Children redesign the city

This might be basically an advert for Lego, but it still has some good lessons for urban design - assuming that the kids are not being directed with what to build.

https://youtu.be/blqgnf9bpIg

What have young people done to Osborne to deserve such contempt? Polly Toynbee in the Guardian

"Why are the young caught in the cross-hairs of this government? That will mystify future social historians. Most societies talk of them as “our future”, to be nurtured and encouraged, but in yesterday’s budget, yet again they were pursued in a special vendetta of dislike, bordering on disgust."

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/09/young-people-george-osborne-chancellor-cuts-budget

A summary of the CRAE report in relation to play:

Increased attention on recording the attainment of very young children is inhibiting their ability to learn through free play

Rest, leisure and play have been a casualty of the austerity drive. In the absence of a national play policy, many councils have disproportionately targeted play services for cuts¹ with many long-standing services and projects closed and the land redeveloped.

Since 2010 the Government undermined children’s rights under Article 31 by:

• Abandoning a ten-year national play strategy for England with eight years still to run;
• Cancelling all national play contracts;
• Removing responsibility for play from the education Ministerial portfolio without reassigning it elsewhere;
• Breaking a public commitment to develop an alternative cabinet-led approach to play policy;
• Excluding all mention of children’s need for play space from a revised framework document on national planning policy; and
• Withdrawing recognition of playwork in out-of-school care, leaving many children supervised under the same arrangements as during the school day.

Policy and strategy for children’s play and recreation should be reinstated as a ministerial responsibility, and sufficient provision for play should be made a statutory duty for local authorities in England.

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1. A survey in 2014 by CYPN magazine found overall spending by local authorities on play services down from £67.9m in 2010/11 to £41.5m in 2013/4 (a 39% cut)

Our nation’s future is inextricably tied to the future of kids in cities.

https://medium.com/@kaboom/kids-first-what-s-good-for-kids-is-good-for-cities-73811301165f

Playgrounds for Palestine

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jun/06/building-playgrounds-in-palestine-this-is-their-special-place-and-refuge

The Child Inside - George Monbiot

http://www.monbiot.com/2015/01/06/the-child-inside/