Playday 2008 – join in the fun!

Playday is the annual celebration of children’s right to play. It’s taking place on 6 August 2008 and Persil is a proud supporter of this year’s activities!

On Playday and throughout the summer, thousands of children, young people and communities will get out and play at locally organised events across the UK.

This year’s Playday theme, ‘Give us a go!’, calls for children to be allowed challenging and adventurous play opportunities and aims to shake off the ‘cotton wool’ culture that can limit children’s play.

Anyone can organise an event to celebrate Playday – it doesn’t have to be huge, you could even organise a small party with a group of friends and family.

To find out how Playday is being celebrated near you and for local event listings and more information on how you can get involved, visit www.playday.org.uk

So celebrate Playday on 6 August and join in the fun!

What is Playday?

A huge network of people are involved in Playday – people who are passionate about promoting children’s play.

Now in its 21st year, the Playday campaign is co-ordinated by Play England working in partnership with Play Wales, Play Scotland, PlayBoard Northern Ireland and a national steering group.

Play England promotes excellent free play opportunities for all children and young people. Play England provides advice and support to promote good practice, and works to ensure that the importance of play is recognised by policy-makers, planners and the public.

Play is an essential part of every child’s life and is vital to their development. It helps children learn about themselves and the world around them. Play helps children develop confidence, self-esteem and creativity.

Give us a go!

This year’s Playday theme, ‘Give us a go!’ calls for an increase in challenging and adventurous play opportunities. Children can benefit enormously from learning how to manage everyday risks through play.

To celebrate this year’s theme, there will be lots of challenging and exciting play opportunities at events around the country.

Play England has commissioned a comprehensive body of research to inform the campaign, including in-depth research with children and young people. This research will explore the benefits of challenging and adventurous play opportunities, children’s views and experiences of adventurous play, play providers’ views of the difficulties they experience in trying to create challenging play spaces and adults’ views of how play has changed since they were young.

This research will be published on the Playday website on 6 August. Visit the website at www.playday.org.uk to find out more about this and other Playday campaigns.

To find out more about Play England, visit www.playengland.org.uk