Playing with your kids is a fun and natural thing to do, but that has suddenly taken a dark twist following a photo that has gone viral on Facebook of a young mother and her daughter going down a slide, and the young girl’s shoe catches an edge and fractures her ankle. It has suddenly brought playground safety to the forefront.
Emily McQuade owns the Playpit in Bracebridge and she says they have a hard and fast rule at her place. Everyone wears socks on the equipment:
She also encourages parents of smaller children to not feel compelled to go down the big slides as there are plenty of options:
When playing outdoors with shoes on McQuade suggests keeping the child’s feet inside the legs of a sliding adult – or modifying how high the child will slide and keeping their feet centred.
McQuade says so far nothing like what has been shown on Facebook has happened at her place. And she adds the rest of the play equipment is quite safe even if there is a fall: