Nature Every Day: How to hook kids on the great outdoors

摘要

It's no secret that kids are spending more time inside playing on screens and less time outside playing in tKe woods. One recent study in the United Kingdom found that the average child there spends less time outdoors than the average prisoner. In Texas, where I work, schoolchildren get outside for unstructured play time just minutes a day. They're in front of an electronic screen for more than seven hours a day.Parents often explain this by saying kids today don't want to go outside. But I disagree. I've taught thousands of children in my 20-year career as an environmental educator in Houston, and in my experience, youth today want the same things we wanted aschildren: real adventure and the opportunity to discover the world around them. Those kinds of experiences, however, are getting harder and harder to find outdoors, especially in our cities and suburbs. But it doesn't have to be that way.