Deciding on the content of the site
What play and decorative elements to install on the playground depends on many factors: the age of the children, their number, personal preferences. And also from the place where it is equipped. This could be a spacious courtyard of your own house, or a small piece of lawn at your dacha, or the territory of a kindergarten, for which parents are often asked to come up with something interesting.
For example, here’s what you can do on the playground with your own hands in a kindergarten, if there is already a gazebo and a sandbox there:
- swing-balance;
- play transport - cars, trains, boats with benches for several children;
- obstacle course;
- animal figurines.
The materials used for decoration were pieces of plywood, old tires, plastic bottles and a barrel Source znamyatryda.ru
Ordinary swings, climbing walls and other similar structures would be inappropriate here, since it is difficult for educators to keep track of a large number of children and ensure their safety. But they can be installed on personal territory, be sure to think through ways to protect the child from possible injuries.
These methods include personal supervision, creating a soft covering on the playground, and providing a free zone around the swing or enclosing net on the trampoline. Much depends on the age of the children, their physical and mental development. In general, each case is individual.
But before you build a playground for your baby, you need to think about the future: he will grow, and his abilities and preferences will change. Other children may appear in the family. The children of your friends and acquaintances may come to visit your child. It is advisable to make it interesting for everyone, and game elements can be added or replaced.
Play complex for children of different ages Source babushkinadacha.ru
Where to place plastic containers?
This is a fertile material for exciting games, competitions and structures on the playground, built with your own hands. The straight wooden bridge will certainly be appreciated by young bowling fans. To do this you will need a dozen white plastic bottles filled with water or sand. It is not necessary to knock them down with special heavy balls; a football or basketball ball will do just fine.
Children's playground with house
Another idea for developing coordination and accuracy is to cut the containers to half. They can be hung on wire and thin rope or nailed to a wooden fence. The essence of the game is to hit these containers with a small ball. Not only plastic bottles will do, but also old mugs and tin cans.
What is better to buy
If you wish, you can do a lot yourself. But when it comes to how to make a playground with your own hands at the dacha, then it is better to buy some things. This applies to both individual game elements and their components:
- Swimming pool for kids. For small children, it is better to buy a small inflatable pool. It is safe - even if you fall on the sides, it is impossible to get hurt. The water in it warms up quickly, and it can be changed and washed frequently.
- Slide. This is one of the most difficult structures to make yourself with many elements: a slope, stairs, platform, fences. The most difficult thing is to make a safe ramp with good sliding properties. Plywood, even treated with varnish, quickly becomes unusable in the open air, metal gets very hot in the sun, and linoleum, which is often used to cover an inclined plane, wears out and spoils the appearance. Therefore, it is advisable to install a special plastic ramp. It can have different lengths and configurations, so the dimensions of the entire structure are initially adjusted to it.
Wooden slide with a plastic slope Source 1090983.ru
- Trampoline. This rather traumatic equipment, so beloved by children, must withstand a certain load, which is impossible to calculate on your own. Trampolines should be purchased with a fencing net or special handrails.
- Climbing wall hooks. They must be durable, easy to grip, with a rough but not traumatic surface, and high-quality fasteners. For inclined low climbing slides, it is allowed to make homemade holds from wood or other suitable materials. But for high vertical walls it is better to buy them.
Homemade climbing wall with wooden hooks and notches Source sport-marafon.ru
Sometimes it can be difficult to decide how to make a children’s playground in the country if the area is small and it is not possible to place everything that the child dreams of. In addition to play structures, children usually want to have their own secluded corner - a house in which they can store treasures, hide, and relax. But it is he who takes up a lot of space.
This problem is solved by making a house not on the ground, but on a tree or on high supports, under which a sandbox is built. But such a complex design requires experience and a decent set of tools, which not everyone has. A children's tent, which can be folded and put away if necessary, would be an excellent solution.
Game tent-house Source logikasporta.com
You can do everything else yourself or hire a specialist and give him a clear plan - where everything should be located and what it should look like.
Choosing and arranging a place for a playground
First of all, safety begins with choosing a place for children to play. Usually the location of the site is chosen at the stage of landscape design, but if the site is already in use, then make sure that the territory of the children's corner is somewhat shaded. This could be the shade of a house or a large tree. It is not necessary that the site be completely in the shade, but it is advisable that for most of the time there is a place on it where direct sunlight does not fall. If the landscape design of the site does not allow you to allocate a shaded corner for children, then you will have to build special awnings for protection from the sun, because often children simply cannot be removed from the swings or slides. To prevent your life from turning into a constant oscillation between the threat of a child’s heatstroke and a potential scandal due to unsuccessful attempts to force him to sit in the shade, resolve this issue at the stage of landscape design of the site.
Choose a place for children’s games that is clearly visible from different points of the site, and most importantly, from the windows of the house. Construction of children's playgrounds in remote secluded corners is not at all a suitable option, although at first glance it may seem that children will like just such solitude.
The next important factor is the coverage in the children's corner. Any options with a soft texture and good shock absorption are acceptable. This could be sand or grass, board flooring, or a special synthetic surface, such as crumb rubber mats. It is very important to first clear the surface of stones and level it. If everything is done correctly, even a fall will not cause serious harm to the child.
Pay attention to the surroundings of your children's corner. Make sure that poisonous plants, which grow in abundance in the gardens of central Russia, are not planted nearby. Remember that lilies of the valley, delphiniums, foxgloves, daffodils, broom, hellebore, etc. are familiar to our eyes. have poisonous parts and may harm your baby. The choice is simple: either do not deny yourself planting these flowers and do not take your eyes off the children, or clear the area around the playground from such plants. Remember: no one can guarantee you that a child will not think of cooking soup from poisonous lily of the valley berries while playing in the children's kitchen and feeding it to his friends.
If there is a body of water in the immediate vicinity of the place of play, then it is necessary to provide a fence between these objects in the form of a fence or a stretched mesh.
Bad neighborhood for the site - greenhouses. If it cannot be avoided, then the glass structures will be shatterproof or unbreakable.
Basic designs
Having decided on the content of the site, you need to choose a suitable place for it. It should be:
- clearly visible from home so that children’s games can be monitored;
- safe, located away from wells, reservoirs, and electrical equipment. And also from the beds that kids can trample in the excitement of play;
- spacious enough to accommodate everything planned.
If there is not much space, the gaming complex is made compact by combining several elements into one. For example, you can build a house on high supports, adding a ladder on one side, installing a slide on the other, and making a sandbox under it.
Advice! This arrangement of the sandbox will solve two more problems: it will protect the sand from rain and excess dampness, and the kids from the scorching sun. In any case, its long-term exposure must be limited by arranging this element in the shade of a tree, equipping it with an umbrella or canopy.
Sandbox-ship with a canopy Source domnomore.com
See also: Catalog of family house projects
Sandbox
This is the simplest design that anyone can do. The traditional option is a square or rectangular box made from boards. With a little imagination and changing the shape, the sandbox can be turned into a boat, a car or a house.
There are several nuances in making this game element:
- Having marked the place for the sandbox, you need to remove the fertile layer of soil from it so that weeds do not grow through the sand;
- so that water does not stagnate in the sand, the area is deepened to 20-30 cm, a pit is made in the middle and covered with gravel, and the bottom of the sandbox is made with a slight slope towards the pit;
- it can be covered with geotextile or film, having previously made slits in it for water drainage.
The easiest way is to connect the sides of the sandbox using corner bars. Additional rigidity of the structure will be given by triangular gussets at the corners, which will also serve as comfortable seats for children.
Homemade sandbox from boards Source koffkindom.ru
When thinking about how to make a playground with your own hands from scrap materials in the yard, you don’t have to use new building materials to make a sandbox. For this purpose, log cuts left over from the construction of a bathhouse, or old car tires are suitable.
Hemp treated with protective impregnation is simply dug in around the perimeter of the sandbox and tied along the internal contour with tarpaulin or plastic tape.
Sandbox made from wood cuts Source cs8.pikabu.ru
Tires are used differently depending on the size. If you have a large wheel from a tractor or truck, just cut off the inside of it and sand the cut or put a garden hose cut lengthwise on it.
A tire painted in bright colors is impossible to recognize Source b-online.ru
See also: Catalog of companies that specialize in equipping playgrounds and manufacturing decorative forms
Tires of small diameter are cut crosswise into 2 or 3 parts and dug into the ground vertically or laid in the shape of a flower, fastening the individual elements to each other. The result is soft sides that are pleasant to sit on and on which you cannot get hurt.
Advice! Children's sandboxes often become a latrine for their own and neighbor's cats. Therefore, you need to build a cover for them or sew an awning.
Swing
If there is no mature tree on the site with thick branches on which to hang a swing, supports with a crossbar are built for them. The material for them can be steel pipes, wooden beams with a cross-section of at least 10x10 cm, or logs of the same or slightly larger diameter.
The main thing is to ensure the stability of the supports, for which they are buried 50-80 cm into the ground and concreted.
U-shaped support for a swing Source moydomik.net
Video description
There is another option that is suitable for baby swings with a small swing amplitude - these are triangular supports with a crossbar and spacers that ensure structural rigidity.
Their production is shown in the video: A swing seat can be bought or made from a variety of materials, not just wood. For example, from the same old car tires, a plastic chair without legs or a steel hoop. The easiest way is to braid it with strong ribbons or belts. And for the little ones, it’s better to make a soft seat by wrapping the hoop in several layers of foam rubber and sewing a fabric cover.
Swing made of steel hoop, canvas slings, foam rubber and fabric Source i.ibb.co
The swing is hung on chains, slings or a strong rope. To prevent them from fraying and squeaking, carabiners are attached to them, which are attached to rings or hooks on the crossbar. This fastening will allow you to remove the swing during rain and winter and bring it into the house, hanging it from a hook in the ceiling, a horizontal bar or in a doorway.
Balancers and spring rockers
Children sometimes build such rocking chairs themselves by simply laying a board across a log lying on the ground. The design turns out to be quite inconvenient and unstable, but it “works”. And if you are already deciding how to make a playground with your own hands from scrap materials at the dacha, then improve it by making a support of a suitable height and securing the board to it using a hinge or an ordinary long bolt threaded through the holes in the support and a block screwed to the board below.
Playground for children 7-12 years old
The design of the playground for children of this age group is carried out in accordance with the level of their physical development. This allows you to organize entertainment for a minor without the presence of an adult.
Playground for children of primary school age Source weller.ru
Organization of a climbing wall for children 7-12 years old Source pinimg.com
Preference is given to games of a competitive nature, for which it is best to equip a sports and gaming complex:
- Handlebar.
- Horizontal bar.
- Rope.
- Swedish wall.
A labyrinth, a rope ladder, and a climbing wall will also come in handy.
Video description
An example of such a rocking chair, made from several short bars and a long board, is shown in the video:
Something similar can be made from a short board attached to half a tire. Depending on its diameter, you will get a rocking chair for one or two children. The main thing is to sand the wooden parts well and make comfortable handrails for the child to hold on to while riding.
Rocking balancer for two Source i.ibb.co
Video description
Look at what a complex and interesting obstacle course can be made from the simplest materials: construction pallets, logs, rope and bars:
Don’t forget to install benches on the site for relaxation and quiet games. A small table wouldn't hurt either. This furniture is also easy to make from boards or stumps of different diameters and heights.
Those who like to draw with crayons will love the smooth sheet of plywood, painted with chalkboard paint and fixed at a convenient height. Targets nailed to a tree or fence will allow you to practice your accuracy when shooting with a bow, a pistol, or even a slingshot.
Take care of yourself too - find a cozy place for a sun lounger near the playground, where you can sit with a book or knitting, without letting the children out of your sight.
Do-it-yourself fences for the playground
Colorful fences and stumps around the perimeter of the children's playground are another way to cheer up. Most often used for these purposes:
- cutting boards;
- logs sawn into “stumps”;
- colored plastic bottles strung on a rope.
Large playground for children
Plastic bottles do not require painting; the main thing in choosing these parts is the color combination. Wooden fence slats can be painted in rainbow colors. A good idea is to give children the opportunity to show their creative inclinations and paint the picket fence themselves. Funny people, animals or anything else - let them draw what they want.
As an addition, let the teenagers paint real graffiti on the wall of an old barn or fence adjacent to the property. Just let them and their parents agree on the sketch of the drawing or inscription.
Children's playground design
