From a dog park fire hydrant to a plastic tire swing on a playground, it is important to have places to play in this world, for children and animals like dogs alike. Play is hugely important, promoting healthy physical activity. Regular play even promotes brain stimulation and growth in children, something that is absolutely essential to their early and formative years. Dogs too must get the required amount of physical activity to maintain their health, and many dogs will even become pent up and aggression if not given an outlet to run around, to play, to enjoy themselves. Therefore, spaces like a playground or a dog park with a dog park fire hydrant are hugely crucial in this world, and their importance cannot be underestimated or even cast aside.
For one, animals also need activity, and many owners do not always have the property to give them that required level of physicality. For these owners, going to a dog park is often the logical solution, and dog parks around the country provide outlets like the dog park fire hydrant to promote play and socialization among other dogs. And the dog park fire hydrant is but one example, with many dog parks utilizing the dog park fire hydrant, but many other dog parks using something different by similar to the dog park fire hydrant, such as rope toys or water bowls.
Children, too, must get the required amount of play (as funny as that may sound), as playing promotes a number of critical things, such as the development of creativity as well as the development of motor skills, both fine motor skills and the gross motor skills that are so essential for every day life. If children don’t have the ample time to practice these fine and gross motor skills, such as on playground equipment, before they pass the age of six, they become susceptible to life long deficits resulting from gross motor skills that never fully developed. Playing outdoors on school playground equipment or on the playground equipment found at a local park has been found to be a great way to develop these oh so important motor skills, growing the brains of our children without them even realizing it.
But playing actively has fallen by the wayside for many children with the advent and widespread use of technology, with more than half of all parents in the United States (two thirds, to be more exact) feeling and worrying that their children spend too much time on various electronic devices. TV watching in particular is a culprit, with the average child living in the United States watching, on average, at least four and a half hours of TV every single day, often on tablets and mobile devices, where streaming services and platforms like YouTube make the consumption of television and other such media more possible than ever before.
Playing physically, such as on a playground or with a dog park fire hydrant, is important for children and dogs alike and helps to stave off a variety of health conditions that have been directly related to being overweight or even obese. For children in particular, this physical play is severely lacking. Recent data has shown that a scant less than one third (thirty three percent, approximately) of children get the required amount of daily physical activity, which is a mere twenty five minutes of moderately strenuous activity in one day, certainly nothing extreme by any means. Promoting physical play can help, in some cases, to rectify this problem, and to reduce the risk of obesity and lack of the crucial brain development that is discussed in more depth in paragraphs above.
Play is hugely important, from helping brain development along to promoting a healthy physical body. Without play, dogs and children alike would be hugely impacted in a negative way, and there would be considerable deficits. Unfortunately, the importance of play is not emphasized as much as it should be, especially among children. Physical play is particularly important, providing a much needed work out for both the minds and bodies of children of all ages – but especially for young children with brains in crucial stages of development and continuous growth and learning.
