Help Your School Take Action - Creating Healthy Opportunities

Great Playgrounds

• Benefits & Ideas for Making School Grounds Attractive
• Planning and Design

"By the end of Grade 6, students will have spent 1,800 hours or 257 schools days in their schoolyard".

-the Canadian Biodiversity Institute's School Grounds Transformation website

Most school grounds consist of large areas of worn down grass and asphalt. Often there is very little for children to do, which can contribute to conflict on the playground.

Benefits of Making School Grounds Attractive

Benefits

These are just some of the many benefits of transforming school grounds into appealing, natural spaces for play and learning:

• Attractive, natural playgrounds encourage imaginative play, exploration and discovery.
• Shade protects children and staff from harmful ultraviolet rays.
• Natural playgrounds provide opportunities for outdoor learning with practical hands-on activities that bring fun and excitement into lessons.
• Having natural surroundings available makes certain areas of the curriculum (e.g., science and the environment) easier to relate to.
• Colour and beauty create a sense of belonging and school pride.
• Discipline problems on the playground and in class are reduced.

Ideas

Consider these ideas for making your school grounds or playground more appealing.

• Instead of children competing for time on one or two "pieces of playground equipment", spread out a number of smaller structures like obstacle course activities, climbing structures, sand boxes and tunnels.
• Create shady, natural seating areas for quiet play and socialization using logs and a few flat rocks.
• Plant climbing vines to cover unsightly areas or screen out traffic.
• Use native shrubs, vines and wildflowers to attract birds and butterflies.
• Build gazebos or put up shade sails. If they're large enough, they can function as an outdoor classroom.
• Add artwork in the form of canvas murals that roll down to protect against sun or wind.

Planning and Design

School Grounds Transformation
The Canadian Biodiversity Institute's website provides a wealth of information and ideas to help schools transform their playgrounds from asphalt to natural spaces for play and learning. Includes information on surveying the school community, sources of funding, plant ideas and types of projects.

Evergreen
Evergreen is a non-profit environmental organization that helps schools create healthy dynamic outdoor spaces. Contains an inspirational workshop presentation to motivate your school to get started as well as comprehensive resources on planning, designing and implementing your project.

Eco Schools
This program was developed by Evergreen and the Toronto District School Board to help schools design for increased shade. Includes tips to involve the school community in the site design; how to analyze and plan the site and develop a fundraising strategy.

Funding

Budgeting and Fundraising
A chapter on the Evergreen site that covers setting a budget, asking for community and corporate donations, determining potential sources of funding and writing funding proposals.

Evergreen Funding Application
Access Evergreen's Funding Application, helpful application and proposal writing tips and recommended lists of native plants and shrubs.

Tree Canada
Learn the steps you can take to 'green' your school grounds and apply for funding through Tree Canada.

Teacher Resources

Evergreen
Contains lesson plans for the 'outdoor classroom' linked to the Ontario curriculum as well as strategies for outdoor class management.

Tree Canada
Check out native tree species, what they look like, where they grow and why they're important to us.

Green Teacher
Publishes books and a quarterly magazine (print and online) with ready-to-use learning activities about the environment.