Promoting Play Outdoors
Praxis Makes Perfect
My hope for this website is to be a resource to all who desire to learn more about outdoor play and the role it plays in childhood development.
Background
Play outdoors encourages a child’s creativity and allows them to better understand how to move their body. The more exposure a child is allowed to the outdoors, the more their brain, senses, and body becomes organized (Hanscom, 2016). However, throughout the years, time spent playing outdoors has continually decreased.
Development of Praxis and Play
What is praxis?
Praxis is how children decide what to do, make a plan, and carry out the action when playing.
This can be as simple as banging two rocks together or completing a more complex action
of building a teetertotter out of logs.
Provided below are handouts with information regarding a more in depth explanation of praxis, the importance of outdoor play, developmental milestones, what play looks like at different ages, and more.
AOTA Inspire Video
This is a more in depth video geared towards occupational therapy practitioners and those wanting to learn more about praxis in outdoor play.
Areas discussed:
-Foundation of praxis
-Ideational praxis
-Assessments
-Activities
-And more!
Due to parental safety concerns, increase in extracurricular activities, and the emphasis for skills in academics, children are spending more time indoors (Dowdell, Gray, & Malone, 2011). The average child spends a minimum of six hours per day in front of the computer, television, or playing video games (Hanscom, 2016; Ridout, Roehr, & Roberts, 2010).
Children are born naturalists.
They explore the world with all of their senses, experiment in the environment, and communicate their discoveries
to those around them.
~The Audubon Nature Preschool
All Your Outdoor Needs
Provided below are website and book resources to encourage play outdoors.
Check out the free downloadable Website & Book Resource for all information
and an added bonus of recommended children books.
Helpful Website
Run Wild My Child
Run Wild My Child is your online destination for all things kid-friendly dedicated to getting kids outside and back to nature, one adventure at a time.
Helpful Website
Rain or Shine Mamma
After becoming a mother, Linda noticed that many American children seem to lack a meaningful connection with nature. Thus, she created a blog in 2013 as a way to inspire outdoor play and adventure every day, regardless of the weather. Many tips and tricks are shared on this website to help promote outdoor play and exploration.
Book Resources
A curated list of books has been created to promote understanding of a child's development
and the importance nature has on the body.
Sensory Integration
Sensory Integration and the child by A. Jean Ayres, Ph.D.
This book is a great resource for better understanding sensory integration. It explains sensory integration and the brain, sensory integrative dysfunction, and what can be done to help the child. It provides stories, tips for parents throughout, and is user-friendly.
Sensory Integration
The Out-of-Sync Child by Carol Stock Kranowitz, M.A.
Carol Stock Kranowitz describes how children react to sensations and integrate their responses to their world. This book is written from a teacher’s perspective and provides detailed, practical information that will help parents understand how the nervous system works.
Nature and the Outdoors
Balanced and Barefoot by Angela J. Hanscom
Written by a pediatric occupational therapist and founder of Timbernook, Balanced and Barefoot shines a light on the silent epidemic affecting modern kids, explains why unrestrained movement and outdoor play are vital for your child’s cognitive and physical development, and even offers fun, engaging strategies to help ensure that kids grow into healthy, balanced, and resilient adults.
Nature and the Outdoors
The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier, and More Creative by Florence Williams
Florence Williams investigates the science behind nature’s positive effects on the brain. Delving into brand-new research, she uncovers the powers of the natural world to improve health, promote reflection and innovation, and strengthen our relationships. As our modern lives shift dramatically indoors, these ideas—and the answers they yield—are more urgent than ever.
Nature and the Outdoors
Nature Play at Home: Creating Outdoor Spaces that Connect Children with the Natural World by Nancy Striniste
In Nature Play at Home, Nancy Striniste gives you the tools you need to make outdoor adventures possible in your own backyard. With hundreds of inspiring ideas and illustrated, step-by-step projects, this hardworking book details how to create playspaces that use nature materials—like logs, boulders, sand, water, and plants of all kinds. Projects include hill slides, seated circles, sand pits, and more.
Nature and the Outdoors
Last Child In The Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder by Richard Louv
Never before in history have children been so plugged-in—and so out of touch with the natural world. In this groundbreaking new work, child advocacy expert Richard Louv directly links the lack of nature in the lives of today's wired generation—he calls it nature deficit—to some of the most disturbing childhood trends, such as rises in obesity, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), and depression.
Nature and the Outdoors
How To Raise A Wild Child by Scott D. Sampson
The average north American child now spends about seven hours a day staring at screens and mere minutes engaged in unstructured play outdoors. Yet recent research indicates that experiences in nature are essential for health growth. How to Raise a Wild Child is a timely and engaging antidote, offering teachers, parents, and other caregivers the necessary tools to promote a meaningful, lasting connection between children and the natural world.
Nature and the Outdoors
There’s No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom’s Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids
by Linda Åkeson McGurk
This book is a fascinating personal narrative that highlights the importance of spending time outdoors, and illustrates how the Scandinavian culture could hold the key to raising healthier, resilient, and confident children in America.
Importance of Play
Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul by Stuart Brown, M.D.
Dr. Brown draws on his clinical research and observations of animals, as well as advances in neuroscience and psychology, to explore the power of play in our everyday world. He explains how parents can nurture their child’s development through play, which companies are harnessing the impact of play in the workplace to encourage innovation, how schools can use play effectively to motivate students, and more.
Raising Resilient Kids
It's OK NOT to Share…and Other Renegade Rules for Raising Competent and Compassionate Kids by Heather Shumaker
In this inspiring and enlightening book, Heather Shumaker describes her quest to nail down “the rules” to raising smart, sensitive, and self-sufficient kids. Drawing on the work of more than a hundred children psychologists, educators, and other experts, as well as her own experiences as the mother of two small children, Shumaker gets to the heart of the matter on a host of important questions.
Why do you like to play outdoors?
About the Author
Alyssa Tilstra, OTDS
Growing up in the outskirts of a small rural town, I was exposed to the benefits nature has to offer. From splashing in the creek to making the most delicious mud pies, exploring nature became an everyday activity. The older I have become, the more evident it has appeared that children are becoming deprived of outdoor play. Thus, I began to research why this is happening and what steps can be taken to better promote outdoor exploration for children.
