![\"Nature](\"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/NaturePlayHeader.jpg\")
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The Pennsylvania Land Trust Association (PLTA) says: “Unstructured, frequent childhood play in informal outdoor settings powerfully boosts the cognitive, creative, physical, social and emotional development of children. It also engenders deep conservation values; more so than any other factor.” \u00a0Continuing research is supporting this statement.<\/p>\n
In an effort to explain the idea further and to encourage conservation organizations to get involved, \u00a0the PLTA\u00a0has published a free forty-page book on the subject<\/a>.<\/p>\n The book has two major parts:<\/p>\n This section begins with the assertion of Stephen Jay Gould who said “We will not fight to save what we do not love.” The premise\u00a0is that those who are now conservationists working to conserve a wide range of aspects of the natural environment do that work because they fell in love with the natural world earlier in their lives.<\/p>\n “But it will not be enough to simply explain and promote the\u00a0ecological value of protected land, since people may fully\u00a0understand that, intellectually, without feeling any personal\u00a0attachment to the issue. Instead, the goal must be to guide\u00a0new supporters into personal relationships with nature. \u00a0Many readers remember appreciating a special natural area\u00a0from afar, but that place only became a passionate concern\u00a0for them once they\u2019d hiked its trails, paddled its waters, and\u00a0soaked in its scenery.”<\/p>\n This section discusses the way that kids have moved away from direct interaction with the natural world as a result of urbanization, parental fears, liability worries, over-scheduled childhoods, and plugged-in play and why getting back in touch with nature is so important. \u00a0Besides creating more people with a conservation mindset, \u00a0childhood play in natural surroundings benefits:<\/p>\n The question is, “How do we restore frequent, unstructured nature play to children\u2019s lives?” \u00a0There seems to be broad agreement that kids need to get more into nature, so this section focusses on how to help them do exactly that. \u00a0As a first step, the book suggests that the rules for outdoor play be considerably relaxed as there are simply too many “do nots” associated with being in natural places. \u00a0It asserts that kids should be allowed to damage the resource saying:<\/p>\n “They will chase away\u00a0wildlife, pull leaves off branches, dig holes, step on ants,\u00a0muddy streams, throw rocks in ponds, whack sticks against\u00a0tree trunks, collect feathers, pull the wings off beetles, erode\u00a0steep creek banks, nail boards onto trees, and who knows\u00a0what else. Yet if 1,000 children do this at a natural area for\u00a0100 years, they will almost certainly cause less ecological\u00a0harm than a single bulldozer will do in 60 minutes as\u00a0it clears a nearby site. In fact, they will probably do less\u00a0ecological harm than was done creating the driveway,\u00a0parking lot or trail for public access to the natural area.”<\/p>\n It is this kind of shift in perspective that is needed to allow children to get the nature experiences they need to grow into healthy adults. \u00a0Why be\u00a0concerned about potential injury during play while every six minutes a kid is treated for injuries sustained on stairs and the number one killer of kids is automobile accidents? \u00a0Why be concerned about liability when anyone can sue over anything and you can\u00a0\u00a0properly manage\u00a0the risks in a play space\u00a0(see\u00a0Managing Risk in Play Provision<\/a> <\/i>a 120 page free book on the subject). <\/i>\u00a0It’s all about the balance of minor risks against major benefits.<\/p>\n The book goes onto describe a variety of features that can be incorporated into a naturalized play area that will attract kids, including:<\/p>\n The overall idea is to give the kinds a natural place to play with the components and tools needed to generate the largest number of play opportunities.<\/p>\n Since the book is designed to get adults working on these concepts, it includes a variety of other resources and helpful ideas to get things going.<\/p>\n It is becoming increasingly clear that kids need more nature play. \u00a0This book offers a great introduction to the topic and can help you or your organization create key opportunities that will help kids get that play.<\/p>\n The Pennsylvania Land Trust Association (PLTA) says: “Unstructured, frequent childhood play in informal outdoor settings powerfully boosts the cognitive, creative, physical, social and emotional development of children. It also engenders deep conservation values; more so than any other factor.” \u00a0Continuing research is supporting this statement. In an effort to explain the idea further and to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1060,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,2,9,8,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","category-featured","category-health","category-helping-others","category-ideas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1179,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions\/1179"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n\n\n\nA Primer\u00a0on Nature Play\u00a0and\u00a0Its Importance (Part 1)<\/h1>\n
![\"Child's](\"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/ChildsPlay.jpg\")
Polls show that people love nature, but the priority they put on it, compared to other issues of the day, has steadily declined since a peak in 1970. \u00a0The PLTA\u00a0wants to raise that\u00a0priority defining the goal this way:<\/p>\n\n
![\"Play\"](\"https:\/\/explore.globalcreations.com\/theblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Recess-Play-A.jpg\")
<\/p>\nRestoring Nature Play (Part 2)<\/h1>\n
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Conclusion<\/h1>\n
Please Share<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"