of Sierra at Tahoe. Here is a video of the Riglet Park from the Canyons resort. It aims to make snowboarding fun in a safe environment. There  is a raised platform with ramps for children to slide down. The platform is equipped with a "stay-steady" area to give children their first taste of balancing. Riglet Park is designed for riding small gradients, mini rails, pyramids and mini half-pipes so children can develop their reflexes and find their balance on turns and steeper terrain. On the snow, children are equipped with specialised Burton equipment, featuring a retractable strap attached to the snowboard that allows the instructor to guide the child easily. This makes for rapid progress through the various modules. This new concept strikes a chord with everything that Annie Famose has been doing for 35 years at the Village des Enfants says the resort: making sure children have fun while they learn in a 5-hectare snow garden, with special mini-pistes with bumps, slides, coloured tracks, jumps, a rope-tow and beginners' drag-lift. Parents and older children can watch and admire - or go skiing and snowboarding themselves in the huge Portes du Soleil ski area. Avoriaz is one of the best resorts in the Alps for families and recently it won the award for the best family resort in the World Snow Awards - we reported on the awards ceremony here on PlanetSKI. Avoriaz has a huge _200m programme of improvements for this winter that we will be reporting on later