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adventure:play | play:ground

Aug 28, 2015 11:41 am

Play and Adven­ture. If you’re a kid, these words go hand-in-hand. But in a world where grown-ups are hyper-vig­i­lant about safe­ty, and kids lives are heav­i­ly pro­grammed, a lot of play has lost its sense of explo­ration and dis­cov­ery. To com­bat the loss of auton­o­my, ​“adven­ture play­grounds” have come roar­ing onto the play scene. These play­grounds allow kids to build, imag­ine and take risks on their own while still in a safe space. While this move­ment is not new (it’s actu­al­ly be around for 60 years, the vision of a Dan­ish land­scape archi­tect), it’s gain­ing momen­tum in the Unit­ed States and around the world. Adven­ture play­grounds allow kids a space that is entire­ly their own. These play­grounds are not only fun, they teach kids how to func­tion in real world social set­ting through self-direct­ed play and team build­ing, help­ing to devel­op deci­sion-mak­ing pow­er, imag­i­na­tion and contemplation. 

For two days this sea­son (Sep­tem­ber 19 and 20), Gov­er­nors Island will host its own adven­ture play­ground, pre­sent­ed by play:ground and Fig­ment. Kids ages 3 – 12 will col­lab­o­rate to build a city of their own imag­i­na­tion uses pro­vid­ed mate­ri­als like card­board box­es, fab­ric, mark­ers, string, tape, and more. Come have an adven­ture with us!