Children in nature: Happier, Healthier, Smarter!
Children experience and express their love for nature in a variety of ways. The visual arts – painting, photography, song and story – offer a way of engaging children and the opportunity to express their feelings for the natural world as they experience it and best communicate it. Both kids and nature win in the “Get to Know Your Wild Neighbors” art contest.
Find out more and enter the contest here.
The Children in Nature collaborative, incl. NRPA, National Park Service and the National Association of State Park Directors, presented this webinar to 300 parks professionals, pediatricians, cardiologists and other health care professionals across the country in April.
Dr. David Sabgir, founder of the Walk with a Doc program and Executive Director Kathryn Stephens, were panelists. They represented Columbus, where Walk with a Doc originated, and the national movement to connect doctors, kids and parks.
Jillian Davis at the 2011 Summit
Brenda Mettcalf and Carolyn Watkins at the 2011 Summit
Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear signed House Concurrent Resolution 29, focused on encouraging Kentucky kids to get outside and do things like go fishing, visit parks or farms, and bike on safe routes to school.
Ed Councill, founder of Frankfort’s Canoe Kentucky and kidsGROWkentucky, lead the effort to get the resolution passed.
“I just want to show that there is concern for getting kids outdoors, and there needs to be public policy to state that,” he said.
More information available in this article.
Check out these recent articles about children and nature:
This article, in the Washington Post, discusses how many preschool-aged children are not getting enough outdoor playtime.
Another article, published to the Children and Nature Network blog, shows the importance of unstructured outdoor play and how parks can promote this.
An additional post to the Children and Nature Network blog, discusses how children’s environments are changing from the natural world to built environments and how this is reflected in children’s books and education.
“Do your kids get outside every day? What prevents their outdoor play? What promotes it?”
The White House Summit on Environmental Education was on April 16.
Richard Louv and Rep. John Sarbanes (MD), who sponsored the original NCLI Act in 2009, were speakers along with a panel of National Park Service & EPA members, discussing collaborative efforts to get kids and families outside.
John O’Meara
Kristen Santel
What’s next for Sanctuary for The Arts?
Four years ago we opened a center for creativity in the woods and have had a wild ride! Stellar teachers have shared their creativity and inspired us beyond their workshops. Art has been exhibited, monologues read under the Big Tree, the garden photographed and sketched, the labyrinth walked around and around, the meeting room host to retreats and special events.
Now ~ we come to a fork in the road of the fourth year, another path to growth and change – much like the evolutionary nature of creativity for an artist.
And Sanctuary for The Arts continually evolves. The garden has been freshened with a new design, and every plant moved, thinned, trimmed or replaced with new. New art has found its way into the meadow. The labyrinth is awakening thick, lush, green. The trillium and dogwoods are blooming. It’s time to open for the fourth season…but along a different yet similar path.
Taking a lesson from Thoreau, who spent whole afternoons walking in the woods and believed in the benefit of idleness with discipline…we’re embarking on a program of …
more idleness with some discipline
less structure with more spontaneity
more creativity in connection with others.
As you might have guessed, this approach reflects changes in my personal life. With my husband’s upcoming retirement, the June horizon beckons with lots of travel, lots of rowing, lots of my own art …and Sanctuary for The Arts.
so Next…
Sanctuary for The Arts is offering Sunday Gatherings in place of workshops and open studios. Throughout this summer we’ll open for designated Sunday afternoons for focused creativity in the woods. At Sunday Gatherings you can choose to participate in the conversation with fellow artists and a facilitator, or you can choose to wander off on your own to contemplate or create. You can bring work to share (and we hope you do) and you can learn from others’ work. You can paint, draw, watercolor, photograph, weave, write…by yourself or with others. You can always stroll the garden, walk the labyrinth, play in the creek, draw on the bridge …
Come anytime between 12n-6pm. Reservations, though not necessary, would be greatly appreciated. Sunday Gatherings are donation only.
Sunday Gatherings are scheduled for the following dates and creative topics. For the finer details click on www.Sanctuary-for-The-Arts.com / Sunday Gatherings
May 20:ebb and flow ~ a dialogue on Art and Water
June 24:on Art…for the Time being
July 22:Gallery in the Garden ~ a celebration of art and nature
Sept. 23:Playing with Fire!
Take a moment on www.Sanctuary-for-The-Arts.com to read a new page, “Artists Around Town” featuring some fellow artists exhibiting in the greaterColumbus area. Send us your information for posting and inviting other artists to enjoy your work.
Sanctuary for The Arts continues to be available for meetings, retreats, and special events through advance reservation. The labyrinth is open for World Labyrinth Day on May 5, for Sunday Gatherings and on other days by calling ahead. We continue to offer creative philosophical discussion, in the style of Socrates Café (monthly on Monday evenings – call to be added to the reminder list).
We’re looking forward to a fourth season, a new path of flourishing creativity in the woods. I hope you can join us for a Sunday Gathering, to reconnect…with nature, with creativity and ourselves.
“Whenever I have found myself stuck in the ways I relate to things, I return to nature. It is my principal teacher, and I try to open my whole being to what it has to say.” ~ Wynn Bullock
Dr. Hicks helped establish the Driving Park walking club in 2004 with the mission to ”create a healthy lifestyle through physical activity and nutrition.”
The club members meet every Saturday at 8:00 am at the Driving Park Recreation Center, 1100 Rhoads Avenue. After walking, members participate in educational sessions conducted by a Certified Personal Trainer, Licensed Nutritionist and other health professionals.
Jim MacDonald is a sports medicine physician interested in getting people active in all ways. Jim is involved in teaching and research as well as clinical medicine.
“I read Richard Louv’s book, Last Child in the Woods and was looking for something to do in response to the sadness I felt for our children. I first learned of the Leave No Child Inside movement for my Children’s Hospital colleague, Wendy Anderson. I then met Jenny Morgan and was duly impressed!”
Visit Jim’s blog for more information.
jmacdmd@gmail.com
Buy Jenny Morgan's new CD, "Nature Needs Kids and Kids Need Nature" now! Go to NatureNeedsKids.com for digital downloads, purchase, lyrics and more!
