Playground Safety

Dangerous conditions on playgrounds, including equipment malfunctions, poor surface designs, and reckless behavior, cause thousands of child injuries every year in the United States. In fact, one study found that on average, over 200,000 children are treated in emergency rooms for injuries they suffered while on a playground.

In order to keep your children safe, it is important that you familiarize yourself with playground safety tips so that you can be aware of your child's safety in nearly any playground situation.

Adult Supervision

One of the easiest ways to prevent playground injuries is to make sure that all children on a playground are supervised at all times by a responsible adult. In fact, many playground injuries that do happen could have easily been prevented with adequate supervision and intervention.

Before taking your child to a new playground, you should inspect the facilities and make sure that there is a place for parents to supervise the children on the playground equipment, and that every part of the playground is visible from that location.

Additionally, it is a good idea to examine the behaviors of children on the playground. Many families will frequent the same playground, and so if you visit a playground where all the children seem to be overly aggressive, you may want to consider looking for a different place to visit.

Playground Surface Design

As children run and play it is inevitable that at some point in time they will fall down. Because of this, the surface design is one of the most important safety features in playgrounds. If the surface on a playground is hard and unforgiving, a child that falls down is likely to suffer serious injuries.

Some things to look for when examining a playground's surface include:
· A soft and cushioning material such as sand, shredded rubber, mulch, or pea gravel. All of these materials will provide much needed cushioning in the event that a child falls down.
· Surface material should be at least 12 inches deep for playground equipment that is at least 8 feet high.
· Surface material should not be tightly packed, as this reduces the cushioning ability of the material.
· The playground surface, as well as all playground equipment, should be kept free of hazardous materials like metal or glass