Safe, healthy child care environments for all children, including those with special health needs. The Healthy Child Care America Blueprint for Action presents five goals for health and safety in child care, and suggests 10 action steps to achieve them. In each issue, this column will focus on one goal, and discuss action steps to reach it. Promote safe, healthy, and developmentally appropriate environments for all children in child care.
Active play has countless benefits.
Properly supervised play areas equipped with materials that are developmentally appropriate, properly installed, and carefully maintained, encourage important creative learning. A thoughtfully planned playground offers endless opportunities for safe and challenging fun. At the same time, attention to playground safety is a critical priority. A total of 200,000 children suffer reported injuries on America's playgrounds each year. The largest number of playground injuries occur during the first few weeks of a new school year on school playgrounds and at the beginning of the summer months on park playgrounds.