Abstract
Children’s health includes physiological, psychological, cognitive, behavioral and other aspects of health. Playing in nature has been demonstrated to have irreplaceable benefits for children’s health. However, the urban built-up environment devours the natural play space and aggravates children’s problems. Since the 1990s, people have gradually realized the importance of nature and play, thus began to explore the natural children’s playground. The COVID-19 pandemic also makes people pay greater attention to the natural and healthy living environment. The urban park is an important place for children to play freely. It is of great significance to explore the natural design of its playground. Starting from the connotation and function of nature, games and playgrounds, this paper analyzes children’s preference for playgrounds. In addition, combined with the previous researches, five thoughts on the planning and design of natural playgrounds in urban parks are summarized: (1) The natural environment should be accessible and approachable; (2) The original natural objects and the natural products are suitable to coexist; (3) The undulating terrain can be combined with the flat grassland; (4) The dynamic and diversity of natural elements is very important; (5) The balance between safety and adventure is also needed. Finally, it is proposed that children’s choice priority and use characteristics of various play elements can be further studied to guide planning and design more accurately.
Highlights
Childhood is a critical period for physical, mental and cognitive development
The results showed that compared with the traditional playground, children used natural materials to play more kinds of games in the natural playground, the frequency of chase and hide & seek was higher, physical activities were more active, and the time to interrupt the activities was less, especially among boys [1]
Childhood experience is of great significance to one's life
Summary
Childhood is a critical period for physical, mental and cognitive development. Children are more deeply affected by their surroundings than people of other ages [1]. There, children’s bodies are integrated with nature in a free posture, bringing precious childhood memories to children [3] These spaces have changed or no longer exist due to the urbanization process in the past few decades. Children can only be limited to procedural activities: waiting in line, going up, drilling through, sliding down, and re-queuing [5] In these "purified" spaces, children’s play becomes a kind of in-situ movement carried out by moving local limbs [6]. The children’s playground in the park is an essential place to undertake children’s activities It should provide children with ample opportunities to contact with nature, play freely and communicate smoothly. How to integrate the diverse elements of nature into urban park playgrounds is a key issue that needs to be further explored
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