Remember the playgrounds you used to play on? They were made of metal and wood and hard surfaces. There weren’t safety features or soft things. Monkey bars. Swings. Walls to climb. The good ‘ol days! Well, one Vancouver municipality is hoping to bring some risk back to playgrounds to better prepare kids for real life.
The new playground will contain ziplines, swings and different rope courses, all designed to help kids learn to take risks, but still in a relatively safe environment. Sure, they might fall and skin a knee, but researchers believe that it’s better than the child not taking the risk in the first place. They say that learning to take risks helps better prepare kids for real life, whereas kids that do not take risks are more likely to suffer from anxiety and depression later in life.
