Beneficial factors of outdoor play that benefit children

There are many benefits to children having outdoor opportunities to explore, test theories, engage imagination, risk asses and test their own boundaries. Outdoor play has been seen to be a benefit to child development for a long time from Rousseau (1712-1758) & John Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827), the Psychologist Fredrich Froebel and his introduction of kindergartens. Piaget (1896-1980) saw the true benefits to outdoor play and that this should be encouraged throughout a Childs Development Vygotsky (1896- 1934) believe there was capability in the child to learn individually and without leadership and that outdoor play supported the exploration of theories and find of an independent mind. The developed curriculums of Reggio Emilia, Montessori and many others around the world.

In my own experience I have been privileged to work in Finland in Kindergartens and the way of life there is highly dependent on outdoor time for personal mental health and personal fitness. Outdoor life is hugely important and it begins with small children sleeping outside in buggies all year round and finding adaptability to temperatures of summer reaching 30 degrees and winter temperatures that drop easily to –30 degrees.

As a kindergarten teacher in Finland, we would spend half of the day in outdoor space either in the park, forest or on the coast. The Finnish curriculum of Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) states that children should experience 4 hours a day of outside play and exploration. The children were given a great deal of freedom to explore and investigate their environment and to take things back into the classroom to discuss and learn what they have found/discovered/seen/built/experienced.

Outside play and exploration brings other benefits too. A new study completed by scientists at the National Resource Institute of Finland, the study was of children’s immune systems and how outdoor play areas which are more bio diverse can improve children’s immunity (Biodiversity intervention enhances immune regulation & health associated commercial micro biota among day-care children (2020)). The study was carried out on 75 children aged 3-5 years for 28 days. These children played in a modified play area, appeared to show greater diversity of microbes on their skin and in their guts in comparison to children playing in area with paving, gravel and concrete. Showing that a close engagement with nature has physical health benefits as much as mental and developmental.

Factors that contribute to children not being active around the constraints of modern living.

Modern living may have many effects on children accessing good outdoor play. More families live in built-up areas where green space is difficult to access. You may need to travel to reach a park or a play space. There are other social factors which may restrict children accessing spaces, parents may feel it is not safe for children to play there, it’s dirty, older children “hanging out” in play space, adults using the play space inappropriately. These elements are sadly an influence on how adults/parents may control children’s access to outdoor play.

We have become a more fearful society of abduction and abuse of our children; we no longer feely allow our children to play outside and take responsibility for themselves to be home at a good time. I remember as a child playing outdoors and having to be home before the street lights come on, or playing at a distance where I could hear my name being called. Unfortunately, we don’t all have this same freedom due to fear.

Other factors also contribute to constraints, the distance to outdoor space becomes further away as more and more land is being built on. Working commitments placed on our society means parents don’t have time to take children to outdoor spaces or do activities with them.

As our world is growing more expensive especially in recent months and in our immediate future financial obligations of living costs and costs to access activities will inevitably restrict Children’s access to play spaces or outdoor adventures if travel or entrance costs are factors to be considered. Parental fitness and parental interest will also influence children exposure, mental health of our adults has been hugely affected after the years of covid and restrictions. More adults are suffering from anxiety and mental health issues, others have been left with long/post covid ailments which restrict their ability to enjoy outdoor activities and limit their capabilities with their families. Extended family have become distant as people migrate for work and making families small, where families are close by children can be more engaged with generations and learn from their experiences of play and discovery sharing experiences and knowledge easily and building solid relationships too.

Modern day living and our constant engagement with media has impacted our children’s desire to go outside and addictions to electronics phones/consoles/internet etc. This will have impacts on our behaviours and interactions in the future. Exactly how we wait for this to be revealed.

“Children are now half as likely to meet up with friends & peers in person outside of school as in 2006”

Nuffield Foundation

Social interactions child friendships & connections are condensed into moments, and are sometimes carried out electronically, we are a society who would rather text than speak to someone on the phone. Or will play video games virtually from our own homes.

Schools are also factors in the constraints our children experiencing play and outdoor space, break times are being shortened in favour of more learning time, indoor play is being reduced in order to reach more learning targets. A report carried out by the Independent revealed “key stage 1 in primary school children aged 5-7 years now have 45 minutes less break time per week than children of that age in 1995”

The NHS recommends Pre-school children aged 3-4 should spend at least 180 minutes a day doing a variety of physical activity including outdoor play.

Conclusion

Outdoor play is hugely important and we are failing our adults of the future if we do not provide them with the skills, health and experiences to allow them to be the best they can be. The removal of play and outdoor interaction & exploration is a failure to see the longer view of how this supports their development and health. We learn more all the time about how important our gut health is to our overall health and if we can create environments that build our children’s health and resilience to disease we should endeavour to make such improvements our standard expectations and provide them with the conditions to create a healthy , strong and resilient life to deal with whatever the future may hold for them

We should be working hard to allow children opportunity to build skills and creativity so that they will have 21st century skills . Be active, creative, healthy, engaging members of society who have been given the best opportunities.

Our society needs change and sadly the change we need is radical in the impact it will have on life now and the changes it will bring to the children who live in the boundaries of what we call normal today. The addictive state of technology creates for them on a daily basis, opportunities for the lack of parental supervision, knowledge or presence to monitor their technology engagement is astounding and the exposure children now have to information, and imagery that is beyond their ability to comprehend has twisting effects on their cognitive skills and their expectations of normality. We live in a world where tik tok controls more of our children’s minds than the people who live with them in their homes. the disinformation and distribution of information is out of control and we are risking the development of our children and young adults.

As we become more engaged with a world where information we used to be required to learn is now at our fingertips we should focus our attention to the skills, behaviours and the connections that as the human speciaes we can be good at.

Having good gut health but also listening to our guts and listening to ourselves trusting our feelings nad intuition. As the world moves in a differnt directions connecting with nature and our environments is crucial in maintaining our mental and physicla health, we all to easily can become keyboard slaves and trapped in an electronic world where our down time is also visual technology or game playing.

We have to hope that we will have prodictivity from the future that will allow us the freedom to reconnect with nature and live long and health lives.

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