My husband and I have three young boys — ages 5, 10 and 12. As you can probably guess, there is a lot of wrestling, intense (and loud) games of competitive hide-and-go-seek, and “illegal” baseball games in our house. Their baseball games are illegal because I have banned this activity from indoor play — but that still doesn’t stop them from throwing balls in the house, resulting in several broken windows over the years. Replacing a few windows is just part of our cost of raising boys.
I find it interesting that they perceive their grandparents to have a huge house, and that I was so lucky to have grown up there. Yes, I was very lucky to have spent most of my childhood at the lake. But my parent’s house is by no means huge and luxurious. It has all the modern conveniences — indoor plumbing, running water and electricity — but with 1.5 baths, limited internet and no decent restaurants or even grocery stores within an hour’s drive (and lots of mosquitoes), many people would not agree.
Our boys perception is based on the fact that my parents own an acre of land in the woods, surrounded by water, trees and everything else nature has to offer in northern Canada. It’s nature’s playground, and they love going there every summer. I call it “easy fun” because all you have to do each day is open the door to swimming, tubing, paddle boarding, canoeing, catching frogs, boating, fishing, hiking, picking blueberries and running free. No organized sports, no scheduled play dates, no electronics, no fast food — just unstructured free play. Easy for me, and best of all, they love it.
[Read: What You Should Know About Your Kid’s Coach .]
Is this type of outdoor play in nature becoming extinct? Are we at risk for nature-deficient disorder? With rising declines in children’s (and adults’) outdoor play being documented globally, the answer to these questions appears to be yes.
Although nature-deficient disorder is not a real medical disease, but rather an intriguing concept developed by Richard Louv in his 2005 bestselling book “Last Child in the Woods,” science is revealing that there is a lot of truth to this “disorder” and its treatment is easy and inexpensive. If we are to look at nature-deficient disorder as an actual disorder, we need to examine its criteria, causes, symptoms and treatment.
The causes of nature-deficient disorder include parents’ fears, limited access to natural areas, scheduled activities, lack of independent mobility and spending too much time in front of a screen. Kids today are busier than ever with schoolwork and scheduled activities such as sports and music lessons. And the world is believed to be a more dangerous place today, leading many parents to cite safety as a major barrier to outdoor play — even though crime rates are similar (if not lower) to what they were in the 1970s.
Outdoor play for kids has been engineered out of their lives with video games, television, the Internet, smartphones, computers and spending too much time in a car driving from one scheduled activity to another. The average American boy or girl now spends less than eight minutes each day in unstructured outdoor play, and more than seven hours indoors each day in front of a screen. The end result is that our kids are out of shape, tuned out (and plugged in), lacking vitamin D from the sun, and stressed out because they are missing out on all the benefits of outdoor play.
Kids need more independent mobility, which is the freedom of children to travel and play outside without adult supervision. Kids who spend more time outside are more physically active and less likely to be overweight or obese. With skyrocketing obesity rates (more than 33 percent of American kids are now overweight or obese), the more opportunities a child has to move, the better.
[Read: Read More, Play More: Simple Steps to Success for Today’s Children .]
With less than 20 percent of American children meeting the physical activity guidelines, outdoor play is one of the easiest, affordable and fun ways for kids to get moving. Most of the benefits of outdoor play are obvious: fresh air, more exercise (and a lower incidence of obesity), getting along with others, and a sense of belonging to a community. Outdoor play can have other health benefits, such as improving distance vision and lowering the chance of nearsightedness. And outdoor activities are often less expensive, more convenient and can foster the lifelong habit of physical activity compared to structured activities and indoor activities.
If nature-deficient disorder was a real disease its treatment is simple, inexpensive, and it starts in your own backyard — go outside and play, preferably in nature. It’s time to make nature-deficient disorder extinct. Our kids’ health depends on it.
[Read: How to Sit Less and Move More .]
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Are You Suffering From Nature-Deficient Disorder? originally appeared on usnews.com
