What is the effect of the loss of roaming?

http://bigthink.com/strange-maps/571-the-great-indoors-or-childhoods-end

Outdoor Play

Perhaps it is the sense of spring, even though it remains winter; in any case playing outside for hours and hours and hours on end has been easy for my boys these past few days.  The sun has been out. It has been relatively dry.  My twin boys have worked on digging their hole.  They have followed mom and dad around as we prune trees and pull the creeping invasive ivy that comes from the neighboring apartment building.  They have climbed in the trees.  They have sat under the bushes and yesterday they turned a pile of branches into first a train and later an airplane.

 I write this in part to suggest that kids don't need a lot of toys outside- although a few digging tools can help.  They just need time.  It is this unstructured time that children have lost so much of in recent years.   My family purposely tries to reclaim it.

The other day my not quite four year old T even said, "lets not go in any cars or on any trains...lets just stay in our yard today."

The boys know that true family time & true play time is right where we are, unstructured.  The reward is the fine memories we have right here at home.  It is also a deep knowledge of our own home and community's ecosystem.    On Monday we saw a sharp shinned hawk (possibly a Coopers) dive into our neighbor's yard and then rise up to a snag in the next yard.   We wondered if it was after their chickens?    We also tracked down why so many dump trucks kept heading past and now know that soon there will be a new home in the neighborhood.  We found more free ranging chickens.  Is that why the hawk circled again yesterday?

We planted raspberry bushes.  We found the first dandelion and also the first crocus of spring in our yard.

Naturalized playgrounds

Last weekend the boys helped me knock on neighbors' doors.  A group of parents and neighbors are trying to survey the community on what they would like to see happen with the local school's playground and field.  One question asked about whether people wanted to see the playground become more naturalized.  Several people requested more information on naturalized playgrounds.  Here is an article I am working on:


Our survey asked what was your favorite outdoor/ playground memories?  Many people responded that they remember wandering  in wild areas,  playing on tree roots or next to streams.

These days many children do not get the opportunity to play in natural areas.  National park attendance is down.  Unstructured playtime for children has fallen.  “University of Maryland Researchers have found that outdoor and nature based activities- from walking to camping now comprise less than one half hour per week of a child’s time.”  (Christopher pg. 2, 2010)

A naturalized playground is a place for children to get to experience nature in their own neighborhoods and school yards.  These environments provide opportunities for child directed, complex, extended play.  They create a place for children to rehearse and refine social competencies in the the tactile and imagined worlds that the natural objects take on.  

Natural play areas also provide an area for quiet play and even curricular integration.

When Orca was at the Columbia building, the few trees in the corners of the concrete pad drew a myriad of activities from running games, to imagined worlds, to quiet conversations.  The well beaten path around those trees tells the story of many children's footsteps.

Richard Louv writes that " surprisingly green play areas can be designed to survive thousands of feet.  During the past two decades, natural-play-area designers have become skilled at creating living landscapes that  use specialized soil and plants as well as irrigation technologies; they design slopes to resist erosion, and cover walls with hanging gardens." (Louv, pg. 209, 2011)


There is a company called Playcore that works on developing natural playgrounds that has summarized the benefits on their website at naturegrounds.org.  These include:

“Innovative projects generate positive press and new funding streams
    “Mixed” play environments are more attractive and comfortable for adults, encouraging caregivers to spend more time outdoors with their children
    Well-designed playgrounds are a primary attraction for families using neighborhood and community parks
    Naturalization adds visual interest, shade, and comfort — resulting in sustained repeat visits, a relaxed and playful social atmosphere, and growth of community social capital
    Users of all abilities discover a wider range of play opportunities
    Curvy pathways provide attractive, accessible, active settings for children, and social strolling by adults
  Naturalization provides new opportunities for nature-based professionals to offer rich outdoor educational and recreation programs for a wide range of children”


In a article written about the Thatcher Brook Elementary School in Vermont where the firm who designed their playground says,  "It's important for kids to physically touch the earth," says Teri Hendy, whose Cincinnati-based firm, Site Masters Inc., helps design playgrounds and evaluate their safety. "When kids play on manufactured equipment, what they do is predictable. Nature isn't. Kids will spend five times as much time playing in a natural area as they do on a traditional playground. "  

Naturalization of playgrounds also helps weave together the green spaces and parks we already have in the area.   It creates habitat for wildlife and a place for community to gather. Additionally Outdoor/ Nature based play also has been shown to reduce the effects of ADHD, myopia, and childhood obesity.   (NEEFUSA, 2009).

Check some of the following resources out:

Examples:

There are quite a few models of naturalized play areas, here in Washington you can find:
Methow Valley: http://www.wenatcheeworld.com/news/2010/sep/16/methow-valley-playground-goes-the-natural-way/?print

Kirkland: http://kirkland.patch.com/articles/floral-final-touches-put-on-sandburg-elementary-natural-playground

There is a nature based play area that can be found in Cincinnati. http://www.cincynature.org/playscape.html

And there are organizations and private companies as well that will help develop them

The North Carolina Natural Learning Initiative links to many examples at http://www.naturalearning.org

Natural Playground Company at Landcurrent, Nature play, Discovery and learning at http://naturalplaygrounds.info/

There may also be some resources in the America’s Great Outdoors Initiative and Report
http://americasgreatoutdoors.gov/

References:
Books and Online-Articles that focus on the importance of Getting Kids in Nature

Christoper, Todd, The Green Hour: A Daily Dose of Nature for Happier, Healthier, Smarter Kids , Trumpeter Books, Boston, MA,  2010

Louv, Richard, The Nature Principle, Alonguin Books, Chapel Hill, 2011

White, Randy (2004) Young Children’s Relationship with Nature: Its Importance to Children’s Development and the Earths Future, White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group  http://www.whitehutchinson.com/children/articles/childrennature.shtml

Fact Sheet Children’s Health and Nature, Health & Environment A National Environmental Education Foundation Program  the National Environmental Education Foundation, Health and Environment Program (2009).   www.neefusa.org/assets/files/NIFactSheet.pdf

Celebrating Urban Nature with a March

Playgroup has still continued to have low attendance.  However, my family continues to try to get out in nature and build community.  This past month we once again put on an Urban Nature Playgroup, this time moving it to the local library.  It just happened that the local elementary schools was going to be marching in recognition of Martin Luther King Jr to very near the library and so part of our plan was to join the march.

As we gathered at the library meeting space we began with introductory activities: I had a theme in the back of my mind that we would be focusing on trees and even had some books about Wangari Maathai.   Of course we did not get to do very many of the planned activities as the local march came past in only 30 minutes.  So basically we did an introductory activity of parachute, playing a question and observation game of:  What type of animals live in trees.  I pulled several stuffed finger puppets out of my bag and handed them to the children & adults who were in attendance.  Then I asked a few questions that made them stop and look at them.  Whose animal has four legs?  Whose animal has two.  Then they would put them onto the parachute and bounce them up and down.  We then moved into a few songs before heading to the art table to make signs that we taped to sticks that we then carried as we marched.   I had hung up a picture of Dr. King & we talked briefly about why the community marches to remember him.  Children were allowed to draw whatever they wanted on their signs.

The most joyous moment was when we turned to meet up with the parade.  The police had already stopped the traffic and the marching band led the whole school.  There were people of all ages and we just blended in.  Marching and community. Donating & collecting food for the local food bank.  It seemed a perfect way to celebrate urban nature.

Since then I have been reading the children's books on Wangari Maathai--tree planter & leader of the green belt movement in Kenya  and Nobel Peace Prize winner with my children.  They are enjoying the pictures, comparing the details of her life told by one author and then another.  We have made connections to their own tree plantings at the local green space.  Joseph Cornell writes in his books  how important it is to share stories about naturalists with youth.  The story of Wangari truly is such a story.  It was especially exciting to the boys when I told them I had been lucky enough to tree plant with  her and some of my students.  T wanted to meet her, but sadly I had to tell him that she had died.  Her vision and legacy, like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s lives on.

Walking after Dark

In many parts of the world families and couples and even young people take an after dinner walk for entertainment.  It is the same in all vibrant communities : you see people walking and talking, sometimes stoping to hear music or take in a view.  In the Northwest it gets very dark and quite cold after dinner, and cultivating this culture sometimes seems challenging.  Thank goodness my family is cultivating a habit of walking.  For the past month we found ourselves walking to see the seasonal  light displays.  It was a great motivator for getting out of the house after dark.   This is a great time of the day as a family to connect and to create memories.  It is even better when you sense community and see others out on the streets as well.

Ways to make the walk the safest includes having had practice walking past driveways and across intersections as cars are often speeding home.  It is also important to choose routes that seem safe.  Our boys enjoy walking with their umbrellas when it is raining and they are always thoroughly bundled.   Things to search for in the night, is to see the phases of the moon.  Notice whether you can see stars.  See if you observe things that may or may not have been present the last time you went on the walk.   If you feel like it bring cookies to a neighbor or plan to take a walk with friends.  

Playing by the Last Light of Day

Perhaps it was just that the evening was clear, or perhaps since winter solstice has passed, yesterday seemed longer.  It was as if the sun hung above the horizon just a little longer than it has been.  In any case, it beckoned us outside.  The boys and I mostly watched the neighbor get their gutters cleaned.  It involved multiple ladders, buckets, and ropes; truly engaging for three year olds.  But then just as darkness started to come on fully and the roof cleaner's headlamp went on, we began a game of "birds" flying to trees.   We used multi-colored cones that I had purchased for our play and learn group and the kids took turns saying which color tree we should run to, then the game morphed and it became just follow the leader with the littlest leading us all.  We ran in circles from one tree to the next, flapping our arm wings, smiling at the night in the occasional on and then off beam of the motion sensor light.

We were truly just playing.  It reminded me of the book that I just had found in the library A Running Start, How Physical Activity and Free Time Create a Successful Child, by Rae Pica.  The book was well written and basically reminded me how important free play is for young people.  One of the messages that it stressed was the children have to lead the play and how that making sure that not every moment of children's lives is planned.  The book also stressed allowing children to just play with other children.  I think that in the past this latter point was so much easier when neighborhood children just played with one another.  Now I find that due to so much childcare, to so much traffic, to so much fear, that parents don't just let their children head out and play.   I find myself needing to set up playdates -- which often don't work out due to illnesses or situations that arise for families.  Spontaneous play is sparse.

It is for this reason that I set up a local urban nature play and learn.  The idea is that children will just get together and play.  The challenge has been that not that many people have been attending, perhaps it is our location or perhaps it is that we have not publicized it enough.  I also wonder if outside play is a challenge when it requires having the right clothing in order to be comfortable in any weather.

Being Squirrels

The books I ordered from the library for last week's play group did not arrive until the day after the session.  So the boys and I have been reading them.  They are written by several of our favorite authors.  Louis Ehlert, Nancy Tafuri and Don Freeman and then a new for us nonfiction author Lisa Bullard (her book actually being about leaves). In anycase, they are a good collection of stories that show how squirrels live in the wild and also through interactions in an urban environment and with people.

 A couple of days after reading the stories,  I noticed the boys using their stuffed finger puppet squirrel in new creative ways.  Also yesterday when we were staying in from the rain and were looking for movement activities we pretended to be squirrels finding nuts:scampering around the house, pretending to climb trees and eat, as well as stuff (puff out)  our cheeks and carry food back to our homes.