Exploring Nature with Children Throughout Childhood

Exploring Nature with Children throughout Childhood

Our little group made a tender picture – five mothers each with their two year-old, happily tromping along an old dirt road through a wooded area. The sun was quickly burning off the night's moisture, and steam rose from the scotch broom and blackberries along the way. It was a damp northwest spring morning and the toddlers, carefully prepared in their rubber rain boots, were laughing and running ahead of us while we followed -talking and never taking our eyes off our lively gaggle of young ones.

As we neared a puddle that had overtaken the old road, I noticed with dismay that its depth would likely exceed the height of my son's boots. In the few seconds left to me before he spied the tantalizing pool, I was able to stifle my warning, "You'll get wet!" (Of course Nick would get wet. That was his goal.) Instead, I watched the excitement take over the little group.

Nick's body paused briefly, if you can call it that since he was still in motion-- and then he seemed struck by an energizing lighting bolt. Off he flew towards the "lake," a few moments behind his pal, Jake. Jake unhesitatingly took a dive, disrupting the still surface of the deep puddle. Nick followed at a run, slowed down only by the resistance of the water flowing over the top of his yellow boots. Next Max waded in and then sat deliberately near the puddle's center. Elsa stood in about four inches of water, admiring the squishing she created with her boots in the mud. Walter watched his buddies from the dry "shore," completely delighted by his friends' explorations, but content to stay dry.

As a parent, this was an early joy shared with friends. Being a part of these kids' discoveries, sharing their laughter, and finding amusement in their squeals against the cold, was also part of my more serious occupation of developing avenues to tap the emotional responses of children interacting in the natural world.

Infants first learn about their world through touch. When we share our joys with our children, there is an inherent feeling response. Touch an infant's cheek, and she will turn towards the touch. Put your finger by her hand, and she will hold onto it. Take a toddler for a walk, stop and show intense interest in a banana slug, and it is likely that the child will be curious too. Why not be detectives together and search for the bird singing nearby? What about seeing if you can discover leaves with similarities and differences?

It is an easy thing to take children outdoors. It also seems like a good thing to many parents, especially if their children are young, and so it is not difficult to "sell" the value of the experience. As our young ones grow up, however, their days become loaded with other valuable endeavors we have created for them: six and a half hours at school, time for after-school sports, music, friends, and then homework, chores, family time for the fortunate ones; bedtime comes all too soon. The value we placed on outdoor exploration when they were very young is replaced by an overabundance of extracurricular activities. It seems a very difficult undertaking for most of us to get our children into the wilderness or even to a local natural area. What happened to the value we placed on outdoor time in the woods, away from the buildings, phones and other distractions of our culture?

So why is it important to get our children outdoors? I believe that stewardship of our environment follows an interest in and understanding of the natural world. If a child spends most of each day indoors, what is that experience to beget but an understanding and interest in our indoor culture? For any of us to care about the plight of a species very different from ourselves, we need to develop a relationship with it. This relationship is nurtured through repeated experiences and develops alongside greater familiarity with a species. For this interest and curiosity to be fully realized, one must purposefully experience the out-of-doors. Several excursions with a toddler is a great beginning, but we need to continue to help the child hold that sense of wonder in later years.

To develop understanding, and further stewardship, experiences need to be repeated or offered many times. Eventually, several characteristics of a slug may become quite familiar to the child and subsequent forays into a natural setting should be a personal adventure – not a homework assignment. With several visits to the same spot, children begin to notice more of the area's biodiversity. So do we.

I have observed children and adults of all ages move through our campus and walk the trails at IslandWood, faces are lit up with that sense of wonder, and I can't help but believe that if we find a way to nurture nature with children outdoors more often, (a lot more often), their sense of community and stewardship will be much easier to develop and sustain.

About the author

Karen Salsbury has been an educator for the past 26 years. She holds a BA in Russian Language and Literature as well as Child Development from Tufts University, and an M. Ed. in Elementary Science Education from Western Washington University. Her teacher certification was granted in Massachusetts in 1978, followed by Connecticut, where she taught in private schools until 1981, when she moved to Seattle. Her teaching focus was with young children for several years. In 1983 she became the school head at University Child Development School where she achieved Private School Certification for the school as well as non-profit status and doubled the enrollment during her administrative tenure. Karen developed, taught and supervised traveling van programs for the Pacific Science Center for three years until moving to Palau, Micronesia where she became Associate Science Professor at the Palau Community College. Three years later, she settled on Bainbridge Island and has taught locally for 10 years for private schools, summer science camp and the school district as a science specialist before joining IslandWood in the fall of 2002. Karen is the mother of two boys and her husband teaches 6th grade math and science on the island.

For permission to redistribute, please go to:
New Horizons for Learning Copyright and Permission Information