But the new favorite activity for my children (ages 4 and 2) is anything involving the extensive pile of chopped wood bordering our backyard fire pit. They use it as a ladder and a balance beam. They stack logs like blocks, or arrange the wood in a circle (picture a bunch of logs sitting around a campfire) and hop from piece to piece. It turns out the woodpile is way more fun than the swing set, trampoline, sandbox, soccer balls, bicycles, and all other child-appropriate activities they could choose.
Like any good mother, my heart stops at the sight of fragile children balancing atop wobbly stacks of wood. (And, ick, aren’t there bugs in there?) But lately, I’ve allowed their exploration. Blame Richard Louv.
In Last Child in the Woods, Louv discusses widespread “nature-deficit disorder” in today’s youth. Technological advances, suburbanization, and concerns for safety have distanced our children from nature. Their play now revolves around indoor computer games and sanitized parks. My children are no different. We have woods and streams in our neighborhood just like the ones that were my childhood playgrounds. But do you think I will ever let my children walk through those streams? Not now that I know about snakes and other yucky stuff they might encounter! What about allowing them to venture through those peaceful woods? Not a chance, given the rumor that bobcats prowl my neighborhood for tasty children.
But Louv argues that many of the physical, mental, and spiritual problems our children now face – like obesity, ADHD, stress, and depression – can be linked to nature-deficit. I’m no child development expert, but I do know the exquisite calm found only in the quiet rustle of the woods. I never feel as completely connected – with the Earth, with the Divine, with all other living creatures – as I do surrounded by the majesty of towering trees and babbling waterfalls. Do I want my children to grow up without knowing that kind of peace and connection? Sure, I can take them hiking or out to the lake, but they’ll never find that adventurous freedom I want them to experience, not with me hovering over them.
So, I let my children play in the firewood. And when my daughter, in her prettiest spring dress, makes a beeline for the patch of dirt in the front yard where we used to have grass, I just let her play. But I won’t be winning any Mother-of-the-Year awards, so I’m doing my homework. Recent articles in The Charlotte Observer (e.g. “Searching for Sunshine” and “Lure the Kids Outdoors”), as well as Louv’s own website, have great suggestions for preventing nature-deficit disorder.
What are your ideas?
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