New Nature Playground at South Plympton

We are pleased to be able to share with you an Artist’s impression of the proposed new nature playground for ECC South Plympton.

The new playground will retain:

• most current trees
• the spiderweb
• the watertank alongside the lawn

The new playground will remove:

• current sandpit
• climbing wall
• monkey bars
• Junior primary play equipment

This will all be replaced with:

• A large sandpit with elevated water course surrounded by large tree logs and large boulders
• water pump
• large culvert under the boulder rocks adjacent for children to crawl through
• A lower ground cubby with slippery dip, fire pole, scramble net and monkey bars
• Mud kitchen complete with two sink and taps
• outdoor classroom area
• elevated cubby with viewing platform above the watertank
• Additional seating and half a dozen garden beds

We hope it will be INSPIRATIONAL and a wonderful place for children to engage in learning and play!

We wish to advise there will be some complexities for us to navigate, requiring patience and flexibility for the last eight school days this term.

• Contractors began work today at 7:00am. Contractors will be on site daily from 7:00am until 3:30pm
• An excavator bobcat will come in to assist in the removal of the current playground
• Trucks will be moving in and out of the staff car park driveway between 7:00am and 3:30pm most days. There will be no trucks between 8:00am and 9:30am; and no trucks after 2:30pm. This will enable students to come on site in the morning without any big machinery movement, and also for students to be able to leave at the end of the day with no large machinery moving up the driveway.
• Disabled access will be maintained through the staff gate along the pavers into the normal administration door. A disabled car park will be accessible adjacent the western fence.
• The high fencing on the ECC building side will be enclosed with shade cloth to try to minimise the dust into the classrooms, and also assist in preventing distraction for Junior Primary classes. The fencing adjacent the oval will be mesh, so that students are able to observe what is happening during the demolition phase.
• Jackhammers and Bobcat - We wish to advise that it will be very noisy. Jackhammers will be used to remove all the foundations in the cement blocks underneath the playground etc. Regretfully, we need to accommodate this work, to maximise the Christmas holiday time, to ensure as much work can be completed as possible before Week 1, Term 1, 2022.
• Off limits - No staff, students or parents are to enter the site of development.
• Parent drop off & pick up – Due to limited space, we would be grateful if parents could please wait on the lawn area for their children rather than enter the JP verandah area space.

We apologise in advance for any complexities this may cause. We pray God’s blessing of protection and safety over the site and development.

Helen Vonow
Head of Junior School