Brothers Nahir and Shamz Khan didn’t waste any time turning blue foam blocks into a store. Their classmates, a group of unidentified girls, used the foam blocks and cylinders to construct a flower that always blooms.
The students were four of the approximately 30 Dixon Elementary School students that put their imaginations to work with the portable playground equipment, dubbed Imagination Playground. The equipment was unveiled, Monday, by Embudo Valley Library and Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Mexico personnel.
“It is good,” Nahir Khan said. “We built a store that sells balls and eggs, but it kept collapsing.
The Khan brothers and their classmates were the first students to put their minds and bodies to work using the $26,000 Imagination Playground in a Cart, that Library personnel secured through a Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Mexico’s Healthy Kids and Healthy Families grant.
The equipment will be shared with various organizations throughout the Dixon area, on a rotating basis, including the elementary school and the Picuris Pueblo.
Blue Cross New Mexico’s Vice President and Chief Medical Officer Eugene Sun said the Dixon project is the 12th playground his organization has funded since establishing the Healthy Families initiative in 2013. This is the fifth playground Blue Cross has funded this year.
The playground may seem just like any other piece of equipment or toy a child uses to play, however, Sun said when a child engages with the Imagination Playground, something is going on beneath the surface.
“We are giving kids in this community an opportunity to play with a set of very light styrofoam toys that they can go crazy with, using their imagination in terms of building bridges, building towers, building castles and building forts,” he said. “Play is a very important part of a child’s development. It helps their social skills, it helps their fine motor development, it helps with teamwork and it helps their intellectual development.”
Library Director Felicity Fonseca said she contacted Blue Cross’s partner, KaBoom, to apply for the grant, after learning about a similar Blue Cross project about an hour south of Los Lunas.
KaBoom is a national nonprofit dedicated to ensuring children have adequate space to play, regardless of socio-economic status.
The nonprofit serves as a clearing house for all Imagination Playground grants, vets all applications and make recommendations as to who or what organization should receive an award.
“I saw they awarded one in Socorro,” she said. “I sent an inquiry email and learned that we had an opportunity to submit the grant. We were in the right place at the right time.”
Fonseca said she was pleased with the opportunity because it coincides with the Library’s ongoing mission of creating opportunities for children and attracting visitors.
“Play is great,” she said. “I am always looking for better resources for our kids. In my wildest fantasy, this would bring people into the library.”
Siddiq Khan, the father of Nahir and Shamz, arrived at the unveiling about 30 minutes before the students arrived, to help, as needed.
As a member of the Library’s Board of Directors, the elder Khan is heavily involved with the community. He said one of the Library’s main roles is to provide activities and materials that nurture young and old.