IBTASEM

In August 2015, Cata­ly­ti­cAc­tion completed the cons­truc­tion of the pilot project ‘IBTASEM’. This project consists of a play­ground design for situa­tions of emer­gency response.

Children have the right to a safe child­hood, an educa­tion and to play. IBTASEM play­ground has been desi­gned in response to the large number of Syrian children now living as refu­gees in Lebanon. Visi­ting the informal tented sett­le­ments in the town of Bar Elias, Lebanon, as well as the schools that have been built to provide educa­tion, a main realiza­tion was that there was a lack of space solely dedi­cated to children. A space that would simply allow them to be children, such as a play­ground, such as IBTASEM!

Reali­sa­tion

The play­ground has been built with the help of volun­teers who parti­ci­pated in the inter­na­tional Design-Build Work­shop Lebanon 2015. The work­shop was divided into two phases, with the first one focu­sing on buil­ding the modular struc­ture of the play­ground, and the second one being more concerned with the play­ground compon­ents and its comple­tion. This allowed for a multi­cul­tural and inter­di­sci­pli­nary process.

The children deve­loped a sense of owner­ship towards the play­ground. They knew that their role was very important;

“I am here to build the play­ground with you, so when I go back to Syria, I can build one myself.”

Shahd, 5 year old.

Partner

The play­ground space is not limited to its pillars, it is rather an expo­nen­tia­tion of what the children make out of it. Cata­ly­ti­cAc­tion part­nered with the basket­ball free­style group Da Move (www.damove.com), who provided a two days trai­ning to the children. This presented a great oppor­tu­nity for the children to use the play­ground in a fun and educa­tional way. The inau­gu­ra­tion day was a cele­bra­tion of the day all the children were able to play freely in the play­ground, as well as enjoy a basket­ball perfor­mance by Da Move and the talents and skills of some of the children.

Right To Play Lebanon (www.righttoplay.com) supported the project by dona­ting basket­balls, as well as provi­ding trai­ning for three of the school­te­a­chers on how to use play for educa­tion, ther­e­fore effi­ci­ently using the play­ground space.