Outdoor Play: Sandboxes


Figure 1.--.

Countries

HBC does not have a lot of information on sandboxes. They seem to have first appeared in England and Germay about the turn of the century. HBC can not determine who is respmsible for the initial idea. It eventually spread throughout Europe as a popular play area for children.

Some teachers saw the sandbox as more than a play area. Danish teacher Hans Dragehjelm (1875-1948) first noticed the possibilities of the new pedagogical play accessory. In 1907 a large heap of sand was placed in the middle of the City Hall Garden in Copenhagen. And the next year it was removed again. With a group of citizens from the Christianshavn area, Hans Dragehjelm took the initiative to establish the first sandbox playground in Denmark. It was at the Elephant fortifications on the old city walls at Christianshavn, and the idea spread quickly to playgrounds and institutions all over the country.

Design

The first sandboxes were wooden frames with no fixed bottom and with play tables at different heights.

Educational Play

The sandbox is an item of pedagogically correct play equipment which has its origin both in children's traditional games in the gravel of the streets and gutters while at the same time the playing has a new, hygienic, instructional framework. The sandbox as well as the idea of sandbox playgrounds was borne up by the dream of giving a piece of nature back to the city children. Childhood was, after all, best lived out in the countryside. Hans Dragehjelm himself was in no doubt that the motive for his work was "consciousness of my own happy, rich childhood in natural surroundings..." His childhood playgrounds had been a "leather tannery that was in the middle of the town; the craft still flourished at that time with all its old-fashioned details", and on the other hand his unlimited access to "gardens, fields, meadows, woods and streams."

Among other sources of inspiration for his work Dragehjelm mentioned early sport and the nature romanticism and religious view of life one finds in the poet B.S. Ingemann's Morning and Evening Songs for children.

The Playground Movement

Over the years Hans Dragehjelm became a central figure in the playground movement. He was widely travelled and worked with playground and open-air movements in both the United States and Germany. What they all shared was that the playground gradually developed into an instructional project. In contrast to the inhumanity of the city, space was to be made in the playground for play. For if children played in the right surroundings, the way would be paved for an active, healthy, dutiful adult generation.

In 1909 he published the book Barnets Leg i Sandet (Children's Play in the Sand). In addition he wrote many articles on play and playgrounds and for several years he was a consultant to the Ministry of the Interior on playground issues. This work resulted in several circulars about the furnishing of playgrounds.

School Gardens

As well as playgrounds, Hans Dragehjelm was also interested in the 'school garden' movement, which was in many ways borne up by the same ideas.

Sandbox play equipment

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In the sandbox children had an outlet for their curiosity, as Dragehjelm once put it, because the sand "lent itself to each of the child's ideas"--unlike the expensive toys of the era, which could hardly stand being played with. It was the craftsman and the engineer who were the adult models for the children, and Dragehjelm thought that the sandbox could develop into a good play option for the street urchins of the city, who were in great need of somewhere else to "blow off steam". As we know, it turned out differently. The sandbox became a space for small children--and a relief for the bigger girls, who at the turn of the century very often had their smaller brothers and sisters in tow.

This development also left its mark on the special range of sandbox equipment that gradually saw the light of day. On the one hand we find the remains of 'the engineer' and 'the craftsman' or 'the little gardener' in the many child-size tools: wheelbarrows, rakes, buckets and spades. On the other had we find, in the many different types of sand moulds, traces of the universe of the girls and the smaller children. The moulds have existed in many variations--from copies of old baking tins, starfish and farm animals to figures taken from advertisements and comic books in more recent years. The sandbox tools were originally made of tin - today they are made of plastic in bright colours.

The siren suit

Even at the early stage, Hans Dragehjelm thought that children should have special 'sandbox suits', and in 1926 such a suit could be bought from one of the big, inexpensive department stores. And now the teachers and carers wanted the children to be able to play outside all year round. This required practical, warm clothing that was easy to wash. The answer was the 'siren suit' - in Danish called flyverdragten or 'flying suit' after the heroes of the air. During the war the teachers recommended that the mothers sew siren suits of brown sackcloth. It was available, it was hard-wearing, and it did not show spots and stains. Until the mid-1960s the siren suits were sewn in blue or red cotton or poplin with flannel lining. These suits were more watertight than warm. At that time no one dreamed that very small children would later be transported all year round between the home and the kindergarten. That was a development that gathered speed in the 1970s. With suits in 'beaver nylon' and 'teddy bear' lining, the children were equipped to face the elements. The new suits were almost dry before they were out of the washing machine, which was an advantage at a time when the mothers of small children were on their way into the labour market.





Christopher Wagner






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Created: September 6, 1998
Last updated: August 12, 2000