Play Today

These highly imaginative and exciting play structures from Copenhagen, Denmark are the work of a playground design group called MONSTRUM. A group of artists and theatrical set-designers, MONSTRUM focuses on visual design, motor challenges, safety, and they believe that, "playground design should be a reflection of the world surrounding us."

I certaintly hope there aren't giant spiders rampaging across the streets of Copenhagen, but if there are, I'm glad to see they've inspired these incredibly imaginative play structures.

There are many more interesting designs and pictures of the playgrounds above on the MONSTRUM website. What's the most interesting play structure you have seen? Have you added it to the Map of Play yet?

Introducing a whole new way to follow KaBOOM!-- the KaBOOM! Tumblr blog!

Tumblr is a super-easy way to blog photos, quotes, links, and much more. It’s an elegant and simple way to share things on the internet, but more importantly, it has produced a vibrant, fun, and often hilarious community of bloggers that has helped us discover stories about playgrounds we might not have found in other social networks.

The KaBOOM! Tumblr blog has been running since June. Take a look at some of our most popular and favorite posts, and if you are a Tumblr user, visit our page and follow us!

Cute dog in a swing - found on 9/30/2011

Bubble hearts mural on a basketball court - found on 9/13/2011

In this post, a fellow Tumblr blogger discovers that KaBOOM! is a real organization and not the elaborate prank as depcited on Parks and Recreation:

Pleading ignorance here that KaBOOM! was merely an "elaborate prank" disguised as a non-profit playground-building organization on NBC's 'Parks and Recreation.'  But not so, which makes it even more awesomesauce, to use an appropriate term of art. 

Quote found on 6/21/2011

Good use of imagination at the playground - found on 10/19/2011

Finally, one of our followers was kind enough to explain what this is:

There were all different colours of these "spinning eggs", I'm not sure what their actual name was, that was just what everyone called them as kids. It was basically a pole with a disc in the center which you grabbed and 'turned', though the actual 'egg' would turn, the pole was cemented into the ground. So you were basically turning this giant egg with you and another inside it, faster and faster. They were great fun but a rarity these days as they are deemed "too dangerous" for small children. Quite a shame really ): But hey - your Tumblr and organization is great! I love it! Glad I discovered you!

Found on 7/15/2011

You can see much, much more when you visit the KaBOOM! Tumblr blog!

This afternoon at the White House, the First Lady convened a task force of childhood obesity experts, government officials, industry leaders and community activists to come up with a strategy on how to make communities healthier for children. For more than four hours, they discussed how to provide healthy food at schools; improve access to healthy, affordable food in local communities; and get kids more physically active.

Access to playgrounds was a big part of the physical activity break-out session, and the panel came up with the following recommendations:

• Extend the school day and include physical activity as a key part of the day
• Define "physical activity" and make sure the definition is not just limited to include sports
• Focus on the built environment with play spaces that are NOT just for team sports
• Create safe walking routes to parks
• Invest in parks infrastructure
• Promote joint-use agreements as a way to increase access to existing spaces
• Aggregate and disseminate replicable best practices
• Focus on engaging parents

We couldn't agree more and look forward to working with communities across the country to implement some of these recommendations.

For more details and to read the First Lady's opening remarks, check out the official White House Blog.