Playground Surfaces & Why They Really Matter
Children are going to have accidents in the playground, no matter what the apparatus, the playground surface, or what we teach them. There will always be show offs and kids who think they are clever, who use swings as climbing frames, or seesaws as circus training apparatus. Unfortunately, even the best behaved child can lose their balance and injure themselves.
You might think that children having accidents in playgrounds is not a common occurrence – you would be wrong. It is such a common occurrence that several lawyer firms have specialized knowledge on playground accidents and how to pursue compensation.
According to the Child Accident Prevention Trust, over 200,000 children under 14 years, are treated in emergency departments for playground related injuries, and that’s just the serious ones like dislocations, broken bones and amputations. This does not even the additional hundreds and thousands of minor injuries, cuts and bruises.
75% of these serious accidents are caused by falls, so having a playground surface, like rubber mulch, that helps take the impact of a fall away would greatly reduce the number of these accidents.
Obviously an ankle that gets dislocated, resulting from getting tangled in a swing chain won’t be affected by what playground surface is used, but a head first fall, or any type of fall from apparatus would benefit from a rubber mulch surface, rather than a concrete one. The surface type could mean the difference between a cracked head and concussion, or a child, just standing up, shaking themselves off, and then carrying on with normal play – no worse for wear.
Why not take a look at the playgrounds in your area, what are the playground surfaces? If the surfaces are not rubber mulch, consider writing to your local councillor and demanding that they use rubber mulch. If you do that, you can be safe in the knowledge that you are helping reduce serious playground accidents.
Further Reading: My Own Playground Experience as a Child
April 15th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
[...] then you need to think about the equipment, different age ranges, sturdiness and even cost. The surface of the playground is just as important as the equipment and the location of the play area, for example can you see it [...]