Beyond Rocks and Trees; Playing In The Woods Teaches Social Skills

It’s summer, and that means kids have a lot more free time and a chance to get outdoors.  But experts worry that too many children are spending those extra hours in front of the television or a computer. That means kids are more sedentary and learn less about the natural world. But they also miss a chance to learn important social and decision-making skills. As part of a collaboration with Northeast stations, North Country Public Radio’s Brian Mann reports.

The sun is pouring down, striking sparks on Lake Champlain, one of the biggest natural lakes in the Northeast. I’m with my teenage son Nicholas and his friend Peter. We’ve paddled to Schuyler Island – a chunk of empty wildness that’s part of New York’s Adirondack Park.

"How was that paddle?"  

"Awesome, oh it was beautiful!"

So -- so far so good.  As I fuss with the gear and the boats, the boys are eager to get away and explore.

"So can we roam?"

With that they’re off, vanishing into the trees. They’ve both made it pretty clear that they want to spend as little time around the grown-up as possible. And it turns out that’s a good thing.

"This morning, obviously, we are going to be speaking about reconnecting children and nature."

In a big conference room in Lake Placid New York, experts and policy-makers gathered to talk about an idea that’s been floating around for a decade or so -- nature deficit disorder. New York state Assemblywoman Teresa Sayward says kids need more time outdoors.

"Children are just being disconnected from the environment, they’re being disconnected from being hands-on outdoors. Schools are teaching more to the test than they are getting kids out for field trips."

It turns out what Nicholas and Peter were heading off to do in the woods -- exploring and making up games -- is important for kids. Paul Hai runs an education outreach program that’s affiliated with the State University of New York called Children In Nature. He says kids who play in unstructured environments -- the forest, a city park, or even just their backyards -- are learning a crucial set of skills, known as “executive function.”

"Children out in the backyard making up their own words, playing kick the cans or sardines, we create the rules, we figure out who’s going to be on which teams, and we order our own world."

Hai says kids these days are learning these social and decision-making skills much later than they used to, three to four years later. In part that’s because they spend tons of time being led around by the nose, often by computer games or TV shows.

"American kids age 8 to 18 are spending on average 7 ½ hours connected to some kind of electronic media on a daily basis."

Hai's group is one of dozens around the Northeast developing programs for urban and rural kids designed to nudge them back outdoors.

Back out on Schuyler Island, Nicholas and Peter are working together, building a massive bonfire. They’re having a blast with zero input from dad. I ask Peter about this tug-of-war between the real world and the virtual world.

"Most kids don’t spend time outdoors anymore, right?"

"I don’t spend time outdoors anymore, it's true." 

"You don’t?" 

"No, not very often. Most of the time, I’m on the computer or something."

"So when you're on the computer, what do you do?

"Oh, I'm on Facebook or playing a game."

"So what do you think about being out here."

"I can’t tell if it’s more fun, but something inside me instinctual says it is."

Chalk this up as a victory -- two kids thrown back into the woods and loving it. But Richard Louv, author of the book, Last Child in the Woods, says a lot of kids and a lot of parents don’t even see this kind of thing as an option.

"Yes, 44 hours a week plugged into some kind of electronic medium is part of this issue, but so is the over-structuring of childhood that so many parents are doing."

Louv says many parents would rather send kids to soccer camp or piano lessons than let them run around outside. That’s because many grownups lack the skills and experience to be comfortable outdoors – and they’re frightened of giving their kids freedom.

"Parents spoke most passionately about their deep fear of strangers, of stranger-danger.  That was the reason that came up the most often when parents would talk about why their kids weren’t going outside very much. It wasn’t because their kid's fear, it was because of theirs."

The truth is it takes some time and effort to get kids outdoors. And overprotective dads like me have to work at finding a balance between keeping our kids safe and giving them room to take some risks. But the payoff, watching Nicholas and Peter drift away confidently into the forest, is worth it.

For WNPR, I'm Brian Mann.

Northeast environmental coverage is part of NPR’s Local News Initiative.