Worcester Play Council Quality Award

‘Worcester Play Council is looking at ways to help organisations celebrate their good practice with children and young people. They also want to help organisations to identify ways in which they could improve how they work with children and young people and the ways they are welcomed into and included within the organisation and playful activities of the organisation.’

The Play Council introduced the Worcester Play Council Quality Award Scheme - a series of quality benchmarks, helping organisations to identify whether they really do provide the environment and opportunities for the development of children and young people, whether they really are playful, inclusive and if they support and safeguard both workers and children and young people.

A WPC Play Quality Award is the ultimate testimonial to your organisation’s commitment to the provision of good quality inclusive play opportunities. It is undoubtedly the most effective method of demonstrating your commitment to children’s play to local councillors, parent’s children and young people

WPC Quality_provision_criteria_form(db).pdf
Wpc Play Quality Award general information.pdf


Best Play – What Play Provision Should Do For Children was written in response to a number of pressures within the field of  children’s play. It draws on the accumulated body of knowledge about play and child development to assert the need for children’s play and to underpin commitment to sustaining high quality play environments.

Best Play is about how children benefit from play opportunities. It is also about how playservices and spaces can provide these benefits, and how they can show that they areproviding them. It draws on research, theories and practice from a number of disciplinesto identify seven objectives for play provision. It is relevant to both supervised and unsupervised settings although the suggested evaluation methods are most applicable in supervised settings.

Best Play - Values

1. Children’s views - Children are “active in the construction and determination of their own social lives”. (Prout and James 1997). This has implications for playwork and for the development of better play provision. The voice of the child, their opinions and reactions, should be taken into account to the maximum degree consistent with health, safety and respect for the needs of others.

2. Access to rich, stimulating environments - There is a poverty of play opportunities in the general environment, and it is the responsibility of the community to ensure that all children have access to rich, stimulating environments that are free from unacceptable risk, and thereby offer children the opportunity to explore both themselves and the
world, through their freely chosen play.

3. Freedom to play - Children’s freedom to play, and children’s sense of freedom, needs to be preserved. Many pressures increasingly dominate the lives of children in the UK. Public fears about safety, including the threat from traffic and from other people, lead many parents to restrict their children’s freedom to play and get around on their own. Commercial interests intrude into children’s lives through targeted marketing and advertising campaigns. Religious and cultural organisations believe that theirs is the right mould with which to shape children. Educational policies and practice take a curriculum-centred approach that places increasing demands on children’s time and energies in pursuit of educational attainment, and constrains their free time.

4. Equal entitlement - Every child, irrespective of gender, background, cultural or racial origin, or individual ability, should have equal access to good play opportunities.

Best Play – The seven objectives for play provision
Objective 1 The provision extends the choice and control that children have over their play, the freedom they enjoy and the satisfaction they gain from it.

Objective 2 The provision recognises the child’s need to test boundaries and responds positively to that need.

Objective 3 The provision manages the balance between the need to offer risk and the need to keep children safe from harm.

Objective 4 The provision maximises the range of play opportunities.

Objective 5 The provision fosters independence and self-esteem.

Objective 6 The provision fosters children’s respect for others and offers opportunities for social interaction.

Objective 7 The provision fosters the child’s well-being, healthy growth and development, knowledge and understanding, creativity and capacity to learn.

Best Play – What Play Provision Should Do For Children (ISBN 094 6085 33) can be obtained from: The Children’s Play Council, 8, Wakely Street, London EC1V 7QF Tel 020 7843 6016: email cpc@ncb.org.uk : web site www.ncb.org.uk/cpc