Currently recess, free play, neighborhood play, and outdoor play are often considered non-essentials as we go about our over-scheduled lives. Pop-Up Adventure Play provides an opportunity to invite our children to create while acknowledging the importance of play in our lives.
Pop-Up Adventure Play has been described as a “flash mob play date,” best characterized by child-directed play where children of all ages play with an abundance of loose parts (e.g. cardboard boxes, fabric, tape, string, etc.) with the support of playmakers who have been trained in community-based playwork by Team Pop-Up Adventure Play.
These events are free to families.
We provide cardboard, paper, tape, scissors and other found objects, all you need to bring is your imagination!
See the calendar for upcoming Pop Up Adventure Plays!
WATCH THIS VIDEO to see a Pop-Up Adventure Playground in action. A Pop-Up Adventure Playground or “Pop-Up” is a free, public celebration of child-directed play, best characterized by an abundance of loose parts (eg, cardboard boxes, fabric, tape, string, etc.) and staff who have been trained in community-based playwork by Team Pop-Up Adventure Play.
Through the Pop-Up Adventure Playground model:
• Children enjoy hours of play in a public or private setting while parents and caregivers can join in or sit back and relax.
• We reclaim private and public spaces, transforming everyday landscapes into vibrant places to play with ordinary, repurposed materials such as cardboard boxes, string, yarn and tape (also known as loose parts).
• We educate and empower parents (and other adults such as grandparents, aunts, uncles and friends), child professionals, and organizations about the importance of child-directed play and how we all can participate.
“At Pop-Up Adventure Play, we take expert advice about the importance of child-directed play – play that evolves when children choose what to play and make up their own rules for how to play – and translate it in ways that are easily ‘gettable’. We help make play easy and fun… as it should be.” – Anna Housley Juster, an early childhood consultant with popupadventureplay.org