School Yards
Since 1998, the Learning Landscapes Initiative has transformed 48 neglected Denver public elementary school playgrounds into attractive and safe multi-use parks tailored to the needs and desires of the local community.
There are 37 schools in the planning phase.
To date UCD graduate students have developed 86 master plans and have prepared 49 sets of design development drawings.
Design Elements
All Learning Landscapes are comprised of grass playing fields, age-appropriate play equipment, trees, shade structures, gateways, artwork, gardens, traditional play elements and non-traditional play elements. Learning Landscapes function as local public parks providing much needed green space and social gathering places while fostering neighborhood pride for local communities. The principal value of a learning landscape is its multi-purpose nature. In an era of limited municipal resources and widespread gentrification, single-minded urban renewal projects that are forced on communities are neither viable nor sustainable solutions for community redevelopment.
Design Elements Photo Gallery
Learning Landscapes Objectives
Each learning landscape serves two or more of the following objectives:
- Provide participatory landscapes that support outdoor learning in tandem with academic and physical education and offer socialization tools for school-age children.
- Create a multi-generational space for outdoor play opportunities for both students and the community.
- Create an aesthetically pleasing focal point for the community.
Learning Landscape Components
The following is a composite list of all of the components of a Learning Landscape project:
- Common areas with trees, benches and chairs that range in scale from plaza to outdoor classroom.
- Improved hard surfaces for games, including basketball, tetherball courts, four-square, hopscotch, and wall ball.
- Natural and “wild” gardens characterized as habitat, grass, herb, riparian, ecological, native grass and/or rock gardens.
- Hard surface educational elements, including painted maps, sight words, mazes, educational games, a compass rose, and the like.
- Improved multi-purpose fields, prepared with gravel removal, weed removal, new sod, grading and irrigation.
- Traditional developmentally-appropriate play equipment
- Improved accessibility and safety with accessible equipment, ramps and pathways and other elements as specified in the Americans with Disabilities Act.
- Shady places, such as a shade pavilion and added trees to offer a cool alternative to wide-open play areas that receive full sun during the day.
- Community gateway
- Non-traditional elements for creative play and/or instruction
- Design elements and ordering systems that reflect a specific design vision and build upon the neighborhood’s strengths, history, culture and vision.