Can Young Children Help Create a Sustainable World? - Liz's Early Learning Spot

Can Young Children Help Create a Sustainable World? - Liz's Early Learning Spot

A great contemporary Australia Blog posing some very interesting questions..... "While most teachers profess interest in sustainable living research shows that effective programs require at least one highly committed and enthusiastic teacher or leader if it is to continue. "

How the latest playgrounds are making child’s play fun again

How the latest playgrounds are making child’s play fun again - The Globe and Mail

Helle Nebelong and a number of other prominent contemporary designers talking about the renaissance of common sense and adventure playgrounds in Europe and the US. We may get back to it in another 50 years.

Evergreen’s Toronto Brick Works

This is an eclectic play space that feels as wild as the postwar adventure playgrounds – less dangerous, but liberating. The presence of nature here, Nebelong argues, is crucial. “If you ask children what they want, … they have lots of ideas about bushes and trees where they can pick apples,” she says. “It’s a grownup approach that all things to do with childhood should be colourful, and have heavy equipment and horrible rubber in lots of colours.”..........
Beginning in the 1970s, driven partly by a handful of lawsuits from the parents of injured children, official opinion began to focus on what might go wrong. Safety regulations in the United States and Canada became stiffer and began to alter the landscape.“In some ways, the lawyers were designing the playgrounds,”

Evergreen’s Toronto Brick Works

EMPOWERING THE NEXT GENERATION TO CONNECT WITH NATURE: A GLOBAL MOVEMENT

parksjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/PARKS-20.2-Lopoukhine-et-al-10.2305IUCN.CH_.2014.PARKS-20-2.NL_.en_.pdf

A great paper, well worth the read.


"At the most basic of levels, we learned that plants and animals provided food, fibre and skins and so we tended them and cared for them. Our affiliation, however, goes deeper than addressing the biological necessities of life. Nature has provided spiritual, aesthetic, and philosophical pillars for the growth and expression of human culture."

Creating and Managing Places Where Children Engage with Nature

natureplayandlearningplaces.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Nature-Play-Learning-Places_v1.2_Sept22.pdf

An American paper but the philosophy & concepts are still relevant

BBC News - Children 'prefer to play outdoors than watch TV'

BBC News - Children 'prefer to play outdoors than watch TV'

Read more from the link above

"As a consequence, street play is becoming increasingly rare, with parents citing traffic and stranger danger as reasons for keeping tabs on their children - either indoors or in the back garden."

Children themselves said they wanted to explore through unstructured, free-spirited play, with 67% preferring free play.