Children's Play Advisory Service

Training

As well as bespoke training we offer the following courses:

For more information see below

Inspecting Children’s Playgrounds (ICP) – Training for Playground Inspectors

This course is designed both for dedicated inspection staff and for those who carry out other duties at the same time, eg litter picking. It is also very suitable for people inspect playgrounds in a voluntary capacity, eg Parish Councils.
This is a high quality course. We regularly get good feedback:

Informative and motivational! Very hands-on, easy to understand. Thank you.
Excellent course, very useful, thank you
The course was delivered in a clear and understandable way with a good mix of practical and theory
Brilliant course – well worth it. Lots of information – thank you.
Packed with useful information and good advice
Very informative – I shall feel confident to examine the Parish Council’s play equipment from now onwards.
Very practical – able to implement learning immediately

» Download a draft programme and checklist with budget cost here.

Inspecting Play Areas – Cutting the Costs

When difficult decisions have to be made, this seminar has been proved to save money and ensures you get the best value out of playground inspections. The course is suitable for managers of at least 10 fixed equipment playgrounds.

Our experience is that many local authorities have felt pressured into making their own inspection systems very paperwork intensive. Some inspect all playgrounds every day with the result that the inspectors spend more time in the van going from place to place than actually inspecting playgrounds.

At a time of financial stringency there is likely to be pressure to reduce the amount spent on inspections.

As a direct result of attending this seminar in February 2011, Jon Winder, Play Leisure Improvement Officer at Greenspace for Islington Council was able to make £18,000 worth of savings without compromising safety.

Participants will also be shown how the new criteria for using grass as an impact absorbing surface can be used to save money particularly in less heavily used playgrounds.

Each participant will receive a free copy of our publication “Impact Absorbing Surfaces/Using Grass as an IAS".
This seminar has been very popular with attendees. When it was run three times in London (in conjunction with LondonPlay) feedback was positive with 92% very or completely satisfied and comments included:

“Very interesting points raised and a refreshing “common sense” approach to what is a potentially very expensive and litigation ridden area of our work.”
“Very useful information about reducing visual inspections and the methods to justify this. Guidance on the tiers of inspections and wording of annual inspection reports.”
“A very worthwhile event that provided some useful pointers to change practice back at the work place.”

» Download a draft programme here.

Training for Playground Inspection Managers

Managers have found it advantageous to attend the above ICP course with their staff as this gives them a good understanding of what to expect from the staff and the time that should be allocated for the inspections.

We also run courses (often the next day) specifically for those who are managing a team of playground inspectors. This goes more deeply into systems to be used and ways of having robust systems of support and control. We have also found that many local authorities can reduce the number of inspections and the paperwork and have more robust systems.

This training can be specifically tailored to the needs of an individual local authority. It can also be delivered as one-to-one sessions to individual managers or as a training day to a group of managers from different local authorities.

For more information contact Rob Wheway at whewayrob@childrensplayadvisoryservice.org.uk

Can Play Will Play – Training for Accessibility and Inclusion

This day is run jointly with Alison John of Alison John Associates.
It is based on the report “Can Play Will Play: Disabled Children and Access to Outdoor Playgrounds” prepared jointly by Alison John and Rob Wheway for the National Playing Fields Association.

For more information contact Rob Wheway at
whewayrob@childrensplayadvisoryservice.org.uk

or » click here to go direct to our contact details page.