conundrum

[phinnia]

we talk about environmental awareness but most of our kids' interaction with nature is through man-made manicured spaces. we're expecting our children to eventually inherit and care for national parks and wildlife reserves, but the unspoken message is that nature is Not Safe and that manmade areas are superior. how will kids really have an idea

Comments

[dolphingirl]

This is a really good point. I think I'd be interested in reading that book. There are a couple of blogs I've been following that are along the same lines: The Grass Stain Guru and Free Range Kids (their blogrolls are pretty interesting, too).

[shutterbug_12]

Huh. That makes me kind of sad. I know that, where I grew up, this was never, ever a problem. Even our playgrounds in the area for the longest time were made up of wooden things and like, the only piece of man-made material was the metal for the slide itself. And maybe chains on swings, but some had ropes. I walked and rode my bike through woods on dirt roads on a regular basis. So, this sort of thing, that most kids don't have that kind of childhood, is sad to hear to me. =(

[arhh]

But Nature is Not Safe. Mother Nature is a bitch and will do her best to kill you.... *hugs*

[paradoxhorizon]

We must continue to force children to go camping with youth organizations

[winterknight]

I think it's a matter of uneducated parents, and a social attitude that discourages 'risk taking' of any sort. We got around that because both sets of grandparents have Property, and because we have a lot of 'lung space' in town, often with nature trails with parkour stations (obstacles to jump and scale), and the Arboretum is free to run around in, in addition to all the conservation areas. From the time Mys was four, she was off and running about in the woods on her own, except for a dog or two or three. One of the reasons we had dogs was to send one with her when she went out, and my mother's dogs would go with her as well. At one house, she even had chickens and ducks to play with. At my mother's she had a play house on the side of the escarpment where the drop was only about 30 feet and it was sloped gently in that area so really she'd just roll down after the first drop (my mother tried it out herself; you have to admire her dedication, falling out of a playhouse at 50-something), and you had to jump from rock to rock to