I’ve spent the past few weeks travelling. My goal was to help local groups advocate for children’s play. First, I visited Il Foro de Desarrollo Infantil in Bogota. For those who speak English, this is the Child Development Forum,
In addition to the TV, print, and radio interviews, I had the opportunity to speak with some incredible professionals. These front-line workers were both dedicated and enthusiastic. Many of them combine various roles, such as supporting play alongside food banks or helping entire families in crisis.
Bringing Pop-Up Adventure Play to Cairo
After that, I returned home to repack. Then, it was time to head to Cairo. The Canadian International School of Egypt was hosting Egypt’s first Pop-Up Adventure Playground! This event was organised by the amazing Lola Bradford. She brought together an incredibly dedicated team of teachers and even arranged custom uniforms for us all!
After the day’s play, we gathered up the houses that had survived to bring them to an exhibition space in the school’s lobby. For the last children, it left a beautifully strange “children’s city” of cardboard and paint.
I feel even luckier than usual to be part of Pop-Up Adventure Play, to have the chance for all this fun travel and to meet people all over the world who care about children’s play. Everywhere I went people talked about fear of public space, the rigours of academic over-scheduling, the collapse of social networks as people increasingly relocate for work. While so much is different in every community, it seems that we share so many problems internationally.
The power of play and exciting new training opportunities
Play is a universal instinct, it’s central to our humanity and essential to our happiness. When we come together in support of children’s play, whether locally or across huge distances, we feel less alone, we are inspired by the new friends we meet and the ideas they share with us.
All of this contributes to my next exciting news, that we are proud to launch our very first online training opportunity, called the Playworker Development Course! We’ve designed it for people of all backgrounds who are interested in supporting children’s play. Over the course of 12 modules it addresses such key issues as:
- improving any environment for play;
- essential theory and practice;
- risk/benefit assessments;
- developing communities around play.
Of course, there’s much more to it than that! Every student gets key readings and assignments, and access to a private online discussion forum. Students can sign up independently or be part of a group. All of our course tutors are experienced, trained UK playworkers, dedicated to inspiring and supporting playworkers in settings all over the world.
If you’re interested in learning more about the course, email us morgan@popupadventureplay.org and we will send you more info!
By Morgan
