Children Outdoors

50 ways forest and outdoor learning experiences benefit child development

Outdoor play is key

Everyone loves the great outdoors. Children love playing in nature’s playground. They love gloriously muddy outdoor adventures. They love to explore further than the eye can see. They love to discover wildlife as they go. Connecting with nature is key to creativity and curiosity.

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50+ Ways Outdoor Education Can Help Child Development

Contents
01. An introduction to children and the great outdoors
02. 50 ways nature can help a child develop
03. Useful links

Source
Forest Holidays UK

18 Ways to get Kids to go Outside

Source: Active For Life

… more and more parents struggle with getting kids outdoors at all times of the year. Here are some proven tricks that will get them outside and playing:

1. Tell them it’s okay to get wet, dirty, and messy.
2. Organize an outdoor play date. Take your kids and a few of their friends to a park, creek, or lake. Watch them cooperate and interact with each other and the natural environment.
3. Allow your kids to incorporate natural resources into play equipment. Examples might include tree stumps for jumping off, boulders to climb and sit on, logs to practice balancing or climbing … and plants, sand, gravel and wood for jumping over, walking through, and throwing. Nature encourages imaginative play and physical exploration. Nature play is often freely chosen, spontaneous, and unstructured.
4. Set a timer for a maximum amount of screen time. Have your kids spend less time watching TV or using the computer.
5. Tell your children to go outside in the backyard and play. Give them balls, sidewalk chalk, buckets, and let them get creative. If you’re nervous about it, check on them in 10 minutes or, better yet, get out there with them.
6. Plant a garden or flowers with your child.
7. Explore nature with your children far from your home. Include outside time in nature on your next holiday (visit interesting geographical areas like the ocean, mountains, or desert).
8. Give your children rope and an old sheet and help them to build a fort in your yard, or with friends at a neighbours’, or at a park or the beach. Suggest they use driftwood or sticks, too.
9. Park a few minutes from school and walk with your child. Point out the colours of the natural world around you and watch them play with sticks, rocks, and leaves along the way.
10. Go for regular walks, runs, or bike rides in natural settings as a family. Many urban communities have trails and bike paths through parks, riverways, or lakefronts. Keep a few kid-friendly trail games in your back pocket.
11. Have a picnic dinner at a playground or park.
12. Gradually increase the level of independence your child has outdoors. Start with going up and down the street, to around the block, and progress to the nearby playground.
13. Organize a play group that meets after school for snack and playtime. Meet other kids and parents at a field near your child’s school and bring a soccer ball.
14. Create an outdoor scavenger hunt where your kids collect items from nature (or try this nature ninja scavenger hunt for a twist).
15. Give your children a jar and have them catch bugs.
16. Make mud pies at the beach or in a sandbox.
17. Go geocaching.
18. Each weekend explore new areas of your town or city as family. Make it your mission to visit as many different parks and playgrounds and find your favourites.

Raising Little Rippers

If You Want Your Kids to Succeed, Let Them Fail
The greatest gift a parent can give is teaching their kids to dust off and keep going.

4 simple tricks to get kids to enjoy getting off their devices

The kids are back to school, and back to their usual routines. And, if you’re like most Aussie parents, often this routine involves time spent on mobile phones, iPad, other electronic devices, or in front of the TV – sometimes far too much!

Here, mum of two and Apex Camps outdoor recreation centre’s marketing manager, Heidi Ramberg, shares her top tips to get even the most avid digital kids to enjoy playing outside.

One Man’s Trash …

To enhance the quality of outdoor play, primary schools across Australia are moving away from more traditional, fixed school play facilities (such as monkey bars and slides) and embracing everyday equipment.

This includes loose, recycled or scrap parts (blocks for climbing/building, tunnels, pipes, crates, foam, rubber and plastic parts) and sports equipment (balls, bats, boards and hoops). The equipment can be transformed according to students’ play needs over time

Stop Telling Kids to “Be Careful” and What To Say Instead

Saying “Be Careful!” to children is probably one of the least helpful things we can say to them. First of all, it’s not specific enough. “Be Careful!” could mean “watch out for the poison ivy!” or “watch out the sky is falling!”. When you tell a child “Be Careful!” it usually doesn’t get the response you’re hoping for, either they’ll give you a look of confusion (“what’s there to be afraid of?”), ignore you (“this isn’t scary!”) or start crying (“something really bad is about to happen!”).

The other problem with saying “Be Careful!” is that it instills fear. It teaches kids that they should avoid taking risks, trying new things and making mistakes because bad things could happen, an yes bad things can happen, but kids need to engage in risky and challenging play for healthy growth and development.

What To Do and Say Instead

Breaking the Habit!

Imagine this scenario: Your child is climbing up a small tree and the slim branches are bowing under her weight. In a flash your brain calculate multiple scenarios, all of them end badly. Even though your child isn’t in immediate danger you want to call out “Be Careful!”, here’s what you can do instead:

STOP: Notice what you are about to say and tell your brain to “STOP!” or “PAUSE”.

BREATHE: Acknowledge how you feel and take a deep controlled breath.

REFLECT: Look at the situation with fresh eyes and ask yourself:

• What is the potential for serious harm?
• Why does this situation make me feel uncomfortable? 
• What skills is my child learning right now? 

RESPOND: There isn’t one right response for every situation. If your child is in danger by all means do act quickly! However, some situations might require you to do nothing and other situations might require you to help your child foster awareness or problem solve.

DOWNLOAD: What to Say to Kids Instead of “Be Careful!” (PDF)

Read Full Story

Source
Backwoods Mama

5 Sneaky Ways to get your Kids off Wi-Fi and into Adventure

We are on a mission to encourage families to start their own journey of adventure after seeing how much our boys have grown in resilience, independence and responsibility.

Source: Sons of Adventure

Weather for Kids

Information and activities all about the weather and weather related emergencies

Your Family’s Guide to Exploring Our National Parks

The revised edition of the South East Queensland version of our Kids In National Parks booklet, now titled “Your Family’s Guide to Exploring Our National Parks”, has been published.

You can download a PDF from www.kidsinnationalparks.org.au.

Places To Go
Nature Play QLD

Nature play spaces in Queensland – search by type, age group and proximity

Practical Solutions

Making outdoors a habit can be easy if you know how. Here is a list of simple ideas to try, adapt and add to, and many of them you can do right in your own backyard. These groups and activities are suitable for kids of all ages, so join your children and get outdoors!

1. Try a night walk. Bring a torch for fun and safety, but be sure to turn them off for listening to the nature sounds and stargazing.
2. Go on a nature walk. Smell flowers or hug a tree. Look for animal footprints. Watch insects. But remember, soaking up the smells, sounds and sights is sufficient, and leave only footprints behind.
3. Get outside. First, set up any outdoor space you have access to so that it’s inviting, and spend time outside with your child. A sandbox, wading pool, swing, climbing structure or garden will keep your child entertained for hours. But if permanent structures aren’t possible, think impermanent: A tablecloth teepee or a bucket of water with funnels and cups, or a shovel to dig a hole you can later refill.
4. Plant a native tree. Together, take responsibility for your tree or shrub. Care for it, and you and your child will reap the satisfaction in the months and years to come.
5. Grow a herb garden. This could be a window box, or be included in a vegetable patch if you have the outdoor space. Choose plants that your child will eat and enjoy, and especially those that develop before your eyes. For example, herbs are generally quick to mature, and bush tomatoes change colour as they grow.
6. Take your camera out into the backyard, a nature strip or a nearby park, and photograph areas of nature where you think animals might live. Take pictures of trees, leaves and grasses and see if you can name the plants/animals when you get home. By printing them off and sticking them into a book, your child can create their own story.
7. Go on an adventure bike ride. Remember all your cycling safety, and simply enjoy riding in the fresh air.
8. Go on a picnic. Pencil in your diary or on the family calendar one day to venture out into nature. Encourage your children to help pack the food, and discuss where it has come from. You could picnic at your local park, beach, river or even just in the back garden.
9. Set up a colouring in and painting table. Ask your child to draw or paint a number of environmental images, including trees, rivers, and animals. You can also use leaves that have fallen off trees as stamps, by painting them and pressing onto paper. If you can, doing this outside is perfect. See your child’s interpretation of nature.
10. Lend a hand in the garden. If you do have a garden space, ask you child to assist with raking leaves and pulling weeds. Check out if you have a community garden in your local area by searching on Communitygarden.org.au.
11. Take an indoor toy outdoors. Introduce your child’s favourite toy, game or book to nature.
12. Create an obstacle course. This could be indoors or outdoors, and you could use trees to run around, a pile of leaves to jump over, a stick ladder on the lawn.
13. Create a collection of nature objects. Try and collect one item each day. It could be as simple as a leaf or a stone. Use each object to tell a story – perhaps about where it came from and what or who it has come across before reaching your hand. Although make sure you don’t take anything from a National Park, or any animal’s homes.
14. Visit a local look out, hill or mountain. See the world from a different view. Talk about how birds and animals see the world differently to us. Discuss what the world might look like for a magpie, and how it might seem for an ant. If it’s safe, roll down the hill – careful not to get too dizzy!
15. Watch the sunrise or the sunset. Find a natural environment to watch the sunset. If you aren’t by the sea or a river, you could watch the sun rise or fall behind a tree in the local park.
16. Make a grass trumpet. Pull a blade of grass (making sure it’s clean) and put it between your lips. Press your lips and blow out, trying to push the air out of your mouth. It will make a squeaky, trumpet-like sound kids will love and be fascinated by.
17. Go camping. Set a date to go camping with your family. There are great options for hiring camping gear if you don’t have the resources (time/money/storage space) to own it.
18. Look for shapes in the clouds. Sit down and create a story. As the clouds change, the story will evolve.
19. Create a nature mystery bag. Find a box and put in a collection of nature objects, with different textures and shapes. Ask you child to guess what it is, and discuss where it’s come from. Next time they’re outside, ask them to collect some natural items (safely – or with the assistance of another adult), for them to create a mystery box for you.
20. Start a nature journal. Ask your child to write down all their favourite things in nature. If there’s something they’ve learnt about, but haven’t seen, add it to the list and try and find a time and place to catch a glimpse or make a visit. Use this to reflect as well. How did they feel when they saw it? Where were they, and who were they with? What was the weather like? Keep adding to the list, and watch it grow and change.

10 Ways To Have Fun Outdoors

Ten fun ways for parents to encourage children to experience the great outdoors

Getting Kids into National Parks

Whether the idea of taking your children out into nature fills you with a sense of excited anticipation or nervous dread, one thing is certain – today, more than ever, we are well aware of the benefits of childhood contact with nature.

For hints and tips on how to share the wonderful experience that national parks have to offer, download the new Getting Kids into National Parks guide from NPAQ.

Nature Play QLD

Increasing the time Queensland children spend in unstructured play outdoors and in nature

Unlock the secrets of playing in Nature to GROW super healthy happy kids.
GROW with Nature Play is the practical play app featuring heaps of things-to-do, tips, hints, and all sorts of information about how and why playing in nature can benefit your baby.
Designed for children 0 – 3 years old, the important formative years of a child’s life, GROW with Nature Play allows parents to plan age appropriate play lists that can help GROW their child’s

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16 Inspirational Quotes from Children’s  Literature