Jacob Ballas Children's Garden
The Jacob Ballas Children's Garden officially opened its highly anticipated water play area on 25 February 2025, offering an engaging and educational space for children to explore the water cycle through interactive play. Designed by RIOS to integrate seamlessly with the garden’s lush landscape, this 1,200-square-metre playground combines innovative water play equipment with thoughtful design to encourage curiosity and active engagement. Featuring safe and durable equipment from Vortex International, it provides a splashing retreat where children can experience the joy of play while gaining a deeper understanding of nature’s processes. This exciting addition enhances Singapore’s growing number of family-friendly play areas.
The water play area is thoughtfully designed around the key stages of the water cycle—precipitation, runoff, and evaporation—allowing children to engage with water in a dynamic and hands-on way. The water cycle refers to how water moves through the Earth’s atmosphere, transitioning from the liquid in rivers and oceans into vapour-forming clouds, before falling back to the ground as rain. This essential process sustains life and is cleverly incorporated into the playground design, making learning about science both fun and immersive.
The Water Cycle
Precipitation
Water Cycle: Precipitation
Tall water structures mimic rainfall with an overhead tipping bucket that drenches the play area. Green poles with umbrella canopies enhance the rain effect. A magenta activation button controls water flow, adding interactive engagement for children to explore cause-and-effect play.
Runoff
Water Cycle: Runoff
Rubber mounds simulate mountains with meandering water streams flowing into valleys. Rainbow arches, a bubbling volcano, and animal sculptures enhance sensory play. Green water control buttons allow children to redirect water flow, illustrating how runoff moves through landscapes.
Evaporation
Water Cycle: Evaporation
Ground-level water jets simulate evaporation, while shallow pools with varying depths provide splash play. Otter track prints reinforce environmental themes. This zone offers a safe, cooling play space for toddlers, designed for supervised water exploration in Singapore’s warm climate.
Precipitation: The Thrill of Rainfall
In the precipitation play zone, towering water features simulate the downpour of rain, immersing children in an exhilarating rainfall experience. A huge tipping water bucket is suspended in the air, swaying back and forth as it fills with water. Once full, it tips over, releasing a thrilling cascade of water, much like a powerful tropical thunderstorm. The theme of rain is further emphasised with tall green poles holding umbrella structures, adding a visual and sensory element that reinforces the experience of a real downpour.
Adding to the interactive play experience, children can control the flow of water through by pressing buttons, engaging them in cause-and-effect learning. This encourages exploratory play, helping children understand how precipitation works while they have fun in a safe and engaging environment.
Runoff: Flowing Streams and Gentle Exploration
From the rainfall zone, the journey continues through the runoff zone, where rainbow arches and sculpted mounds shape meandering streams. The rubber flooring features raised mounds, representing miniature mountains, contrasting with the river valleys below. As water trickles down from these mini-mountains, children can observe how runoff carries water from higher to lower ground, much like the rivers and streams in nature.
To make the experience more engaging and educational, the runoff zone also features playground elements such as a bubbling volcano, an orange starfish, and a turtle play sculpture. Children can spin green water control buttons to change the direction of water flow, simulating how runoff leads to lakes, rivers, and eventually the ocean. This interactive water play feature encourages tactile exploration, fostering creative problem-solving and sensory play in a safe and controlled environment.
Evaporation: The Final Transformation
As the water moves through the play area, it reaches the evaporation zone, where low water fountains shoot up from the ground, mimicking the process of evaporation. These gentle water jets create a flowing effect, resembling a mini river that gradually disappears, just like how water evaporates from lakes and rivers under the sun.
One of the highlights of this zone is the shallow water pools with varying depths, offering a cool and refreshing play space for children to splash and explore. This section also features playful riverine animal prints, including otter tracks, reinforcing the connection between water, wildlife, and the environment. The shallow pool area is perfect for toddlers and young children, providing a safe and fun way to experience water play in Singapore’s tropical climate. Parents are encouraged to supervise their little ones as they enjoy the inviting and interactive water playground.
A Sustainable and Biophilic Playscape
Beyond fun and learning, the new water play area champions sustainability and environmental awareness. The site-sensitive design incorporates reused boulders, which blend naturally into the landscape while demonstrating real-world examples of erosion processes. Surrounding the space, pollinator-friendly plants enhance biodiversity, supporting the garden’s broader eco-friendly mission.
By integrating these elements, the playground fosters a nature-inspired learning environment, showcasing how sustainable playground equipment can create a harmonious balance between play and conservation. This approach aligns with the growing trend of biophilic play spaces, where children can engage with nature-based play equipment while understanding the importance of protecting the environment.
A Space for Growth and Development
Aligned with Jacob Ballas Children's Garden’s mission of outdoor learning through play, this innovative water playground not only introduces children to the fundamentals of the water cycle but also fosters essential motor and social skills. The diverse play structures and interactive features encourage solitary, parallel, and group play, offering an enriching experience where children can develop problem-solving abilities, creativity, and teamwork.
With its blend of education, adventure, and sustainability, the Jacob Ballas Children's Garden water play area sets a new benchmark for biophilic play in Singapore. Whether children are splashing in rainfall, tracing the path of streams, or exploring water jets, this safe and exciting playground offers a unique opportunity to connect with nature.
Dry Playground Adventure
For those who prefer dry play, Jacob Ballas Children's Garden also boasts several nature-inspired play areas.
On the east side of the garden, the dry playground offers a diverse range of fun and safe play equipment, catering to children of all ages. Young adventurers can climb up the treehouse platform using either a ladder or stairs, before choosing one of the two slides that lead down into a sandpit play area, perfect for digging and sensory exploration.
On the west side of the garden, a forest-themed adventure playground awaits, featuring an elevated swing rope bridge, a thrilling flying fox, and climbing ropes that encourage active and imaginative play. The highlight of this zone is undoubtedly the flying fox, delivering an exciting zip-line experience that children will love. For group play, the saucer swing allows multiple children to swing together, promoting cooperation and teamwork. A bouncy trampoline provides extra fun and the playground features inclusive play equipment allowing children with mobility challenges to enjoy the adventure.
With its blend of adventure, exploration, and inclusivity, the dry playground at Jacob Ballas Children's Garden is a fantastic complement to the water play area, offering families an all-encompassing playground experience in Singapore’s largest dedicated children’s garden.
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