New studies keep coming out as if its news that children need to be in nature. They cite may reasons. I asked my son who has been taking kids out into the wilderness for years, “What is the first thing that comes to mind that you’ve learned with kids out in the woods?”
I’ve learned that kids, like all of us, are in a confusing world with a lot of confusion, distraction and uncertainty. They are also in a state of change internally where they don’t know what is going to be happening. Every day is different. So, going out in nature, rules are simpler, there are fewer people to interact with . You can know how trees will act. We give them schedule so they know what’s happening.
And nature is consistent
With all that, they get an emotional safe environment– both natural and cultural–they have more freedom to be themselves and see who they are.
Josh Epstein National Expansion Coordinator YMCA BOLD & GOLD
The rules of the natural world have a reality beyond the rules of human beings. A high school student who spent three days on a solo camping trip in winter on a mountain wrote a poem that began, “Nature doesn’t care if you act cool, if your pants sag…..if it is cold, you will freeze…” How do we move from rules in our buildings that can seem arbitrary, senseless, certainly unfair to individuals if not the collective group of kids.
Restorative Justice and Love and Logic are two programs that have been around for a while that first come to mind for providing consequences with meaning and an order for kids to consider how they live.