Children are naturally active, which means when given the space and freedom, they will play without hesitation. So why aren’t children exercising outdoors at day care? About 75 percent of preschool-aged kids go to a day care facility for most of the day while their parents are working. While at day care, those children spend 70 to 83 percent of their time indoors. Dr. Kristen Copeland, a pediatrician at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, has been trying to figure out why day care teachers are not allowing the kids to play outdoors. From her research, she has learned that day care administrators think that playing outdoors risks injuries and is too dangerous without parental supervision. She also learned that many preschools do not have proper playground equipment due to the cost. Some teachers even go far enough to blame poor weather or the children’s unfit clothing for not playing outdoors.
When I was younger, my mother was a single mom and had to go to work. That means that I had to go to a day care facility during the day when my mother was not home. At my day care, they had multiple sets of playground equipment outdoors including tunnels, swings, slides, ladders, bridges and all sorts of fun toys. In the rare case of a bloody knee or scraped elbow, they would help the child and give them a band-aid. Children playing on the playground is definitely not a hazard.
A local day care called Kid’s Discovery Learning Center has a white bus that they parade the children around with on field trips. I’ve seen them at CiCi’s Pizza, but they probably go to many other places over forty-five miles away just for a meal… Day cares have the funds, they just do not want to use it on a playground for the students.
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