Abridged version: Garden maintenance for playspaces

By Tess Michaels, Sr

Garden Maintenance for Playspaces is a comprehensive guide to the inspection and maintenance of playgrounds, playspaces and playscapes.

The guide includes an all-inclusive inspection check-list as well as reporting proformas for incidents/accidents and any other events that may compromise the safety of your environment.

Contemporary research addresses common misconceptions and misinformation about safety practices and procedures, giving you greater choice and peace of mind.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tess Michaels, Sr
• Release date: Aug 7, 2012
• ISBN: 9780987205407

Tess Michaels, Sr

Tess Michaels is a natural playspace and landscape designer, early childhood teacher and workshop presenter with a passion for natural play and sustainable outdoor environments for children of all ages.

Book preview

Garden Maintenance for Playspaces

Published by Tess Michaels & David Reed at Smashwords

Copyright 2012 Tess Michaels and David Reed

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author

"We don't own the land, the land owns us. The land is my mother, my mother is the land. Land is the starting point to where it all began. It's like picking up a piece of dirt and saying this is where I started and this is where I'll go. The land is our food, our culture, our spirit and identity".

Knight S., 1996, Our Land Our Life, card, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, Canberra

By helping young children know and relate to the soul-making aspects of the natural world, we connect them to enduring sources of strength, wonder and joy

Rachel Carson, 1956, Help your child to wonder

We would like to thank the following people for their timely advice, professional perspectives, field testing and general all around encouragement.

Dr Philip J. Landrigan, MD, MSc, Professor of Pediatrics, Director, Children's Environmental Health Center, Mount Sinai School of Medicine. New York

Fran Hughes, Randwick TAFE, School of Childs Studies, Randwick, New South Wales, Australia

Katherine Morgan, The Point Preschool, Oyster Bay, New South Wales, Australia

Rebecca Andrews, John Brotchie Nursery School, Botany, New South Wales, Australia

Con and Mary Kakakios, Kids Cottage, Gladesville, New South Wales, Australia

About

Tessa Rose Playspace and Landscape Design

Tessa Rose Landscapes is a naturalistic playspace design company focused on creating natural, sustainable and inspiring play environments. Tess also has a comprehensive Australian blog site focused on design, children's play and development with heaps of links to resources, literature, audio and visual downloads and presentations.

Tess Michaels

Tess Michaels is a natural playspace and landscape designer, early childhood teacher and workshop presenter with a passion for natural play and sustainable outdoor environments for children of all ages.

Tess has a background in early childhood education initially as a teacher then as a director and is a member of Early Childhood Australia. She has worked in an assortment of centres, both private and commercial, community and religious based; she has also worked in varying capacities in Local, State and Federal government Childcare organisations. Tess has a Diploma in Horticulture & Landscape design and is a member of The Australian Institute of Horticulture.

Her experience in all these positions led her to believe that it is essential for children in early childhood to have access to natural, stimulating and aesthetic outdoor environments.

David Reed

David has a background in Early childhood and Before and after care, working with ages 0-15 whilst studying to obtain an Associate Diploma in Child studies and a Certificate lll in Horticulture & Landscape construction. David operates his own garden maintenance business specialising in the construction and maintenance of naturalistic playspaces.

Disclaimer: Any products referenced in this guide are mentioned because they have been used in the construction of playspaces designed by Tessa Rose or in the maintenance of the same. The products were chosen on the basis that they’re functional, durable, low maintenance and child friendly. No consideration financial or otherwise was provided to mention them. Any chemical product mentioned should be used in accordance with the manufacturer’s directions and a MSDS should be obtained and read prior to their application. Links to international Safety and MSDS providers can be found here, for Australia here. If you have any doubt whatsoever about the use of any product within a children’s service DO NOT USE IT and seek professional advice for alternatives. Any photos used in this publication are either Property of Tessa Rose, derived from a Creative Commons photographic database (where commercial use is allowed providing attribution is provided) or if derived from a blog or website they are used in the form of a pictorial hyperlink to the original site (all property, intellectual and copyrights are retained by those sites)

Copyright © David Reed and Tess Michaels, 2012.

This work is copyright. All rights reserved. Apart from any use permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced by any process, nor may any other exclusive right be exercised, without the permission of the authors. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, by any person without the written permission of the authors. The views expressed in this book are those of the authors. Sydney, Australia, 2012.

Given that this is the first printing of this type of document I’m certain I have forgotten something, probably a number of something’s.

I welcome your constructive criticism, constructive advice and specific information about maintenance practices that you perform that are geographically and culturally specific. Acknowledgement of the author of the information will be detailed in any subsequent printing.

Please feel free to contact us at [e-mail] or [e-mail] or drop by and say G’Day at http://tessaroselandscapes.blogspot.com/.

Playspace Maintenance

Whilst every consideration is given to the design of a safe playspace, playspaces can cause injuries if they are not maintained in a suitable condition. Playspaces need to be inspected and maintained regularly to ensure the health and safety of all those using them.

This manual is for the use of educators, parents (and in supervised circumstances, children) who want to be involved in the maintenance of their playspaces. The manual covers the Who, What and Where questions and the appendices provide checklists, proformas for reports and letters and research. You should check your own countries advisory guidelines for specific information about National, State, Parish or Territory children’s playspace standards.

Inspections

Routine visual inspections of the playspace should be carried out by staff and may be necessary each day for playspaces that are subject to heavy use. Operational inspections should be carried out every 3 months and comprehensive inspections should be carried out annually. If you’re unsure or uncertain of your capacity to carry out an inspection, contact KidSafe in your state or the authorised inspection service in your country.

Routine visual inspection - The daily routine visual inspection is required to identify obvious hazards. (e.g. damaged parts, loss of soft surfacing or surface grip).

Operational inspection - The operational inspection is a more detailed inspection to check the operation and stability of the play structures and surfaces, especially looking for any wear.

Comprehensive inspection - The comprehensive inspection is done to assess, preferably annually, the overall safety of the playspace. This includes the structural integrity of items subject to the subtle effects of use, weather, corrosion and rotting. This inspection also assesses any change in the safety of the playspace resulting from repairs made, or added or replaced components.

Supervision: Appropriate supervision of playspaces must be ensured so that accident and injury can be avoided. Educators in the playspace environment must be aware of the potential dangers and develop suitable rules of play for playspace usage.

Accident trends: Accidents and injuries can result from play. Where an item in a playspace or a manner of play is linked to a number of incidents/accidents, alteration of the item or behaviour might be required. To monitor incident/accident trends, records should include details of location and associated play.

The Health and Safety Inspection Checklist (Appendix A) provides guidance on what to look for when inspecting playspaces. A system of regular inspections, maintenance and upgrading of the playspace should then be adopted. Consideration should be given to the allocation of funds for this purpose.

The Incident/Accident reporting form (Appendix B) can be used to detail all information about events that occur within the playspace, the results and what remedial corrective actions need to occur to avoid subsequent problems.

Maintenance

The following pages provide information about the establishment of components within playspaces and list details of periodic maintenance that should be carried out for them to retain their vitality and safety.

How to use this guide – Each