Are you looking for ways to stretch your child care center’s dollars?
Newton Community Child Care Center showed you can build a playground from an empty dirt lot with a dream and a little help from your friends. The non-profit child care center was due to open a new branch at Asbury Park this spring but had no equipment for the playground and no funds to buy equipment.
Preschool kids play "hot lava" on repurposed tires.
Site director Valerie Romero got the idea to use donated and recycled materials to create an eco-friendly play place for the pre-kindergarten children who attend at the Station. “They love it out here,” Romero said of the children. “I think they have just as much fun as if it was a $15,000 playground.” Children ages 3 and 4 play “hot lava” on a series of donated tires mounted in the playground’s sand lot. “They pretend that the ground is hot lava, and they can’t touch it,” she said. “They climb all over those tires.”
In addition, Jeff Saxton donated material and built a stepladder and small stage for the children, which they also can move around the playground area for use in whatever game their imaginations conjure.
Using imagination and games we played as kids
Saxton also constructed a sound station with cans and metal tubes hanging from it. The children use sticks to bang on the structure, as well as tin-cans, which they march around the playground with — members of a flip-flop clad drum corps. Sherwin Williams donated the paint to decorate the wood fixtures and tires on the playground. The tires were donated by Bud & Steve’s Auto.
A tin can and a wooden stick make for an awful lot of fun--and sounds!
An anonymous donor gave a children’s swimming pool, which the child-care center has filled with water bottles. The children use the pool along with a Slip ’n Slide for water play on hot Friday afternoons.
Locals donated pots and a planter so the children could have a planting and digging station. The children plant fake flowers in pots. However, Romero said the children’s imaginations have again taken them on an adventure.
“They decided they could grow vegetables instead of flowers and use the picnic table for shade, so they could just live on the playground and never leave,” Romero said. The children will get a chance to grow real vegetables this fall.
As the weather cools, the child care center hopes to plant a cool-season garden along one fence of the playground. The center is seeking donations of garden soil and gardening tools for this project.
The children also have a weaving station made from ribbon connected to the playground fence and a soccer goal that was purchased with a grant.
A repurposed plastic basket nailed to a tree serves as a bean-bag goal. Before the stations could be built, more volunteer families cleaned up the play yard, pulling weeds and removing sticks and roots that could be hazards to the children. Other anonymous donors gave books, large tires, paper items and other items to the center for the project.
Having the child-care center at Asbury Park also has allowed the retirement center residents to enjoy the children and the playground. Romero said residents sit at the windows surrounding the playground and watch the children play. Some residents come down to the playground to interact with and watch the children.
The Station will open another classroom for children ages 12 months and walking through age 2 in August. The center hopes to expand its playground facility to include stations for the smaller children at that time and is looking for donations of equipment for toddlers. The center will add 12 toddler spots, all of but three of which already are filled.
