A challenge today is nothing tomorrow, but for some, it may still be a challenge. However, they're navigating it with much more dexterity, confidence, and skill.

They will raise the bar on themselves. All we have to do is let them. "Hey, Jimmy, come on, use the monkey bars. Let me help you up. Grab the bar."

Jimmy pushes back, "No, no, no!"

It seems high and he wasn't ready. Now maybe because of that, he steers clear of the monkey bars for a long time, when, if left alone, he may have done it tomorrow. If he asks to be lifted up, that's a different story. He's ready to go! When we raise the bar on others forcefully, it can have the opposite effect we were looking to achieve.

While a child is playing, a lot is going on inside and it's very personal. Going up to that higher deck is an uncomfortable decision, but they're doing it. Make sure they're safe and be observant, but let them do their thing. By balancing their play with incremental challenges, they get to move at their own pace.

Nature of Child-Led Development in Playgrounds

Kids often self-graduate from a lower-level play panel to the monkey bars. Today they test it, tomorrow they traverse it (which is a huge victory), and one day it just isn't that challenging anymore and they raise the bar on themselves, moving onto the 5-12 playground and the continuum begins again.

While this all sounds physical, it's much more than that: through all this, it develops critical thinking skills, spatial awareness, and resiliency. It stimulates tactical perceptions, visual perception of distance, and gross and fine motor skills. More? How about kinesthetic awareness, cognitive development, proprioception, and vestibular development, not to mention the development of social skills and navigating risk-taking.

Burke playgrounds are scientifically engineered through research, designed to encourage children to raise the bar on themselves.

To learn more of have one of our design professionals help you with your next project, call 800-921-4509 or email us at info@toplinerec.com

Now, where's that limbo stick?

Is Safety Bad for Our Health?

My dad was old-school and something he said from time to time was, “safety third, if you want to get anything done.”  If you think about it, it’s true.  If it really was about “Safety First”, there wouldn’t be a welding bay to hang that sign in.

There would be no crab fishing, skyscrapers, bridges, or rocket launches.  We wouldn’t have sailed across the Atlantic to build a new country.  We wouldn’t have sailed at all.  How crazy is it to build a structure out of wood, jump in, and leave the safety of land? 

If it was all about safety, we humans wouldn’t exist today. 

Yes, be safety conscious in the endeavor, but it’s the endeavor first.  Probably second is finances, because money moves everything.  But in reality, safety is at least third. 

Unfortunately, in our efforts to make everything safer, we’re becoming weaker and that’s a problem, which brings me to brachiation and sarcopenia.

Wait … what?

Sarcopenia is a musculoskeletal disease in which muscle mass, strength, and performance are significantly compromised.  Age is a factor, but most likely because we become less physically active as we age.  It’s not so much age as strength and movement. 

Sarcopenia is directly correlated with a decrease in longevity.  According to a study by the National Library of Medicine, “weak grip strength is a key component of sarcopenia and is associated with subsequent disability and mortality.”

It can lead to other adverse health conditions, such as falls, fractures, functional decline, sarcopenic obesity, poor quality of life and cognitive impairment which all contribute to mortality. 

A dynamometer is a tool to measure grip strength.  The subject would grip the tool in one hand and squeeze as hard as they could.  A dial would measure the amount of force in pounds.  Grip strength is a highly reliable indicator of sarcopenia.  The lower the grip strength, the more susceptible to the effects of sarcopenia. 

Brachiating is the act of swinging from one object to another using our arms, like a monkey swings from branch to branch. 

Many playground equipment manufacturers still produce overhead climbing elements, such as monkey bars, overhead ladders, and so on.  However, when it comes to commercial playground design, there seems to be an overcompensation towards safety. We’ve greatly reduced the implementation of these brachiating elements and it’s having adverse effects. 

Safety is actually hurting our health and longevity.

Humans and monkeys (apes) share a common anatomical ball-in-socket shoulder design and brachiating helps develop and maintain shoulder joint mobility, improves the balance of muscle tension around the shoulder girdle, and increases the strength and coordination of the shoulder muscles.  As you can correlate, it increases overall grip strength. 

Brachiating has so many other important benefits, such as it increases endurance, flexibility, and hand-eye coordination.

It develops kinesthetic awareness (moving our bodies through space without bumping into things or other people). Many structures in the body have nerve receptors that act as conduits for information that are sent to the brain. For instance, the ear sends explicit information to the brain regarding the head's orientation to gravity, acceleration, deceleration, and direction of movement. The brain also receives information from the eyes, muscles, ligaments, joints, etc. – which are required to allow your body to move smoothly, stay balanced, maintain posture, and react to the immediate environment.

Brachiating develops motor skills, such as depth perception and visual comprehension of distance as well as fine motor skills, important for writing, painting, and driving.

It relieves tension in the back and shoulders, improves depth perception and stimulates both sides of the brain for greater integration and learning, as well as problem-solving.

The list of brachiating benefits goes on, but the macro takeaway seems to be that if we want to enhance our overall health and longevity, we need to design playgrounds with these overhead elements. 

Safety third means being safety conscious within the endeavor: focus, awareness, observation, engagement, and strategic risk-taking. 

Let’s get out and play.  It’s really good for us.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Architecturally Harmonious Furnishings and the Beastie Boys

I worked at McDonald’s, back when we could get a cheeseburger, fries, and a Coke for $1.45.  It was when cordless landline phones were new and Hot Pockets, Fruit Rollups, Nintendo, and the Beastie Boys didn’t quite hit the shelves yet.  Yeah, times were tough.

I worked the graveyard shift; 10:00pm – 6:00am.  One night, I was sitting with the manager in the “dining room”, as they called it.  I said, “Man, these seats are NOT comfortable”.  In fact, they were quite ugly; harsh colors and cold-war styling, illuminated with diffused fluorescent lighting. 

My manager replied, “Yeah, that’s on purpose.”

“Why?” 

He said, “Because we want people to eat and leave.  We don’t want lingering or loitering.”  I was just a young teenager, but even then I thought, “well, that’s not very welcoming.” 

That kind of, “we don’t want you staying here” philosophy is still in play at many places and I don’t get it.  Starbucks got it right with “the third place”.  Howard Shultz’s ideas was that there’s home, work, and Starbucks.  Please come in, gather, share great coffee, and deepen human connection. 

Customers would gather, linger, relax, talk and spend $5 on a white-mocha misto.  Crazy, right?  How did they encourage this kind of behavior in a world of “get out”? 

Atmosphere.  Warm lighting, a friendly and welcoming staff, and stylish and comfortable furniture.  Imagine a chair or a bench that was comfortable and a table where you didn’t smash your knees when taking a seat.  I still feel it on rainy days.  A place where the furnishings weren’t donated by the local high-security prison. 

I see this in many outdoor site furnishings.  A steel bench that if you think about it, could double as a pit barbeque.  Even benches with backrests look like they came from a dystopian world where everyone wears the same utilitarian boots and the skies are always gray.  You’re wearing a jacket, but it’s not even cold and for some reason, there’s an air-raid siren in the background.  Who wrote this script?  Yikes!

What if the outdoors; a city-scape or a park was a “fourth place” (I didn’t want to steal Starbucks’ spot), or another place where we would feel comfortable gathering and relaxing?  The lighting is already pretty awesome, so really it’s about the furnishings. 

A bench, chair, or table that brings us together, makes us feel welcomed, lowers our collective blood pressure, and uplifts our spirit.  Did I overshoot that? 

Equiparc site furnishings creates an outdoor environment that is more enjoyable, welcomes us, celebrates the human form, and encourages us to stay a while.   Combining design with quality and durability for over 40 years, Equiparc elevates the outdoor experience.

The sun is breaking through the clouds, the kids are playing frisbee with the dog, and I’m pretty sure I hear ‘Three MCs and One DJ’ playing in the background.  Not sure why that guy is wearing a jacket though. 

Life is good.

International Darwin Day and the Evolution of Playgrounds

International Darwin day is February 12^th, so in honor of that, let’s take a look at the evolution of playgrounds.

In the grand scheme of things, the late 1800’s wasn’t that long ago.  We had cars, cameras, telephones, record players, electric lighting, and typewriters, but pretty much no playgrounds.  They weren’t a thing. 

Very uncommon and if you did find one, it was what the name says; a place (ground) where children played.  The idea was to give kids a place to play that wasn’t in the street.

Cars evolved from the three-wheeled Benz, of Mercedes fame, that didn’t even have a proper steering wheel, to the luxurious, practically self-driving, AI machines of today. 

Cameras are phones.  Wait … phones are cameras?  Actually, phones are also “record players”, but vinyl is making a huge comeback.  Lighting went from that single brownish incandescent bulb that didn’t really illuminate the far corners of the house to the multi-hued, multi-colored, variable brightness, illumination experience we fully control with our … phones.  Typewriters are now a software program or app that’s downloaded onto powerful computers we take for granted.  Remember typing class in school?  Now it’s just inherent. 

And “playgrounds” evolved from sand gardens that were basically an open lot between buildings, to the elaborately designed and constructed destination play-plexes we see today.  I should copywrite that: “Playplex”. 

Back in 1905, the director of the Washington DC playground system and the director of physical education of the New York City school system, got together and formed the Playground Association of America. 

The PAA’s basic belief was “that inasmuch, play under proper conditions is essential to the health and the physical, social, and moral wellbeing of a child, playgrounds are a necessity for all children as much as schools.”

Hmm.  Sounds well and good, but their literature dictated that an ideal, proper (see, there’s that word again) playground, would have separate play sections, and not only would it be supervised, but there were instructors (on a playground?) to teach children necessary (necessary?) lessons and organize their play. 

They pretty much ruined the very definition of play.  Play is imaginative, full of discovery, not structured, actually fun, mentally and physically engaging, while decompressing from the regiments of life.  They made it regimented.  They took play out of play. 

Early playground apparatuses weren’t very safe.  In fact, they could be quite dangerous, so maybe the supervision part was needed.  Everything has a starting point, so in the case of playgrounds, evolution is a good thing.  Through the years, playground manufacturers used better materials and safety in components and overall design became a thing.

In the 1970’s we had the brilliant idea to stop using asphalt, you know … what we make roads out of, as playground surfacing.  We started coming up with more resilient, softer, and less bodily-damaging surfaces.

Today, we have committees, standards, compliance in design, and so many other safeguards that would make you think the next evolution in playgrounds is a padded room. 

Instead, playgrounds are more elaborate with more play value, inclusivity, challenging, engaging, inviting, and lots more fun than their ancient ancestors. 

The evolution of playgrounds has come a very long way in a short period of time. 

Happy Darwin Day!

About the Whole Flower, Bee, Playground, Child, Community Analogy

“A flower is simply a weed with a good marketing budget.” – Rory Sutherland

A weed gets no love, but a colorful flower gets bees.  More bees, more pollination, more flowers.  The landscape is enriched with beautiful weeds; eh … flowers. 

But it’s not just flowers.  These bees will pollinate and fertilize other plants that produce seeds, and the entire habitat continues to grow and thrive, supporting other animals.  Life proliferates harmoniously.    

Without these flowers, there would be no bee activity, and no pollination or fertilization of more than 70 crop species out of 100 that feed around 90% of the world’s population.  No honey either. Our world and lives would become much harsher, bland, and devoid of many things.

Because of these well-marketed weeds, the bees get excited and that communicates joy and excitement to other bees that also visit the flowers and that’s how all of this works.  Everything is positively affected exponentially.

To paraphrase Mr. Sutherland, a playground is a park with a good marketing budget.  It makes the landscape more attractive, just like a flower to the weed.  It’s not that much of a stretch, but the point is that a playground brings more kids, which excites other kids to visit and play. 

This spreads joy, health, social skills, happiness, positivity, fitness, friendships, learned cooperation, risk taking, resiliency, and stress relief.  Yes, children experience and hold more stress than we’d like to admit.

They get better sleep, it strengthens their immune system, and their brains are more prepared for learning.  Beyond the children, there’s the community.  A park with a playground increases property values, which means more property tax and therefore more funding for better maintenance, beautification, and growth and the ecosystem proliferates positively. 

And it’s not just playgrounds in this respect: Shade structures, shelters, site furnishings, outdoor fitness equipment and so on, are like planting flowers, whereas they add something beautiful and useful to the landscape that attracts more “bees”.  More “bees”, more “honey”, more growth and so on.

Let’s plant some flowers. 

Even Monkeys Fall From Trees

Climbing, swinging, sitting, eating, socializing, playing, and living in trees isn’t just second nature to monkeys.  It’s their way of being.

But … “Even monkeys fall from trees”. – Japanese Proverb

Humans fall from “trees” too.  We slip, stumble, and fall literally and metaphorically.  Many times we’re embarrassed and our confidence takes a hit.  We hope no one noticed, we assess the damage, take emotional and physical inventory, and mentally process the moment.  Sometimes we’ll dwell on what just happened; “should I ever go back up in the tree?”

Well … do you know what the monkey would tell us?  Not much, I’m afraid.  It’s a monkey and they tend not to speak.

But, they would be back up in that tree, looking down at us, not understanding why we’re still sitting there.  Because when monkeys fall from trees, they shake their head, regroup, and get back up there, because it happens.   

Even experts make mistakes.  It happens. 

Kids are experts at playing.  And they’re experts at making mistakes.  It’s their nature.  It’s how they learn, develop resiliency, make adjustments, build confidence, and realize that falling or making a mistake or misstep is not the end of the world.  Sure, we might get a little embarrassed, but we shake that off too and the other monkeys quickly forget.

As we get older, we tend to hold on to those mistakes and lose some of that resiliency.  The best thing we can do is keep playing.  Just because we become adults, as if it’s some kind of cosmic transition, doesn’t mean we stop playing.  The activities and approach might be different, but we need to maintain our ability to fall and get back up in the trees.

Keep playing.  Keep climbing.  Stay resilient.

Photo by Jared Rice on Unsplash

The Positive Health Benefits of Our Uncommon Thanksgiving Traditions

Thanksgiving is right around the corner and you know what that means.  Yep, you guessed it: John Madden tournaments with the cousins!

Wait … what? Bear with me; I’ll bring it back around. Did you know that there’s more to thanksgiving traditions than turkey, the Macy’s parade, and Black Friday? 

With just a little research we found close to a hundred not-so-uncommon Thanksgiving traditions, such as: Playing a board game with family, hanging by the fire pit, cornhole, running a turkey trot, bocce ball, or other outdoor leisure games, and taking the kiddos to the playground just to name a few.

In our family, the John Madden trash talk starts right around this time.  Then on Thanksgiving day, first thing in the morning, you can hear John’s voice, “Boom”!  And the gaming has started, followed by lots of yelling.  At some point during the day, John’s video game character will say something like, “Here’s a guy who’s 6’,4”; which means at his height, he’s taller than the other players who are shorter than he is.”

Great stuff.  We’ll play Madden all day, only taking a break to eat with the whole family. 

The common theme here is quality leisure time with family and friends.  Whatever the activity, the benefits come from social interaction while letting go of the pressures of everyday life.  Laughing, playing, interacting, and just enjoying each other’s company is so good for us.

Leisure, recreation, and play with others reduces stress, decompresses our mental pressures, alleviates anxiety, enhances positivity, and heightens happiness.  Overall, our mental, emotional, psychological, and even physical health is restored and upgraded.  Literally, our joints, muscles, blood pressure, heart, brain, immune system, lymphatic system, organs, digestion, and so much more are all positively affected through play and leisure with others. 

Maybe not a cure for eating turducken, but it helps. 

Thanksgiving gives us a reason to do all this, but once a year isn’t nearly enough.  We can’t go to the gym for nine hours once a year and expect to be healthy and fit.  But going for 30 minutes every day will.  Same with play and leisure time.  All those benefits come from relaxing and decompressing on a regular basis.  Still do the full-day on Thanksgiving of course, but throughout the year, we really need to play.

Taking our kids to the playground for 30 minutes on a regular basis increases their learning capacity, alleviates stress, enhances focus and attention, and it positively affects their overall productivity.  But more importantly, all those health benefits. 

Regular bouts of play and leisure with others isn’t just for kids and it’s not just for Thanksgiving.  Neither is turkey, by the way.  And neither is Madden NFL Football. 

Let’s play.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Photo by MART  PRODUCTION: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-in-brown-sweater-sitting-on-brown-leather-couch-7330165/

Burke, NRPA, and the Importance of a Big Purple Party

Fun is only done right for the sake of fun with no peripheral agendas, hints of business, or underlying purposes.  Otherwise, it’s “fake fun”.  When fun isn’t real, we don’t get the full benefits.

“We need more moments where we’re simultaneously in the zone and feeling ourselves, but not for work.” – Catherine Price; Author of The Power of Fun

Real fun; unadulterated fun, brings us happiness and joy.  We’re enjoying ourselves in the moment, being fully present, without our brains being attached or distracted otherwise.  Experiencing happiness and joy on a regular basis is more powerful than genes, nutrition, and exercise for overall health and longevity. 

Add friends or a group of friendly, fun people and the effects are multiplied.  I used the word “unadulterated” because as adults, we tend to do fun things from time to time, but not fully.  We convolute it with thoughts of things we have to get done, “important” stuff (whatever that is), and other obligations.  Children get fun right.  It’s very important that we do as well.   

After 15 years in the parks, recreation, and playground industry, I had the pleasure of attending my first Big Purple Party by Burke.  Business and marketing sure, but when it was purple party time, that’s what it was.  It was just fun for the sake of fun.  It was observable and apparent in the 1,800 people in attendance. 

Great band, great music, and dancing.  I caught myself a couple of times thinking the music is just a little too loud to have a conversation with someone.  Crazy, right?  It’s like playing pool volleyball, wondering if the water could be less wet. 

This is the playground industry.  We promote play and fun.  Everyone at the party was a professional working in the parks and recreation industry.  It sounds like working in a field with the words “parks”, “recreation”, and “playgrounds” would be all fun and games.  While it’s fulfilling and can be fun, it’s a lot of work, stress, moving parts, red tape, politics, management, organization, delegation, responsibilities, and a hundred other things. 

It was so good to see all these professionals letting go and just having a good time.  We can get caught up in day to day responsibilities and making fun available for others, while we lose track of our own fun.    We all need to recharge, reinvigorate, and decompress.  This is what I saw at Burke’s Big Purple Party.

Looking forward to seeing everyone at next year’s party.

Play hard!

The Art, Science, and Consequences of Playground Color Schemes

If we need a hammer drill, would we go to a furniture store?  How about a suit or a dress?  Would we go to Best Buy?  We wouldn’t go to GameStop for a ping pong table no more than we’d go to an appliance store to buy a watch or a purse or makeup or shoes or … okay, you get the picture.   

What if there was a store like that?  Well … there was and it was called Sears.  One of the biggest reasons Sears ceased to exist is that they became everything and nothing at the same time.  Sears lost it’s identity because, according to George Troy, author of the Five Laws of Retail, upper management focused on financial shell games to enrich themselves personally and to appear successful in the short term.  They profited, but at the cost of killing Sears.

Back in the 1980’s Pepsi’s marketing department launched the Pepsi Challenge.  Pepsi vs Coca Cola in a blind taste test and guess what; most people picked Pepsi.  Great for marketing, but here’s the problem; it was a one-sip test.  Pepsi was much sweeter than Coke and in the short term, our senses loved it.  In the long-term though, too sweet is just too sweet and people went back to Coca Cola.  Even today, Coca Cola is worth $65-Billion more than Pepsi, even though Pepsi is a much larger company with many more different brands.  Hmm.      

When we mix all the paint colors together on a palette, we don’t get an explosion of color.  Instead, we get a drab, gray sludge.  Some colors and various shades of those colors are more colorful than other colors.  Individual colors can compliment other colors, making each even more vivid.  Doing this strategically makes the whole more colorful.

At the back of a Playground catalog, there’s a color palette with examples of playground designs in different mixes of colors and they’re brilliant.  There’s an art and science to it, but many years ago, I got the idea that I was smarter than that and created a playground with various colors that I picked.  Looking back on it, it was like pushing Bob Ross aside, while slapping various paints onto the canvas.  I had no idea what I was doing and when I saw the finished product, I realized I created a gray sludge with no artistic theme or identity.  All of the individual colors lost their value.

Sears tried to be everything to everybody and became nothing to nobody.  Pepsi won the battle but lost the war.  Well they’re not exactly losing by any stretch, but you get the analogy.

Instead, consider the audience.  What does this playground design mean in this space, in this community, in this park?  What are we trying to accomplish?  Narrow that down and get real focused on the “why”.  Is it about nature and outdoors, is it about a colorful wow factor, is there a theme to this area that relates to certain colors? 

Maybe there isn’t any of that, but in any case, going to a color palette that was designed by a trained and experienced expert is probably the best way to go.  They know color schemes and how certain colors affect other colors, creating an identity for each design so that it will engage with the human spirit.

Otherwise, we might get an unappealing gray sludge with no identity and no staying power.

Photo by Chaewon Lee on Unsplash