Effective Tips To Use Bouncy Castle Safely

Want to add a wow factor to your party by hiring bouncy castle? Good idea indeed. Bouncy castle is kids’ hot favourite amusement device at every function whether it be birthday party, fundraising event, school fun day or BBQ party. But you should not ignore the fact that there are some safety issues associated with bouncy castle. If you want to hire bouncy castle for your function then you have to take into consideration risks associated with bouncy castle quite seriously so that you can make them as safe as possible for kids’ usage.  For your help and guidance, we are presenting effective tips to use bouncy castle safely.


Always hire bouncy castle from a well- known and reliable bouncy castle rental company.

Ask the rental company to provide the staff to set up, operate and supervise the bouncy castle at the event.

Manage the bouncy castle by yourself only when the rental company has provided with you written safety instructions and operating manual.

Select the type and size of bouncy castle according to your event, location and the people who will be using it. This will help you to choose the right bouncy castle for the users.

Check the label on the bouncy castle to make sure that it is manufactured in the light of British standard requirements.

If the bouncy castle was manufactured a year or two ago then make sure that it is tested by someone registered with PIPA Inflatable Play Inspection.

Do not allow kids to use bouncy castle in high wind or wet weather.

Make sure that the pathway to bouncy castle is safe and clear.

Keep the bouncy castle away from fences and overhead power lines.

The distance between blower and bouncy castle should be 1-2 meters. Hitting to the blower unit can cause serious injuries. Therefore, location of the blower should be out of reach of guests.

Select an even and flat surface for the placement of the bouncy castle.

Make it responsibility of someone from your event management team or rental company to monitor kids playing on a jumping castle in order to avoid any accident. The person monitoring kids playing on a bouncy castle must make sure that the bouncy castle is not overcrowded with kids. He must try to stop an unruly behavior that can result in injury.

The number of kids using the bouncy castle at a time should not exceed the limit set by the rental company.

Do not allow any kid to play in the jumping castle whose age is not suitable for it.

Don’t allow kids to eat while jumping on the bouncy castle.

Shoes, pens, buckles, jewellery and other hard objects should not be allowed in the bouncy castle.

Hiring A Reliable Company

Due to rising trend of bouncy castle hire there is a lot of competition in this business but before hiring any of company and availing the services make sure that the company and their services are reliable and their products are safe to play for the children.

Here are some main points that should check and keep in mind while hiring a company:

Certification

All the equipment should be PAT certified. Mostly well known companies are members of the British Inflatable Hirers Alliance who help the industry to provide a better, safer service.

 Risk assessments

The company should conduct regular risk assessment on every bouncy castle. This follows advice from the Health & Safety Executive.

Maintenance

The company should be responsible of good maintenance and all equipments are in good condition, reasonably practicable and safe in use to maintain relevant standards. The inflatable and all bouncy castles need to be properly maintained. All inflatable are safety checked and a copy of the certificate will be in your hirer pack having RCD protected cables.

ELECTRICAL SAFETY

All of electrical equipment should be PATS tested annually to make sure the safety.  All inflatable should be supplied with crash mats to make sure the safety.

Guidelines

The company should supply guidelines including ‘Rules of Play’ which help you make your event safe and fun.

Insurance

The company should have Public Liability Insurance. 

Inspection

The company should have regular inspection include prerequisite and supervision of a blower unit as specified by the manufacturer, or to provide adequate pressure to allow the inflatable to be used safely.

The proper safety measures are very necessary in order to fully enjoy the event without any mishap.

Children’s Development And Growth

Children go through different stages of development according to their ages. Different aspects of development stages are physical, emotional, intellectual and social. In these developmental stages parents play a very important role through providing proper encouragement, support and activities that facilitate the child to for developing a good personality.

Role of Parents

Parents should understand the child’s behavior as it is very important to increase their confidence as well as developing a healthy relationship. Understanding the child’s personality is very important for their proper growth and development.

• One of the best ways to understand your child is by observing them as they sleep, eat, play or in different activities.

• Try to talk to your children as it is essential for understanding. In the case of young children, they require less verbal language and more facial expression and body language in order to understand their thoughts and feelings. Ask them questions to share their feelings to you as well to make them expressive.

• Play activities are also very necessary to healthy development for children. Different play activities influence the development of fine motor skills, language, socialization, personal consciousness, emotional well-being, creativity, problem solving and learning ability.

• Play that is associated with sensory-motor, cognitive, and social-emotional experiences provides a perfect setting for brain development.

Outdoor Activities

Outdoor activities also play a very important role in the development process. There are some examples of outdoor play or entertainment such as:

• Ball games in the local park
• Walk or cycle ride in a nature reserve
• Using a skate park
• Exploring the beach
• Swimming
• Fossil hunting
• Stone skimming
• Throwing a ball into a bucket and varying the distance
• Potato sack races
• Parachute games
• Running around with paper streamers
• Catching games
• Kicking and throwing using a soft ball
• Running and stopping and hitting a soft ball

Other outdoor entertainment for kids is bounce houses and slides that attract them very much. These are the great way to promote enjoyable and health activity and add great excitement and value to any outdoor event as best outdoor entertainment for kids. Kids always have a great time playing in bounce house at parties and other events. Inflatable water slides are also very exciting outdoor entertainment for kids.

Conclusion

Parents should encourage children for outdoor activities for better development and growth as well as to keep them active.

Importance of Physical Activities in Children

Childhood is the age of joy and enjoyment. Children are our future so every parents show concern about the physical and mental development of their children. At every age for the fitness, exercise and physical activity is very necessary .If we talk about children it the essential and important part to being active in physical activities and exercise. These activities lead them to a happy and healthy life style.

Benefits of Physical Activities

Health and Developmental Benefits:

These physical activities help them in many ways like:

·         Stimulating healthy growth and development

·         Sustain a healthy weight

·         Strong bones, muscles and joints

·         Heart fitness

·         Good posture, balance, synchronization and power

·         Improve flexibility

·         Improve motor skills

·         Improve social skills

·         Improve learning skills

·         Improve basic movement skills

·         Improve cognitive and emotional skills

·         Reduce fat

·         Increase concentration while study and other tasks

·         Increase confidence and self esteem

·         Helping to establish connections between different parts of the brain

·         Relax mind and body

·         Improve sleep

Examples of Physical Activities

There are a lot of physical activities that help to improve health as well as many developmental elements and uprooted all the risk elements. These activities include:

·         Walking

·         Jogging

·         Running

·         Climbing

·         Lifting

·         Dancing

·         Wall climbing

·         Yoga

·         Skiing

·         Hiking

·         Skipping

·         Gymnastics

·         Digging in the garden

·         Basketball

·         Bicycling

·         Ice-skating

·         Soccer

·         Swimming

·         Tennis

New Trends in Physical Activities

There are also a lot of new trends in physical activitieslike Bouncy castles, soft play and slides. Children love to have fun in all these on different occasions. There are also a lot of bouncy castle and soft play hire companies too who provide soft play equipment and different types of bouncy castle according to safety standards for different parties and occasions .It’s a perfect way for tremendous physical activity. Children love to jump, climb and play in bouncy castles.

Role of Parents

Children spend most of their time with their parents or other substantial adults, at home and in childcare amenities so both of them have a resilient influence on the child’s health behavior. They control the exposure and disclosure to physical activity prospects; they act as role models and parents can use explicit parenting practices, such as a specific time check for watching TV and other activities. Children need a support and help for exposure to the environment for different physical activities.

Conclusion

Research has shown that young children tend to be more active if their parents participate in physical activity and are active with them. This means that parents should show healthy physical activity behaviors by being active themselves, and by cooperating with their children in physical activities such as bike riding, walking and active play. Ideally, children need to spend several hours outdoors every day for mental and physical health and keep them fit and active.

Importance of Outdoor Play for Children

Physical activitiesplay a very import role in children’s mental and physical development. The best physical activity in children is ‘PLAY’. Play is a method through which children learn.  Play involves so many things at the same time like thinking, imaginative expression and feelings, and physical demands. Children learn about relationships with peers, adults, and the world around them and how to act with them.

Types of Play

There are two types of play indoor and outdoor.  Now days most of the children are involves in indoor play specially video games, using computer and watching TV. Parents should encourage the children for outdoor play as well for broaden their horizon.

Advantages of Outdoor Play

There are so many advantages of outdoor play for example development of their skills by achieving different tasks, exploring the world, risk-taking, perfect motor development and the combination of vast amounts of basic knowledge that can be most efficiently and successfully  learned through outdoor play.

Purpose of Outdoor Play With reference of different reports

Outdoor activities help in children's development. There are different reports regarding physical activities and entertainment that shows how significant outdoor entertainment is for children:

·         Children who play regularly in natural environments show more advanced motor fitness, including  coordination, balance and liveliness, and they are sick less often (Grahn, et al. 1997, Fjortoft & Sageie 2001).

·         When children play in natural environments, their play is more varied with creative activities that promote language and mutual skills (Moore & Wong 1997, Taylor, et al. 1998, Fjortoft 2000).

·         Exposure to natural environments improves children's cognitive growth by improving their responsiveness, analysis and observational skills (Pyle 2002).

·         Nature helps children to expand powers of surveillance and imagination (Crain 2001).

·         Outdoor environments are important to children's development of independence and self-sufficiency (Bartlett 1996).

·         Play in outdoor environments stimulates all aspects of children development more than indoor environments (Moore & Wong 1997).

·         Outdoors, a child learns on multiple levels with each new adventure (Burdette and Whitaker, 2005). 

Some Examples of Outdoor Play

There are some examples of outdoor play or entertainment such as Ball games in the local park, walk or cycle ride, Using a skate park, Exploring the beach e.g. swimming, fossil hunting, stone skimming. You can also entertain your children with different range of outdoor games such as throwing a ball into a bucket and varying the distance, sack races, Parachute games, Running around, Catching games, Kicking and throwing using a soft ball, Running and stopping and hitting a soft ball.

New Trends of Inflatable and Bouncy Castles

Another new trend of outdoor entertainment for kids is bounce houses, bouncy castles and slides that attract them very much. Now children love to have these inflatable on different occasions like birthday parties and other different events. It’s a source of healthy entertainment.  Now there are many companies that are providing bouncy castles on different occasions according to safety standards of children. They are providing the best services that is a great way to promote enjoyable and health activity and provide excitement and value to any outdoor event that is a best entertainment for kids. Kids always love to play in bounce house at parties and other events. Inflatable water slides are also very exciting outdoor entertainment for kids.

Conclusion

Parents should encourage their children for the outdoor games. If you have a courtyard, or a big compound then these are best places where children can play. Make sure that area is clear from any dangerous debris or any other things that may harm your child. If you take your children to a park, stay close enough to keep an eye on them, so far enough to let them play, explore or just enjoy on their own. These things give them confidence and make a good and strong personality.

Increasing Trends of Soft Play Hire

Soft play is the favorite options for entertaining children in a way that enhances their social and physical development. These are a great way for children to play and develop independence and learn to steer the world by them. As they climb, run and jump on inflatable’s, they find new ways to manage obstacles, and though it might not look like much, your child is actually becoming more independent and taking control over their own ways of playing and moving. Exploration of new environments challenges and builds up children, mentally and physically. That’s why it’s also important that any environment in which they play be safe as well.

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Advantages of Soft Play Areas

Soft play areas are the perfect place for your children to meet new friends and get used to socializing with others and enhances their communication skills. Tremendous fun filled soft play packages Add-ons including different bouncy castles and soft play equipment’s bring lots of entertainment to you on different occasions and parties. The packages are designed according to requirements of different occasions and different age groups.

Increasing trend of Soft Play Hire in Surrey, UK

The trend of soft play areas is increasing among the children. There are 1000 of soft play areas only in Surrey, UK. Like the other cities of United Kingdom, there is also an emergent trend of bouncy castle hire in Surrey and surrounding areas like soft play hire Woking, Guildford and many other. They provide services to related surrounding areas.

Objectives of Well Reputed Soft Play Hire

 The main objective of soft play hire is to provide professional services according to the satisfaction of the clients as well as according to the safety standards. Soft play areas are the best entertainments for children especially in parties so when parents select any soft play hire company; they keep in mind high quality soft play equipment’s as well as high safety standards.

 According to different researches children who are commonly implicated in an active play build up more skills including physical, emotional, mental and social.

Soft Play Equipment’s

The soft play equipment’s are basically designed to be soft so that it’s safe for children to play on. At many soft play centres, there are multi-levels of play activities, including climbing frames, slides, ball pools, crawl tubes, rope bridges and scramble nets. Children can jump in and get involved on their own, with friends or interact with other children who are already there and playing.

Active and exploratory soft play helps children learn new skills in a fun and motivating environment. It helps in increasing physical activity and help children to enjoy in different adventurous ways.

All the Well reputed soft play hire companies are providing professional services according to safety standards.  They make sure that all the equipment is clean and safe as hygiene is first priority for the parents.  

Industry of Soft Play Hire and its Key Players

There is vast expansion of soft play hire industry due to its increasing trends in the children. They provide different inflatable, slides and other soft play equipments with great fun filled soft play packages.

The designers in this industry design the soft play areas, equipments, bouncy castles with highly visual appeals having different themes according to the requirement of different occasions and for different age groups. Then the manufacturers develop high quality products according to safety standards with netted walls and padded floors. Each and every company tries to introduce more exclusive and fun filled soft play equipments and different soft play areas such as runways, ball pool, slides, inflatable’s and many more.

Conclusion

As soft play equipments and areas are great fun for children but at the same time it should be safe according to safety standards because the children’s safety is always the first priority. It the parent’s duty to select well reputed soft play hires and at the same time companies should also follow all the rules according to safety standards.

How to Decrease Risk of Injuries in Soft Play Areas

Play is an essential component for the development of the children. It not only makes healthy children but also increase their communication and social skills. Children enjoy both indoor andoutdoor play. They enjoy being played in unique and fun filled environment.

Increasing Trends of Soft Play Areas

 Now days there are a lot of activities for children for indoor and outdoor play. One of popular trend among the children is soft play equipment, bouncy castles, inflatable’s and soft play areas. Children love to play in bouncy castles and soft play areas. These are the essential part for children parties and these things make their parties more enjoyable and fun filled. Children not only enjoy a lot but also learn from these kinds of activities. In these kinds of activities parents should take care of the children because safety of your children is always the first priority.

Increasing Rate of Injuries

The rate of injuries while playing bouncy castles and soft play areas is increasing so parents should choose those soft play hire companies that provide full safety measures according to the safety standards.

According to news of Telegraph, Experts have warned about the dangers of bouncy castles after excitable children suffered an “alarming increase” in injuries while jumping on inflatables.

By 2010, one child every 45 minutes was found to be visiting American hospital emergency departments, as experts called for national guidelines to be put in place.

Current advice from the Boys’ Brigade, the youth organization, cites statistics showing approximately 10,000 injuries arising from bouncy castles in the UK every year.

It claims 4,000 of these were caused by playing on inflatables in private homes, while the remainder were at public events.

Researchers writing in the journal Pediatrics are now calling for safety guidelines, as they find 43 per cent of all bouncy castle-related injuries are cause by falls.

Safety Measures

Soft play areas should be properly maintained. Parents should inspect that the soft play area is properly maintained, sanitized and cleaned according to the standards to keep your children safe. The soft play hire companies should take care of the following things for reliable services:

·         Simple, routine inspection, cleaning and maintenance will result in clean, attractive soft play areas. It also extends the life of the equipment and decrease costly repairs.

·         The soft play areas and equipments should have high-quality, super soft foam surfaces for safety of the children.

·         There should be an age limit for each soft play area.

·         Play structures should have soft safe flooring for protecting children and keeping them safe.

·         Risk assessment test should be done on each and every soft play area, bouncy castle and soft play equipment.

·         Soft matting covering hard surfaces must be placed adjacent to the front or open sides.

·         Make sure that the blower is placed 1 to 2 meter away from the inflatable.

·         There should be proper supervision.

·         Adult and children should not be together in the soft play area.

·         There should be limited number of children as should not be over crowded to minimize the risk of injuries.

·         Children should not be allowed to play in windy weather.

Conclusion

These are some of the basic instructions that should keep in mind. The companies should give reliable services according to safety standards and at the same time parents should keep an eye to make their children safe.