蜜桃影视

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Corrected March 13, 2026聽

At the Firefly Gardens in suburban Pittsburgh, children and caregivers can explore a sensory playground filled with wind chimes, grassy tunnels and a mud box. Their playtime doesn鈥檛 end at the park though; each activity is paired with caregiver-focused messages and QR codes that encourage at-home activities.

The Washington County Park system, WashPA Outdoors and Pittsburgh鈥檚 PBS station, WQED, created the sensory playground using a pilot grant from Let鈥檚 Play PGH!, a Pennsylvania initiative that provides funding to local organizations to create playful learning experiences for people of all ages in public spaces, and Remake Learning, a peer network for educators in Pittsburgh.

The activities at the sensory playground, which is located in a community , were designed to foster intergenerational play and joint exploration, helping caregivers see play as 鈥渢he work of kids鈥� and understand how to actively support learning through shared activities, according to Gina Masciola, a program director for learning neighborhoods at WQED who sits on the Remake Learning Council.聽

鈥淪o the messaging really is for adults,鈥� said Masciola. 鈥淚t’s really about modeling and helping parents connect to their kids.鈥�

launched in summer 2023, when Remake Learning brought together organizations to work on prototypes for play installations. The initiative has to distribute, and has already doled out a majority of the money to organizations that are redeveloping spaces in the region, incorporating child development research, urban design and the science of play, said Tyler Samstag, executive director of Remake Learning.

Pittsburgh isn鈥檛 the first city in the U.S., or even in Pennsylvania to create public works that foster intergenerational play and learning. Samstag pointed to a simple and effective project in Philadelphia that put playful signage up in grocery stores encouraging parents to talk to their kids. Those relatively inexpensive installations can provide a boost for children鈥檚 literacy and language development, according to Samstag. 

Let鈥檚 Play PGH! was inspired by research from Playful Learning Landscapes, a joint project from Temple University鈥檚 Infant and Child Laboratory and the Brookings Institution, Samstag noted. Researchers examined how children spend their time outside of school 鈥� which for many, they said, was about 80% of their waking hours 鈥� and . The initial Learning Landscapes found that communities must buy into the project at the outset, create simple science-based activities and build on existing city infrastructure as much as possible.

鈥淲e put up this question, 鈥榃hat would playful learning installations prioritize? What would they look like?鈥欌�� Samstag said. 鈥淲hat might it look like if a bus stop turned into a site of learning, or a laundromat turned into a site of learning?鈥�

After brainstorming, participants tested out ideas in their communities by building prototypes, placing them in public spaces where children and caregivers could interact with them, and sought feedback from residents on what could make the designs more accessible, engaging and fun. WQED, for example, collaborated closely with Pam Kilgore from WashPA Outdoors and Washington City Parks to install the sensory playground and worked closely with Kilgore, who surveyed community members visiting the garden and asked them what they would like to see, Masciola said. She added: 鈥淲hen we are building anything, we know that the community is going to end up being the user. Those are the experts.鈥�

When WQED partnered with Washington City Parks and WashPA Outdoors to create the sensory playground, Masciola said, the team used the grant to buy materials for the prototype of the playground, scouring thrift stores for supplies to create homemade wind chimes. They also created a sensory tunnel with sticks, long grasses and bark woven throughout. The PBS Kids show, Elinor Wonders Why, inspired the signs and play prompts dotting the garden. Those signs were written for caregivers, not just children, with the intention of sparking curiosity.

A lot of PBS shows, like Daniel Tiger and Carl the Collector, really are 鈥渁bout modeling and helping caregivers interact with very young children,鈥� Masciola said. 鈥淢aking sure that families understand what it means to observe, encouraging them to maybe have a data collection notebook that they can record things in together with their children.鈥�

Another grantee, the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy, was invited by Let鈥檚 Play PGH! to join the initial cohort to transform the Frick Environmental Center, a public facility inside Pittsburgh鈥檚 largest park. The vision was to revamp the center, which serves as a nature and education hub for the city鈥檚 dwellers, into an area that would encourage caregivers to interact with their children, rather than just watch them. 

鈥淥ne of the deeper goals of this is promoting play between caregivers and children,鈥� said James Brown, director of education at the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy and the Frick Environmental Center. 鈥淭his is not the place to let your kids go loose and then you’re just on your phone.鈥�

When Brown received feedback from caregivers after the first round of play testing, he said he noticed that the adults were taking on more of an observational role while their children were playing.

Then, when Brown鈥檚 team introduced play prompts, such as a hide and seek game or a cleanup song, and posted them around the space, the feedback from caregivers changed, he said.

鈥淲e found there was much more 鈥榳e鈥� statements, like 鈥榳e did this,鈥� and 鈥榳e built the habitat,鈥� and 鈥榳e were exploring,鈥欌�� he said. 鈥淛ust that invitation was the game changer.鈥�

Frick has plans to continue with a larger scale redesign with more play installations, and has been translating caregivers鈥� feedback into plans for the next phase of the environmental center, Brown said. Last summer, he contracted a narrative muralist who read through the data from parents and kids, then drafted an artistic rendering for the space. Brown expects the artists working on the project to have installations ready by this spring.

With feedback in hand from people in the community who have experienced their installations, the Pittsburgh Park Conservancy and other grantees that have projects underway with Let鈥檚 Play PGH! are continuing to iterate on their prototypes. 

As of last month, the initiative has funded 16 projects 鈥� including the sensory playground in the Firefly Gardens and the Frick Environmental Center 鈥� with prototypes in motion, and intergenerational play is key to a number of them, Samstag said. One project he highlighted, 鈥淐layground,鈥� by the Manchester Craftsman鈥檚 Guild, made a bicycle-powered potter鈥檚 wheel as a way to improve access to the art of ceramics. Guild members retrofitted an old bicycle from the 1970s with a pottery wheel and took it around to local festivals throughout the summer where parents and grandparents pedaled with their kids. With the help of a new grant, the guild plans on building a suite of bicycle installations that can travel to various public spaces around Pittsburgh, Samstag said.

Joyful learning is so important, Samstag explained, adding that when he brings people together across all types of organizations and asks adults to reflect on their own experiences of play, the question sparks vivid memories. 

鈥淓veryone knows how important this is,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ut it’s often overlooked because of all of the other things that you鈥檝e got to do day in and day out.鈥�

Correction: An earlier version of this story failed to include the pivotal role WashPa Outdoors played in the creation of the Firefly Gardens鈥� sensory playground. In addition, copy edits have been made throughout the story.

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