goodideas Making Play a Priority in Cities Around

the Globe

The Brookings Institution has announced that its Center for Universal Education (CUE) in the Global Economy and Development program has received a $24 million grant – the largest in Brookings’s history – from the LEGO Foundation. The fouryear grant supports CUE’s strategic vision focused on holistic education, locally-defined priorities, and deep collaboration with partners.

As urban populations continue to grow globally, so too are disparities in economic opportunity. Meanwhile, the availability of enriching social and learning experiences for children decreases. In 2020, to help address that need, CUE and the Bass Center for Transformative Placemaking launched the Playful Learning Landscapes City Network.

Interest in Playful Learning Landscapes (PLL), a movement that seeks to transform cities into playful learning centers to prepare children for success in a global world, has been growing in the U.S. and abroad, reports The Brookings Center. Representatives from its City Network (Chicago, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Tel Aviv, plus Santa Ana, California, and Lima, Peru) have been meeting quarterly to discuss challenges and share strategies. Their conversations on ways to infuse playful learning into the mainstream practices of government, businesses and other organizations have yielded several key insights. Among them were these.

PLL can materialize in seasonal or even annual events rather than in permanent installations. Summertime, for instance, is a time of high need for children, especially those living in low socioeconomic-status neighborhoods. Tel Aviv’s Play Streets, for example, begun in 2019, brought 12 sessions of playful learning activities to neighborhood streets, parks and gardens. More than 1,000 children attended the sessions.

PLL events can build momentum by sustaining collaborations throughout the year.

Ultimate Play Day in Pittsburgh, for example, brings together a variety organizations including CitiParks, the Grable Foundation and the Carnegie Museum of Art, among others. Representatives from those organizations plan an annual day of fun for city families and then stay in regular contact so that their collaboration and impact is sustained beyond that single day.

PLL initiatives can reclaim public spaces for children and families, making safe play and playful learning more accessible.

Philadelphia’s Play Parks initiative, for instance, works to reclaim public parks in the Kensington neighborhood where violence and open drug use are prevalent, and children have few safe spaces for safe outdoor play.

Another example is Urunaga Park in Lima. Rebuilt into an activities circuit for local kids, it was difficult to access because of busy streets. The PLL team created a new pedestrian crossing so children from the local schools can now take a safe path to get there.

Overall, these three takeaways illustrate how well the Playful Learning Landscapes movement can be adapted to each city’s goals and context.