Creating Inclusive Play Opportunities In Natural Play Spaces

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Creating Inclusive Play Opportunities In Natural
Play Spaces

• Mary McLennan M.S.
• Anne-Marie Soltysik-Webb BA
• Lorrie Kelly OTR/L
• Santa Barbara County Education Office
• Kathy Gulje Coordinator

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Early Childhood Centers

• Kinkos Early Learning Center
• Santa Barbara City College
• Director Beth Rizo
• Lead Teacher
• Anne-Marie Soltysik-Webb
• Orfalea Children's Center
• University of California at Santa Barbara
• Director Leslie Voss
• Curriculum Specialist Tamara Thompson
• Quality Time Child Development Center
• Director Tanum Gilbert
• Early Childhood Educator
• Jason Armitage

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Objectives

• Engage
• Value of Free Play for ALL Children
• Empower
• Reconnect Children with Nature
• Enact
• Creating inclusive play
• opportunities in natural
• play spaces

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Engage-WHY?

• Article 3 of the UN Declaration of the Rights of
  the Child (1989)
• The right to play is recognized as a human right
  in UN Convention on the Rights of the Child

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UN Convention Highlights3 Main Areas

• The provision of space
• Space is a basic resource that children need
  in order to play
• (Guddemi Jambor, 1992)
• Consultation with young children
• Explicit requirement
• (Adams Ingham 1998)
• Integration of all children

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Importance of Play for ALL Children

• Childs way of understanding their world
• Vital to the development and well being of all
  children
• Two Types of Play
• 1. Play that Merely Occupies the child
• 2. FREE PLAY
• Contributes to their social,
• physical, intellectual,
• creative and emotional
• development

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Qualities of Free PLAY

• Involves a Pretend Element
• Voluntary
• Spontaneous
• Engaging
• FUN and Pleasurable
• (Frost, Wortham and Reifel 2001)

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Play and Children with Disabilities

• A child with a disability is a child with
  ABILITIES
• Opportunities for
• free play are
• DOUBLY important
• Take Risks
• Believe they are
• competent, capable learners
• NOT JUST Merely Occupied

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Developing Inclusive Play Spaces

• Important to remember
• that play takes place
• in the head.
• Play equipment is not an end in itself
• It is just a starting point for play
  (imagination, experimentation, creativity, etc)
• Its presence is no guarantee that play will
  actually take place

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Why is Free Play important?

• When children with disabilities cannot engage in
  free play
• They have increased dependence on others
• Lack of assertiveness
• Decreased motivation
• Lower self-esteem
• Poorly developed social skills
• (Missiuna, C Pollack, N. 1991, p.883)

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Empower-WHY Reconnect Children to Nature?

• The changing nature of childrens play -
  difficult for children to find special outdoor
  places where they can explore. Richard Louv
  (2005) has termed this growing issue Nature
  Deficit Disorder
• Change in outdoor play behavior is associated
  with an
• alarming rise in obesity and increase in drug
  use for ADHD
• 2 out of 10 of Americans children are
  clinically obese (Louv, 2005)
• Nationwide 17 of children are on Ritalin (Orr,
  2002)

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Nature Can Have Positive Effects on Child
Development

• Wells and Evans (2003) found the impact of life
  stress on children was lower for those with
  nearby opportunities to experience nature.
• Taylor et al (1998) found that the amount of
  vegetation in outdoor play areas affects the
  amount of time children play and results in
  higher quality creative play

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Childrens Connection With Nature

• Passion does not arrive on videotape or on a
  CD passion is personal. Passion is lifted from
  the earth itself by the muddy hands of the young
  it travels along grass stained sleeves to the
  heart. If we are going to save environmentalism
  and the environment, we must also save an
  endangered indicator species the child in
  nature.
• -- Richard Louv (2005, p.158)

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Play, Place and Remembrance

• In Childhood Domain (1986)
• Robin Moore discusses the attachment to outdoor
  places that children develop over time through
  multiple play experiences.
• Authors A.A. Milne and Lewis Carroll write about
  the feeling of connection to ones surroundings
  and the sense of wonder associated with
  childrens exploration of the outdoors.

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Design for Learning

• By suggestion and example, I believe children
  can be helped to hear the many voices about them.
  Take time to listen and talk about the voices of
  the earth and what they mean-the majestic voice
  of thunder, the winds, and the sound of surf or
  flowing of streams.
• -- Rachel Carson (1956,p.68)

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Criteria for Designing Effective Outdoor Play
Environments

• In recognition of the importance of play to
  learning and to child development, Robin Moore,
  Susan Goltsman, and Daniel Iacofano have
  identified 5 key design criteria in Design for
  Play Planning Design and management of Outdoor
  Play Settings for All Children (1997)
• 1. Accessibility
• 2. Safe Challenge
• 3. Diversity and Clarity
• 4. Flexibility
• 5. Graduated Challenge

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Enact-Inclusive Play

• Is NOT about meeting Special Needs
• It IS about meeting
• ALL Childrens needs
• in the same place
• and in a variety
• of different ways
• -- Di Murray (2000)

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Accessible Play Spaces

• All children, whether or not they have a
  disability, use play spaces differently
• Accessible play space is one where
• All children can play freely with each other
• Explore their capacities
• Experiment with objects
• Make decisions
• Understand cause and effect
• Learn to persist
• Understand consequences
• -- Missiuna Pollock (1991)

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Different Disabilities, Different Abilities

• Children with disabilities may need different
  levels of support to enable them to use play
  spaces.
• Important to identify
• the barriers that
• prevent children
• from using play
• spaces and to find
• ways to overcome them.

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Children with Physical Impairments may

• Have a lack of physical mobility
• Have difficulty with long distances, steps, steep
  slopes
• exhibit decreased endurance, have diminished
  respiratory capacity
• Be unsteady on their feet and liable to slip or
  trip
• have hypo or hyper-tonic
• muscle tone
• Have greater space
• requirements
• wheelchairs and walkers
• Find it hard to hold on to
• or to grip ropes/poles
• diminished upper-body and/or lower body strength
• Demonstrate decreased play initiation

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Supportive Play Ideas

• Swings with back and side
• support, hammocks.
• Area with posts and hooks
• for removable equipment
• e.g. large bucket swings
• Rocking and seesawing
• in a sitting position
• Sand/ sensory tables of
• different heights on wheels
• Low-level crawling and climbing nets, tunnels and
  tubes, Zip line with various heights, large deep
  sand pits with ramps

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Children with Intellectual Impairments may

• Find complex layouts difficult to navigate due to
  poor motor planning
• May have difficulty taking turns.
• Socializing with peers
• and engaging in
• dramatic play requires
• support from adults.
• May appear to lack awareness of or have a
  heightened sensitivity to other children

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Play ideas

• Ground level activities, e.g. balance beams,
  adventure trails
• Play that encourages
• co-operation and eye
• contact, e.g. seesaws,
• group swings, foam building
• blocks, water play, sound areas
• wind chimes, rain sticks, large drums, bells.
• Role Play Activities, e.g. dramatic play
  accessories
• Pictograms explaining how play items may be used.
  Some children make up their own pictograms!

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Children with Impaired Vision may

• Be able to find their way with clues, e.g.
  changes in texture, colour contrast, edging on
  paths
• Need to hear important
• information that other
• children might just see
• Be less active on playgrounds. Activities that
  encourage repetition can help build up their
  experience and confidence
• Use colour contrast e.g. mirrors, tactile play
  panels, play items which involve sound, play
  items with consistent and good color contrast

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Children with Hearing Impairment may

• Not to able to hear other childrens voices or
  adults instructions
• Unaware of things
• going on behind them
• May need to see important
• information that other
• children can hear
• Safety-related audible effects, e.g. gravel
  surrounds can be designed into play spaces
• Clear easy to understand information boards can
  help

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Children with Autism may

• Appreciate quiet places where they can rest, hang
  out or play on their own
• Muted colours work better
• Sand and water are great
• play materials for all children
• Creating sensory spaces/gardens
• will allow children to develop their
• smell, taste and tactile senses.
• Create circular maze paths
• Huts, multi-story play houses and shelters offer
  children the opportunity to chill out, chat, play
  fantasy games, be a pirate, rest or be alone for
  a while
• Remember it is not just children with recognized
  disabilities that can find play spaces too
  challenging.

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Safety and Risk

• All children
• need and want
• to take risks
• to explore limits,
• venture into new
• experiences and
• develop their capacities
• Children with disabilities have an equal if not
  greater need for opportunities to take risks
• Children would never learn to walk or ride a bike
  unless they were strongly motivated to challenges
  involving a risk of injury.

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Design for Abilities rather than Disabilities

• Physical access is necessary and important
• Does little to
• promote the
• inclusion of the
• majority of children
• with disabilities
• (Christensen K. 2000)

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How do you create greater social access or
inclusion in a play environment ?

• The key is
• Provide a diversity
• of play opportunities
• (Oestreicher 1990, p53)
• which stimulate a wider range of developmentally
  appropriate play activities (Frost and Klein 1979)

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Types of Play Activities

• Should not be confused with specific types of
  equipment (i.e. slides versus swings)
• May be provided by
• playground equipment,
• settings, sounds,
• fragrances, textures
• and other elements that stimulate the child.
• Play activities are defined according to the
  following types Dizziness, Passive Resting,
  Exploratory, Dramatic, Interactive, Practice and
  Clues.

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Dizziness Activities-Physical Stimulus

• Engages large muscles climbing, balancing,
  jumping, rolling, pushing, pulling, hanging by
  hands, spinning
• Obstacle courses over, under, through
• Incorporate loose parts
• with different heights
• and slopes slant
• boards, balance beams
• Create the illusion
• of movement
• High places,
• slopes, tunnel, maze (Senda 1992, p.137)

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Passive Resting-Meditative Stimulus

• Non-activity or absence of activity
• Process information and rest
• Limited stamina
• Withdraw from
• social experiences
• - autism
• Close to activities
• Lack of private spaces correlated with
  occurrences of aimless wandering and aggressive
  behavior (Phyle-Perkins,1982)

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Exploratory Activities-Cognitive Stimulus

• Sense of discovery
• Children prefer
• playing in natural
• landscapes,
• not static

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Dramatic Activities-Imaginative Stimulus

• Preschoolers are externalizing their surroundings
• Role of loose parts,
• props or creative
• materials encourages
• more cooperative play
• and socialization
• Maintain physical access for preschoolers with
  moderate to severe physical disabilities using
  ramps and shared activities at lower levels

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Interactive Activities-Social/Emotional Stimulus

• Interaction between
• two or more
• preschoolers
• Opportunities for
• interactive activities
• least common for
• preschoolers with disabilities
• Opportunities to observe, interact with, and
  imitate typically developing peers
• (Roger-Warren et al, 1980,p.3)

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Practice Activities-Developmental Stimulus

• Physical development, balancing, increasing large
  and fine motor control, increasing strength and
  endurance
• Should NOT be
• the focus of the
• free play environment
• Can combine with
• other activities
• e.g. dizziness

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CLUES-Sensory Stimulus

• Not an activity
• Sensory stimulation
• Important for
• preschoolers with
• sensory-related
• disabilities visual,
• hearing, low mobility
• Use of sights, sounds, colors, textures, and
  smells
• Awareness of sensory overload/ sensory
  defensiveness
• Awareness of sensory under-responsiveness

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What Is Important?

• If facts are the seeds that later produce
  knowledge and wisdom, then the emotions and
  impressions of the senses are the fertile soil in
  which seeds must grow. The years of early
  childhood are the time to prepare the soil. Once
  the emotions are aroused - a sense of the
  beautiful, the excitement of new and unknown, a
  feeling of sympathy, pity, admiration or love -
  then we wish for knowledge about the object of
  our emotional response. Once found, it has
  lasting meaning.
• -- Rachel Carson (1956, p.45)

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Thank-you

• References
• Play for all http//www.dessa.ie/publications_play
  forall.htm
• Creating Inclusive Outdoor Play Environments
  Designing For Abilities Rather Than Disability
• http//www.adventureislandplayground.org/Keith20C
  hristensen20article.PDF
• Designing for the Future Promoting Ecoliteracy
  in Childrens Outdoor Play Environments
• http//scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-051
  02006.../Ecoliteracy.pdf
• OT PRACTICE August 31, 2009 Promoting Accessible
  Playgrounds