Schools add cooperative games to playground

Cooperative games is an important part of new playground.

Old school yard favorites such as hopscotch and four square are re-emerging at the schools within Park Ridge – Niles Elementary District 64.

Parent and teacher volunteers have painted the playground surfaces of Roosevelt and Field Schools with “cooperative games” to create “Peaceful Playgrounds” – not just a concept but a trademark playground designs. Playgrounds at Franklin School are slated to be painted later in the school year.

Cheryll DeYoung, community information specialist for the district, said the Peaceful Playgrounds were funded by the PTO. In addition to blueprints and stencils, activity guides, rule books, a program overview video and problem-solving strategies are provided as part of the “kit.”

The company touts that it has packaged an ideal recess.

Amenities of Roosevelt School’s playground now include a map of the United States, letter and number grids which allow for multiple games, plus hopscotch and four square.

DeYoung said that while the playgrounds have been designed for recess, there is nothing that would prevent a teacher from incorporating some of the cooperative games into classroom programs. She said the letter grid can be used to spell out words and the map could be creatively integrated into social studies.

“Of course, everything that we are doing with civil behavior fits nicely with these playgrounds,” she said.

To date, only the teachers at Roosevelt have been fully trained on the rules of the games which make up the Peaceful Playgrounds.

DeYoung said students will start learning the “new” playground games at recess this school year. She said, “We weren’t finished painting the playground at Roosevelt until June 11 – a couple of days after the school year ended. None of the students really had an opportunity to use the playground yet, unless they just happened by.”

Additionally, on its Web site, Peaceful Playgrounds said its games reduce playground injuries. It read, “Each year over 200,000 children are injured on school playgrounds. The Peaceful Playgrounds program has been shown to reduce playground injuries by over 80 percent.”

In part, it said that this is the result of teaching students specific games with specific rules, as well as conflict resolution guidelines. Those guidelines include the following: “walk away from the problem; talk together with the person with whom you disagree until an agreement is reached; or use the ‘rock, paper, scissors’ game.”

According to its Web site, Peaceful Playgrounds received the American Association for Leisure and Recreation’s Friend of Recreation Award.