National Play Day is the biggest annual play celebration in the country. On Play Day each year, thousands of children take part in play celebrations across the UK. These events are organised by local people, with support from local authorities and other organisations. Play Day is about giving children and families a great day out, while conveying an important message about the benefits of play.
Through play, children learn about themselves and the world around them. Play helps children develop confidence, self-esteem and creativity. As well as enhancing social skills, coordination and memory among may other things. The purpose of Play Day is to promote the importance of play, and to give opportunities and ideas to children and their parents.
Play Day is a special annual day of local events organised by local people when children and adults celebrate the child's right to play.
Play Day events range from big public get-togethers in parks, to smaller gatherings of children at home or holiday play centres. Play Day events are organised by a wide range of organisations including local authority play services, play associations, play schemes, libraries, and health and environmental projects.
Now in its seventeenth year, Play Day has evolved into Britain's biggest play celebration, involving over 100,000 children every year. A different theme is chosen for each Play Day; last year’s theme was ‘Fit for Play’, with this year’s theme still to be decided.
Play day events can be huge public get-togethers in parks, or small groups of children marking the day in a special way at their holiday play centre or with their parents or carers. Play day events are organised by a wide range of organisations including local authority play services, play associations, play schemes, libraries, and health and environmental projects.
Play Day has proved such a big success in Hastings that we now run similar events more than once a year. For the past two years we have held play days on the beach during term time and weekly events in Alexandra Park during school summer holidays. These free and open events offer hundreds of play opportunities for children of all ages. Traditional activities are combined with newer ones to make sure every child finds something they enjoy.
We now have thousands of children and families attending each year, helping to make the events a great success. As the events become more popular, they become more difficult to arrange on a regular basis due to limited resources and volunteers. We hope to have at least one big play day this year and lots of smaller street play sessions. For more information about these events contact us.
We recognise the rights of children and young people to express and form opinions, give feedback and plan for future events. So each year we ask the children, young people and families involved in our play days what they thought. We use this feedback to develop and improve future events, in our aim to provide the right play opportunities for the town. You can view the results of last year’s feedback survey here:
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This page last updated: 14/03/2006