Vera Vollbrecht, Ken Voorhis
Wednesday, October 15, 2008 - 8:30-9:00
The 2005 publication of Richard Louv’s book, Last Child in the Woods, received national attention and initiated a movement among educators, parents, and youth workers to reconnect children with the outdoors. In his book Louv coined the term "nature deficit disorder" to describe the disconnection today’s children have with nature and outdoor experiences. This trend, called by some "No Child Left Inside" or the "Children in Nature" movement, focuses on getting children to spend regular, unstructured time in nature. Throughout the United States, parks departments, nature centers, science museums, and an organization in California has initiated a statewide "Children’s Outdoor Bill of Rights." A comprehensive list of "Children in Nature" campaigns can be accessed at http://www.cnaturenet.org/movement/info. Current research indicates that as adults, people are most often motivated to protect land, air, water or wilderness when they had significant childhood or adolescent experiences in natural areas. Because children today spend more time indoors, often connected to electronic stimuli such as computers and video games, natural area managers must consciously incorporate the Children in Nature movement into natural area management and educational programs. Today’s children are our future environmental policy makers and natural resource managers and need outdoor experiences to ensure long term stewardship of the land.
Keywords: STEWARDSHIP, EDUCATION, CHILDREN, NATURE-DEFICIT DISORDER