A swing with a hard wooden seat and a tall steel slide...

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cinnaminson said:
A lot of kids these days wouldn't be able to play safely in a "traditional" playground. They just aren't used to using their bodies and knowing what they can and can't do safely.

This seems like a massive problem to me.
 
cinnaminson said:
A lot of kids these days wouldn't be able to play safely in a "traditional" playground. They just aren't used to using their bodies and knowing what they can and can't do safely.

what do you mean by this?
 
sorry. I mean that a lot of kids aren't used to climbing, jumping, swinging around and that sort of thing. When I was a kid we would be on the monkey bars all day and get callouses on our hands or climbing up the big pyramid and hanging off at all sorts of weird angles.
If kids aren't used to lots of physical activity then they don't know their limits and are more likely to hurt themselves.





Geez, I sound like a granny, "in my day":madwife:
 
Yeah, seriously.

Kids need to get off the Wii and start taking chances, making mistakes, and getting messy,

This week: Jourmey to the Centre of the Colon

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I live in Southern Nevada where temps easily reach 120F in the summer. If we had steel slides here half the kids would be in the hospital due to third degree burns on their butts.
 
it's interesting -- we can talk about the nanny state/lawsuits all we want, but i remember splinters, smashed heads, shredded knees, and too many near-misses, every single one of which turns my stomach when i look back as an adult.

we view seatbelts in cars as an advancement, we view airbags in cars as an advancement, why don't we look at safer playground equipment as an advancement? no one is advocating that kids be kept in a rubber room, but if you've ever seen a 5 year old spring across the blacktop, trip, fall, and rip up his knees and hands, then you might not feel so badly about rubber padding.

injuries are only a good thing in hindsight. i don't get all of this nostalgia -- it's like saying that kids were tougher and thusly better because kids used to work on the farm and lose limbs in the farming equipment.
 
If it makes playgrounds safer, I'm all for it. :up:

I was lucky as a kid - only a few scrapes and bruises, no broken bones. But, that said, I'm sort of in agreement with Irvine - all of this "we broke bones, and smashed our elbows and lived to tell the tales" nostalgia is all fine and good, but I think the reason why this primarily exists is because the culture nowadays tends to view/treat children as coddled creatures who for some, if they scrape their knee or break a bone, it will be the end of the world. And if they do, a brand new cell phone or iPod will make it all better.

But that's an entirely different subject matter altogether.
 
^oh, i agree.

i just don't think that safer playgrounds = spoiled children.

i do think that scrape your knee= get a new iPod = spoiled child.
 
Yeah, I've never understood that kind of nostalgia. I hope my post wasn't read like that, the :up: was sarcastic. That metal slide putting a gash in my leg isn't anything to be nostalgic about... It hurt like a bitch, so did the shots... I honestly don't really understand this thread. How can well being and safer options be looked at as bad things. Do we wish we still had lead based paint as well?
 
i think some people rightly think that parents are overprotective of children. there was that thread about how all men are being treated like predators, and that seemed like a valid point. there's lots of media hysteria, some of it justified, some of it not, regarding the safety of children, and nothing, but nothing, is going to attract women viewers between the ages of 18-45 more than if you tell them their children are under attack, but there are the following things you can do to protect them.

i do think that kids, on the whole, are more coddled than they used to be. i do think that kids should be outside more than inside playing Wii. i do think that being allowed to roam sparks an active imagination. i do think that there are too many rules at school and, say, at the public pool (where i lifeguarded for years, and i did think it was insanely over regulated).

so i understand the impulse, but i don't think that safer playground equipment comes into play here. if you were the unlucky kid who stepped on a rusty nail and had to get shots, or fell off the slide and broke your leg and missed the 2nd half 3rd grade, or got his hand crushed by the metal merry-go-round, i don't think you'd feel so nostalgic.

i view these things like seatbelts and airbags. there's nothing wrong with being safe. there's nothing wrong with not breaking your arm. and i don't see how it impedes fun, but then again, what's fun about stepping on a rusty nail?

seems like that swing mentioned in the first post is loads of fun, until the rotting wood snaps and the child goes flying and breaks his tailbone on a rock and has to miss playing soccer for the rest of the fall.
 
I think the safer playground, and the larger issue of whole generations of Americans having no clue how to deal with adversity, loss, negative feedback, etc, are mutually exclusive. I grew up in an urban area, and took tons of spills as a kid, but, I don't think needing stitches and getting concussions helped make me whoever it is that I am today. Well, the memory loss can be attributed to my childhood, but, beyond that, nothing. Keeping kids safe while doing things that leigitmately can cause injury should be encouraged and applauded, in my opinion.
 
What exactly are the social benefits to keeping old-style playgrounds around? And do those benefits outweigh all the safety issue?
 
Irvine511 said:
seems like that swing mentioned in the first post is loads of fun, until the rotting wood snaps and the child goes flying and breaks his tailbone on a rock and has to miss playing soccer for the rest of the fall.

And the school district has to pay out millions in a settlement with the kid's parents.
 
anitram said:
What exactly are the social benefits to keeping old-style playgrounds around?

Getting to feel all nostalgic?

:rolleyes:

My issue with the initial post is that it just seems so intellectually lazy. Like a lot of things, it has that "gut" ring of. . .truthiness about it, but when you really examine the case being made closely--as has been done on this thread--you realize what a lot of bollocks it really is.
 
bonosgirl84 said:
I live in Southern Nevada where temps easily reach 120F in the summer. If we had steel slides here half the kids would be in the hospital due to third degree burns on their butts.
I grew up in Australia, where it gets to 40 degrees Celcius easy in the summer and we DID burn our arses on the metal slides in the summer. :D We also had monkey bars with nothing but asphalt underneath and I'm sure I remember one kid falling off onto their heads. And then what about the backyard swing? My Dad made me one from rope and a plank. I never got a splinter, while my hyper cousin jumped off and broke his arm. Fool!
 
I do remember fondly the metal slides (on the rare occasions I was in an area with them and was able to make myself climb that high). Those suckers were slick and fast, but they were also really hot in the summer sun. I don't remember anyone getting hurt much (some scrapes and bruises), but there weren't ever many kids around either.

Everything changes and moves on -- if it didn't we'd be wearing bearskin pelts and beating our food to death with clubs. :shrug:
 
indra said:
Everything changes and moves on -- if it didn't we'd be wearing bearskin pelts and beating our food to death with clubs. :shrug:

ah, bearskin pelts. . .now THOSE were the days!
 
maycocksean said:
My issue with the initial post is that it just seems so intellectually lazy. Like a lot of things, it has that "gut" ring of. . .truthiness about it, but when you really examine the case being made closely--as has been done on this thread--you realize what a lot of bollocks it really is.

Congratulations. We have a winner.
 
You wanna see a regulated "play ground"? Step into any competitive gymnastics gym in North America. Sometimes I think I spent more time learning which combinations of mats can be stacked and how they can/cannot touch other mats...Seemed dumb at the time, until a kid did a dismount onto mats that were not placed correctly and broke a leg because of it.

Anyway, I don't see the big deal here. Safer play ground equipment. Safety or reduced liability....sounds like a win-win to me.
 
the iron horse said:

Yeah, it's killed millions....if you believe the hype.

It's not that it kills children, it's that it makes them stupid and a pain in the ass to deal with.
 
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