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Getting Children Back to the Great Outdoors
Raised on video games and kept indoors by parents obsessed with ‘stranger danger’, children have lost touch with nature - and that's a tragedy, says a bestselling US author
Many people of about my age, baby boomers or older, were inclined towards a kind of free, natural play. I knew my Missouri woods and fields; I knew every bend in the creek and dip in the beaten dirt paths. I wandered those woods even in my dreams.
Such experiences were as likely to occur in the UK as in the US, although the settings differ — a prairie windbreak of trees in the American Midwest, a hedgerow on an English heath. Even in the most urban areas, children had more freedom to experience nearby nature in a park or on patches of undeveloped land. In this era of children’s pagers and instant messaging, natural play seems to many like a quaint artefact of a distant age.
Children today are aware of global threats to the environment but their physical contact, their intimacy, with nature is fading. A child can probably tell you about the Amazon rainforest but not about the last time he or she explored the woods in solitude or lay in a field listening to the wind and watching the clouds move.
“I like to play indoors better ’cause that’s where all the electrical outlets are,” one ten-year-old student told me recently. Our increasingly high-tech environment offers young people a new world of possibilities but at what price? It’s pretty difficult to experience a sense of wonder while playing Grand Theft Auto.
“Times have changed,” says Tina Kafka, a teacher and mother of three in San Diego, California. “Even if kids have all the unstructured time in the world, they are not outside playing. They are inside with their video games.” She recognises that carefully planned activities pale in comparison with more spontaneous experiences in her children’s long-term memories. Like many parents, she knows that playing independently outdoors didn’t come naturally to her kids, but she lacked a language to describe the profound change that she sensed.
In Last Child in the Woods, first published in the US four years ago and updated for publication this month in Britain, I suggested the phrase “nature-deficit disorder” as a way to define a widespread problem. The phrase is not a medical diagnosis (perhaps it should be) but a handy way to describe today’s increasing alienation from nature.
An expanding body of research in the UK, the United States, Scandinavia, Australia and elsewhere suggests the extent of this trend and the impact if it continues.
Yesterday a survey of 3,000 parents by the National Trust revealed that playing in a garden or a park was their favourite childhood memory, followed by building a den and seeing wildlife in its natural habitat — yet, says the Trust, 38 per cent of children now spend less than an hour a day outdoors.
In March this year, the Report to Natural England on Childhood and Nature: a Survey on Changing Relationships with Nature Across Generations measured differences in nature contact between children today and their parents’ generation. The researchers found that fewer than 10 per cent of children played in natural places, such as woodlands and heaths, compared with 40 per cent of adults who did so when they were young. The researchers also reported that 75 per cent of adults claimed to have had a “patch of nature” near their homes when they were children, and that more than half went there at least once a week.
A survey by BBC Wildlife Magazine, reported in 2008, found that many children in the UK sample group could not identify common species, including bluebells and frogs; these children ranked playing in the countryside as their least popular way of spending spare time. The report led Sir David Attenborough to warn: “Nobody is going to protect the natural world unless they understand it.”
Lest anyone should consider nature-deficit to be only a Western phenomenon, an article this year in the American Journal of Play reported the results of a survey of mothers of 2,400 children in 16 countries. The percentages of mothers who said that their children often explored nature were lowest in Brazil (18 per cent), Indonesia (7 per cent) and China (5 per cent).
Why is this happening? In my interviews with American parents, they gave various everyday reasons, including disappearing access to natural areas, competition from television and computers, dangerous traffic, more homework and other time pressures. Most of all, though, they cited fear of strangers, as round-the-clock news conditions them to believe in an epidemic of child-snatchings. One father told me: “I have a rule. I want to know where my kid is 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I want to know where that kid is. Which house. Which square foot. Which telephone number.” Such comments are widespread, despite evidence that the real number of kidnappings by strangers is small relative to the impression that the news and entertainment media create.
These are no small barriers. I felt that fear, too, as a parent, so my boys did not have the kind of free-range childhood that I did. But when Matthew made me aware of the nature gap in his life, I tripled my efforts to get both my sons outside more. My wife and I encouraged them to build forts in the canyon behind our house (within eyesight) and we took them hiking and fishing, standing back to allow them to play as independently as possible, as long as they were relatively safe.
Although times have changed, we all have to do what we can, in new ways and old, to give our children the gifts of nature.While some children do just fine without nature, a growing number of studies have indicated that nature can offer profound enrichment to young lives.
Environmental psychologists report that simply being in a room with a view of nature can help to protect children against stress, and that the protective impact of nearby nature is strongest for the most vulnerable children — those experiencing the highest levels of stressful life events. Mind, the mental health charity, commissioned a recent study that compared the benefits of a 30-minute walk in a country park with a walk in an indoor shopping centre on people with depression. It found that after the country walk, 71 per cent of participants reported lower levels of depression, while only 45 per cent experienced a decrease after walking in the shopping centre.
Researchers at the University of Illinois have correlated direct exposure to nature with the relief of symptoms of attention-deficit disorders. Studies also suggest that children’s creativity, learning and test scores are stimulated in schools with green play areas, or that emphasise experiential learning. Swedish researchers reported that children at “all-weather schools” who played outside every day regardless of weather conditions had better motor co-ordination and more ability to concentrate.
Physical health is also affected. A nationwide survey in Sweden indicated that children who spent at least six hours a week outside had fewer absences due to illness. The Swedish National Institute of Public Health notes research suggesting that “children who are out in the natural environment are healthier than children who are mostly indoors and do not have access to the nature environment in the pre-school yard”.
Greener neighbourhoods may also help to reduce child obesity. In December 2008 the American Journal of Preventive Medicine published the results of a two-year study that followed 3,800 inner-city children; researchers found that trees and other vegetation were associated with slower increases in children’s body mass.
Why does nature appear to have such a powerful impact on health and wellbeing? One possibility is that when a child is in a natural setting, he or she is likely to be using all the senses simultaneously. E.O. Wilson, a Harvard University scientist and Pulitzer Prize winner, goes farther, proposing his “biophilia hypothesis”. He defines biophilia as “the urge to affiliate with other forms of life”and argues that human beings have an innate affinity for the natural world, probably with a biological basis. The theory, though not universally embraced by biologists, is supported by more than a decade of research. Simply put, children need to go outside and get their hands wet and their feet muddy.
Of course, no one believes that nature experiences are a panacea for everything that ails children. Life is not that simple. Also, much of the research currently available is relatively new and describes correlations rather than causes and effects — but, as Howard Frumkin, head of the National Center for Environmental Health in the US, says, “we need more research but we know enough to act”.
A movement to heal the broken bond between children and nature is already growing internationally. More than 50 regional campaigns have sprung up in the US and Canada over the past three years. The No Child Left Inside Act of 2009, designed to help educators to get children out of doors, is moving through the US Congress (the House approved a version of the Bill last year). In November, Sesame Street, the children’s television show, will launch a year of special “nature” programming. For the first time in four decades the programme’s set will be redesigned, adding features of the natural world.
In the UK, several initiatives are setting good examples. To coincide with its report this week, the National Trust is organising more than a thousand “wild child” events to encourage interest in local wildlife. It has also compiled a list of “Ten things to do before you’re 10”, including going on an insect hunt and hosting a teddy bears’ picnic.
Nature’s Capital, a report issued by the National Trust last year, calls for local funding for “wellbeing prescriptions”. The charity Mind recommends “green exercise” to be considered as a clinically valid treatment, and the UK’s growing Green Gym movement brings families together to exercise through nature restoration projects. This served as partial inspiration for an initiative launched in the US by the Children & Nature Network, called Family Nature Clubs.
Last year, Chip and Ashley Donahue, parents of three in Roanoke, Virginia, decided to start getting their kids — and themselves — back to nature at weekends. One day their five-year-old son asked: “Why are we the only family having so much fun?” So the Donahues created a free outdoor adventure club for families in the Roanoke Valley. What began with one family spread quickly. Thanks to word of mouth and two local newspaper stories, the membership grew to more than 170 families. These families, two or more at a time, agree to meet each other at the weekend to hike, do some gardening or even work on projects such as stream reclamation.
What if tens of thousands of families were to create nature clubs or “green gyms”? With the help of government agencies, regional campaigns, nature centres, educators, college students and conservationists, they might accomplish what seems impossible today: the end of nature-deficit disorder.
A week ago my son Matthew, who asked such a pertinent question a decade ago, graduated from college and left for his summer job as a fishing guide on Kodiak Island in Alaska. He may have missed out on some of the childhood nature adventures that I enjoyed, but he is making up for lost time. It’s never too late to have fun outdoors.
32 Comments so far
Show AllThe harmful parents' obsession has been more concerned with their careers than with direct dangers to their children. The steady increase in the percentage of families with two working parents over the past four or five decades has left no one to be with the children.
Too many parents have bought into the absurd notion of "quality time" to justify devoting more time to their jobs than to parenting. Our culture has consistently denigrated both women and men who stay at home to raise families.
Yes, children need to spend more time out of doors . . . and they need Mom and Dad to be there with them.
q
The article omitted a critical factor...media...primarily television as an undesirable influence.
While TV existed in the 1950s, my family and most families in the neighborhood didn't own one until most of us kids were 5, 6 or 7 years old. Madison Avenue was therefore unable to start the brainwashing process at birth the way it did with subsequent generations. In addition, brainwashing at any age was limited because Madison Avenue had not yet refined its brainwashing techniques.
We experienced many things first hand that subsequent generations will only be spoon-fed after being filtered and adulterated by Madison Avenue.
Don't forget the DVD and Blue-Ray players.
I found it amusing that the article mentioned that Sesame Street is going to use more natural settings in their programs. Regardless of what's on the TV screen, the children watching are still indoors sitting on their increasingly fat little asses. The kids would be far better off playing in the park themselves instead of watching Elmo and Big Bird do so.
q
Also, back then, there weren't TV screens in waiting rooms and in grocery store check-out lines, restaurants & bars and airport terminals.
Big Brother is everywhere now. It's so hard to get away from the constant stream of dreck coming at us from the tube!
It's changed the world alright, not sure how we'll ever go back to the way-it-was.
I'm glad to hear Congress is paying attention, though not sure what good it will do!
Whenever I'm in a public place where a TV is blaring, I engage in direct citizen action and go turn it off.
Mr. Louv,
Thank you for this wonderful article. I cannot tell you how depressing it looks travelling from St Louis to the rurals every time I visit my parents although I have been striving for ways to overcome that unhappy feeling. All this depopulation of the rurals and packing people into the suburbs and inner cities has proven both economically and ecologically destructive. I have to admit that even some like myself have gotten a bit too caught up with digital seduction but am working on correcting that. Some good news though. I heard that KS is working on correcting the problem too and giving children more outside time at school. For a state that is depopulated, not a bad idea. Keeping people cooped up only brings depression and sometimes even anti-socialism. Doing that to younger people only makes it harder for them to come out of it when they're adults. I've heard all the doom and gloom of our children's future and while much of it may be true, maybe Peak Oil will actually help them fight that unhappy feeling and even reverse the tide.
"Keeping people cooped up only brings depression and sometimes even anti-socialism."
Correction on the last word. I think you meant to say anti-social . Otherwise, that sentence says it all and you're right. I meet a lot of rude people even on the Internet who claim to know it all. I can't say if they're anti-social in nature but some of them sound like it.
"I have to admit that even some like myself have gotten a bit too caught up with digital seduction but am working on correcting that."
This can happen anywhere, Jennifer. Hell, I'm in Maine with all kinds of wilds just a short drive away and I spend too much time indoors (though, I do tend to my garden quite a bit).
Digital seduction is right. I guess only we can control which seductions we respond to.
A couple of years ago I did something that I highly recommend to everyone. I went on a healing journey to Vermont and spent a weak-end under the stars being de-briefed. I listened to the trees and felt the wind and the rain and even the mosquitoes. I bathed in a frigid stream. It wasn't the wilds exactly, but it was in Nature and away from the great digital divide.
Hey, I need to do it again! C'mon, let's go outside!
I love Acadia National Park! Once, I actually sat in the woods, and read Henry David Thoreau's book, Maine Woods. It was a glorious experience!
"He enjoys true leisure who has time to improve his soul's estate."
Henry David Thoreau
Yeah, Acadia is the jewel in the crown of national parks. Small, but stunning.
I'll share an anecdote: When my kids were very young, we lived in student family housing as I studied for an advanced degree. Later, degree in hand, we moved into a suburb. At student family housing, the apartments were arranged within a park, and NO CARS were allowed in the park. You had to park on the outskirts of the complex and WALK to your apartment with your groceries, a small inconvenience. But I didn't realize the advantage this was to the KIDS until I moved into the suburb, and my children found a four-lane blacktop RIVER separating them from the lawn on the other side. Of course they couldn't cross that river because the cars owned that river, and they weren't going to slow down for the kids. Two of those lanes were for parking extra cars, of course, but even there the suggestion was that what was important was your cars, what was not important was your kids. So, my kids went from an environment where, at the age of two, they would wander willy-nilly all over the place, meet and form relationships with other kids, take a trip to this swing, or that green-space, or out to the gardens. They OWNED that park, and were generous with themselves and with each other in their ownership. They were children of nature yet we lived in an urban area. And when we moved to the suburbs, that all died. They were tucked, out of sight, out of mind, into their rooms, away from the dangerous black river that defined their boundaries, and ours. Too many kids, faced with this formidable jail, turn inward and die.
While human psychology has equilibriums, their balance is founded on Nature's. When we are seperated from Nature, or the Natural World is decimated, our functioning is impaired because we are then dependent on artificial rythyms. It is Nature's heartbeat that brings our own to health - body, mind, and spirit.
Live Simply So That Others May Simply Live
This reminds me of three things:
In her book "Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry", Lenore Skenazy writes little or nothing about contact with nature specifically, but she does describe very well the mind-boggling paranoia that is encouraged in parents these days. She was labelled "America's Worst Mom" on mainstream TV for letting her young son take the subway by himself -- an act which, in the previous generation, was so common that it passed without notice.
In his book "Dumbing Us Down" Frank Taylor Gatto mentions the educative value of his utterly unsupervised childhood rambles along the banks of the local river.
In a comment to the article "Crops, Ponds Destroyed in Quest for Food Safety", published yesterday on this site, minitrue pointed out another consequence of children's isolation from nature: "I think that more than half the problem is that today, kids don't have a chance to build up an immune system. Mommy follows them around with sterile wipes and every time the kid touches something or pets an animal, Mommy is there telling him he shouldn't touch, while whipping out a sterile wipe or three and scrubbing all of his exposed body. Seventy years ago, we played outside, in the dirt.... I could go on, but I imagine most of the young mommys and daddys are about to faint or vomit. The point is, we all generated immune systems that would deflect an RPG. We seldom got sick except for the usual childhood diseases.... Nowadays, everybody is 'protected' and 'sanitized' to the point that, if somebody runs into a bug, it may well lay his ass out!"
My father used to tell me how, as a boy, he'd walk back home from hunting and stop in a garden, pull up a turnip, wipe off the dirt on his sleeve, and eat it while he continued home. He never got sick once doing so.
q
"Nature deficit disorder" has profound, long-term effects on society. As an earth scientist (specifically, a seismologist), I spend a lot of time in the field, precisely because I used to play outdoors.
We are having a huge problem recruiting youngsters into the earth sciences, because it is perceived as being "dirty". Youngsters sure do like the opportunity to sit in front of the computer writing or crunching code, but field work is alien to them.
I guess noone touched on the nanny state aspect of this. How likely was it, let's say 40 years ago to be charged with child neglect if your kid got out and got hurt?
There's too many "child advocates" pushing for too many new laws and regulations and of course parenta are afraid to put themselves at risk. Those "advocates" also get parents scared.
Maybe I shouldn't talk as I don't have kids but I did all the "bad" suff when I was little too and both my play buddies and I are still around.
While watching a program online one day, I was stunned to see a PSA featuring animated characters from Shrek reminding kids to turn off their computer and go outside. When I was a kid, our parents didn't have to beg us to go outside; during summer vacation, they often had to go looking for us to come inside! We played outdoors until we couldn't see our hand in front of our faces... and, aside from some things like Little League, etc., most of what we did was UNorganized and not managed by adults. We made our own neighborhood teams and played softball and stickball. We played Kick the Can or lay in the grass debating what kind of animal each cloud looked like. The majority of kids today have their schedules micromanaged by parents or other adults to the point where they even have "play dates." Talk to veteran teachers and ask them how imaginative and creative most kids are today compared to, say, 20 years ago. And when their computers don't work or there's a power outage, or if they finish their work early they sit there and have no idea what to do. I've even observed young college students do this; after completing a quiz or short in-class assignment before their peers, they sit waiting for instructions--if their instructor doesn't suggest reviewing the day's reading assignment or getting ahead on something for next week, the students just sit there, clueless.
Next time you sit next to anyone traveling with a small child on a plane or bus, watch and you'll most likely see a parent pull out some kind of electronic device to entertain the kid. Remember road trips when you were young? We played word games or had contests to see who could identify license plates from the most states. Today, on long car trips the kids watch DVDs.
I think a lot of adults- and not just young ones who grew up with video games and computers- are also suffering from being out of touch with nature. Living in NM, where our population is low and even in our "major" cities it's still possible to find places to escape from people, I think most of us take for granted the sanctity of wilderness. I grew up in a very large city in another state and whenever I go back to visit, I have difficulty tolerating street noise-- cars zooming by constantly, horns, loud talking everywhere-- and smells of exhaust, diesel, and grit. The majority of residents seem stressed out, constantly fretting about traffic and the activities of the people around them. People in urban areas miss the simple pleasures we take for granted in my state: beautiful sunsets and fascinating lightning storms unmarred by city skylines, millions of stars- and excellent viewing of annual meteor showers- in our night skies, the delicate music of songbirds and the dramatic aerial displays of hummingbirds. And it always makes me laugh when my family, who still reside in the city where I grew up, express concern for my safety if I tell them about hiking or camping out in the woods. They live in a place where drive-by shootings and break-ins are not unheard of, and they're worried about me?
What a great article to stir up nostalgia and reminisce about the good ole days of youthful innocence.
From the earliest age I can remember we had freedom to roam. We were gone all day and our parents had only a rough idea of where we'd be, they didn't really know until super time (we called it super in New England) when we'd tell the stories about our day. There were always enough kids around to have a spontaneous game of baseball or football. In winter we carried our sleds to various hills, walking a couple of miles, (I'm sounding old now), or find ponds to shovel the snow off and create a skating rink.
We spent most our days either in the forest, exploring or building forts, or by the shore, swimming, running, snorkeling. We were seldom, if ever, inside. And at the end of the day we'd walk home hungry as hell, our lunch rations long gone.
Last winter I was at Sarasota Beach. A family set up near us. The teenage kids sat in lawn chairs playing and listening on electronic gadgets. The mom kept asking, "you guys want to go swimming?" "no". "Hey lets play Frisbee", "not now". This went on for hours when they finally packed up and left. The kids didn't move except to go to the concession stand for some burgers and fries.
I know not all kids are like that but it does seem to be more of the norm. I watched the Woodstock movie recently and I was amazed at how thin most everyone was. Compare that crowd to a concert today, there's a stark contrast.
I'm starting to sound old, but things ain't what they used to be.
And how did our parents always seem to know where we were, even though there were no cell phones and they couldn't call us every 5 minutes?
It really did "take a village" then, too; without an official Neighborhood Watch program, the neighbors all kept an eye on everyone's kids. If someone else's parents saw you doing something inappropriate, it was ok for them to discipline you--and rat you out to your parents. Today, other parents say "Mind your own business" or threaten to sue- and the kids say, "You're not my mom" or threaten to sue.
Apologies for misspelling "supper". Yes NMLib, there was an informal network within the neighborhood. We always knew we could walk up to any house and get help if we needed it. We felt free to even ask strangers for water if we ran out.
genaman
You know it isn't just the warm days that children outside are scarse.
Consider a yard full of snow for several days and not a single snowman oo footprint anywhere.
or frozen over small streams or gutters with their thin ice melting naturally because not a single kid even stepped on it.
Summer if you can find a child pick up baseball game quickly alert the news media.
Even street football in the fall is very hard to find.
Oh one last thing FRONT PORCHES
Anyone remember them. They hardly ever come with a new house anymore. Oh they will put some ugly deck out back for youfor a good price, but no front porch.
Almost every summer we kids would go out and play ball ,ride bikes and whatever else, but then we would usually wind up on someone's porch playing games or just joking and talking.
Pethaps we ought to start small
Put front porches with gliders and chairs about.
Take the kids out for abreath of air REAL AIR.
Heck they might see a real flower or a real bird and then want to explore more.
Me I still sit on my porch everyday. I hardly ever see or hear even one child outside .
Well these kids might as well stay inside so the powers that be can make more money destroying what is left of nature.
SOYLENT GREEN IS TUESDAY
genaman
They might become hippies
Sioux Rose
Lots of interesting posts.
Until the arrival of modern medicine, certain persons within tribal settings understood exactly which NATURAL herbs delivered healing. They also delivered babies and tended to the dying.
Nature is not called "MOTHER" nature for no reason. The whole Mars-Mammon focus of modern society has set forth an elaborate number of rituals that not only separate persons from nature, her wild places too often demonized; they also disable something vitally alive in ourselves. Instead of being the intended zone for our early childhood lessons, our senses of wonder, TV, malls, and artificial plastic themeparks have sought to replace HER sacred sanctuaries while also co-opting wonder.
It's not a huge stretch then to enter the field of artificial food stuffs, "substantially equivalent" to the real or genuine articles. Computer games and TV further act as agents of socialization there to dim one's sense of connection to ALL things living. The escalation of these trends segues into computer-assisted scenarios of real war. I am talking about the kids with joysticks who "man" drones that obliterate real persons.
I am so glad I had a free childhood. I used to go off all day butterfly catching, was quite the hunter of Cecropia cocoons high up in maple trees, road my bicycle to neighboring towns, and spent time in a forest near my home where I believed one could communicate with trees and their inner spirits. (Traces of a prior Indigenous lifetime via soul memory).
When my children were little, before I had to cope with the limitations of a 3rd world (and it is) education in Puerto Rico, they were little beach bunnies. I took them to the rain forest, too. One of my children is now a mother and makes sure her children have time near the sea; and the other became an accomplished gymnast, in part I think, from her comfort in her body as experienced from an early age spent outdoors.
The manmade world of mammon has stolen a great many species, made war at its pleasure, and robbed far too many children of the education that only a Mother, the GREAT Mother, can deliver.
Ok, I see what you're getting at. I agree with your description of why it's called mother nature.
Instead of being bombarded, you have to unleash your mind when you are in the middle of nowhere.
Instead of a constant stream of input, nature is very reserved and you have to pursue things to get feedback.
Ahh the silence, but, it's not silent! If you listen you can discover all kinds of activity. What's happening around you requires you to analyze and think before solving the problem.
You have to come out of your shell, and you will find the life around you struggling to survive just like you struggle to survive. Wildlife plans around a yearly cycle and humans plan on a life cycle.
It is so FUN to try to figure out the why of how everything fits together and it's better if people put their heads together and learn to share knowledge. We have so much science we can apply, and so much superstition too.
You really learn about seeking the truth.
All these critters are making a living just like you! We have so much in common. I think of the movie ANTS! Relating their social life to ours. In the end the camera pans out and the whole movie took place in a city park by a water fountain.
When we were kids, we would often go over to our neighborhood park in Chicago and just informally play ball - often with only 4 players or so per team. We just made up the rules to suit the situation, play for a few hours, and then ride our bikes back home. Last week I had the chance to go running in my old neighborhood and went through the park to see what had changed. It was about the same after 40 years or so except for new signs on our old ball fields. Now if any one would like to use the fields they had to get a permit from the park's youth athletic association!
My current town recently built a very nice park complex of ball and soccer fields. The problem is when there are no organized activites, a large gate blocks anyone from getting into the park. These days there is also a problem with kids getting access to their park lands.
NMLib,
"When I was a kid, our parents didn't have to beg us to go outside; during summer vacation, they often had to go looking for us to come inside! We played outdoors until we couldn't see our hand in front of our faces..."
Like you, my brothers and I played outside all day doing whatever -- baseball, football, jumping rope, kickball, hide-and-seek, looking for bugs in the grass, raking leaves and manning lemonade stands in order to buy nails and boards to build a tree house, etc. And, we did build our own -- two levels. All the neighborhood kids joined in the fun -- all ages, too, at least, for the baseball and football games. The older kids showed us how to hit, kick and catch the ball. Sometimes, the older boys even loaned us their gloves, and most of the time, we didn't even divide up into teams. We took turns at all positions.
Whenever we went anywhere, we either rode our bikes, or walked. We ran all day long without adult supervision, for the most part. Once in a while, someone would fall down and hurt a knee, or elbow, but we always found someone to patch us up and to send us on our way and back to our play.
In addition, each day, we walked to school -- rain, shine or snow. It didn't matter. My family had a TV, and although one of my brothers was completely captivated by the tube, I didn't ever develop a dependence on having to rush home to see any programing. He did.
Later, when I had kids, I began to notice that some newer areas of the city didn't even have sidewalks, and therefore, kids couldn't walk to school -- unless they walked in the street. This also meant no hop-scotch, or games like, "step on a crack and you'll break your mother's back," etc. Front porches were no longer fashionable, and front yards were to be shown off as model green spaces, rather than for kid's play. Back yards were fenced in, more for the dog, than for the neighborhood children.
In my opinion, things have really changed! I'm so glad I took the time to read the article and the comments.
When I was a child we did not have video games, well we had PONG but I had no intrest. I was lucky because I lived about 15 minuets away from a 57 thousand acre public hunting area and I spent my after school hours there with my brother, fishing all the streams and some hunting when the seasons were open. Today I take my son and two daughters to these same spots and they have more fun splashing through the streams than anything else. I live on 8 acres in the country and I have a 5 acre patch of woods and I like nothing better then going out in the middle and set down and listen to nature. My son and I do plenty of fishing and hunting now that he is 16 and I try to take him out to the woods as much as possible and My girls love to go fishing with Dad.
Our town has a local nature preserve where the school children used to take field trips. It was highly rewarding to the kids and oftentimes the kids would then take their families back there on the weekends.
But the local developers feared that as a result of being introduced to nature, the kids might want to see more land preserved so they instituted a call-in campaign to the schools complaining that they did not want their kids to go there. The school board of course caved to the Republican pressure and prevented the teachers from taking their students there. Wouldn't want them to grow up to be (shudder) "environmentalists".
I used to work as a field instructor at a wilderness therapy program for at-risk teens. It was the best and hardest experience of my life. But it was so worth it. We slept on the ground, cooked in a fire and hiked. And two days a week therapists came to work with the kids.
I saw kids bloom.