Ways parents, grandparents and other
caregivers can increase a child’s
wonder in God’s handiwork

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A Great Kids’ Activity Book:

One excellent resource for activities and games for kids is the classic Sharing Nature With Children by Joseph Bharat Cornell.  His middle name reveals that his religious bent is of the Eastern religious, New Age sort; but this book is relatively free of that.  Christian parents and grandparents should have no trouble ferreting out what little bit of pantheistic thought there might be in the short book.  Having had thousands of hours of outdoor experience with kids and adults, Cornell’s suggestions are well thought out and easily made Christ centered by the activity leader.  The booklet itself is inexpensive, especially given its great value for sharing nature with children—just $10.  You can buy it new from Cornell’s organization or new or used through Amazon.com.  I got mine online from a used-book store.

Christmas Gifts for Kids

Consider outdoor or nature related gifts for your children or grandchildren this year.  As a kid, for instance, I loved having a microscope, but always had trouble using only one eye to view a specimen and focusing the instrument.  Edmund Scientific has a binocular version for $60 that might help with both those problems.  This is not an ad for the device—especially since I’ve not tried it and don’t know how well it works.  Maybe one of our readers can give us an idea about how useful this might be for kids.  Browsing in the Edmund catalog, though, has always been a treat for me. 

Nature Activities for Kids and Families

No list of nature activities and community actions can be complete, but here are a few suggestions that may stimulate your own creativity. (For a more complete list see the “Field Guide to Last Child in the Woods,” in the 2008 edition of the book.)  Especially read “100 Actions We Can Take.”

1.  Invite native flora and fauna into your life. Maintain a birdbath. Replace part of your lawn with native plants. Build a bat house. For backyard suggestions, plus links to information about attracting wildlife to apartments and townhouses, see the National Audubon Society’s Invitation to a Healthy Yard. Make your yard a National Wildlife Federation (NWF) Certified Wildlife Habitat.

2.  View nature as an antidote to stress. All the health benefits that come to a child come to the adult who takes that child into nature. Children and parents feel better after spending time in the natural world-even if it’s in their own backyard.

3.  Help your child discover a hidden universe. Find a scrap board and place it on bare dirt. Come back in a day or two, lift the board, and see how many species have found shelter there. Identify these creatures with the help of a field guide. Return to this universe once a month, lift the board and discover who’s new.

4.  Revive old traditions. Collect lightning bugs at dusk, release them at dawn. Make a leaf collection. Keep a terrarium or aquarium. Go crawdadding: tie a piece of liver or bacon to a string, drop it into a creek or pond, wait until a crawdad tugs.

5.  Encourage your kids to go camping in the backyard. Buy them a tent or help them make a canvas tepee, and leave it up all summer. Join the NWF’s Great American Backyard Campout.

6.  Be a cloudspotter; build a backyard weather station. No special shoes or drive to the soccer field is required for “clouding.” A young person just needs a view of the sky (even if it’s from a bedroom window) and a guidebook. Cirrostratus, cumulonimbus, or lenticularis, shaped like flying saucers, “come to remind us that the clouds are Nature’s poetry, spoken in a whisper in the rarefied air between crest and crag,” writes Gavin Pretor-Pinney in his wonderful book The Cloudspotter’s Guide. To build a backyard weather station, read The Kid’s Book of Weather Forecasting, by Mark Breen, Kathleen Friestad, and Michael Kline.

7.  Make the “green hour” a new family tradition. NWF recommends that parents give their kids a daily green hour, a time for unstructured play and interaction with the natural world. Even fifteen minutes is a good start. “Imagine a map with your home in the center. Draw ever-widening circles around it, each representing a successively older child’s realm of experience,” NWF suggests. “Whenever possible, encourage some independent exploration as your child develops new skills and greater confidence.”

8.  Take a hike. With younger children, choose easier, shorter routes and prepare to stop often. Or be a stroller explorer. “If you have an infant or toddler, consider organizing a neighborhood stroller group that meets for weekly nature walks,” suggests the National Audubon Society. The American Hiking Society offers good tips on how to hike with teenagers. Involve your teen in planning hikes; prepare yourselves physically for hikes, and stay within your limits (start with short day hikes); keep pack weight down. For more information, consult the American Hiking Society or a good hiking guide, such as John McKinney’s Joy of Hiking.

9.  Invent your own nature game. One mother’s suggestion: “We help our kids pay attention during longer hikes by playing ‘find ten critters’-mammals, birds, insects, reptiles, snails, other creatures. Finding a critter can also mean discovering footprints, mole holes, and other signs that an animal has passed by or lives there.”

10.  Encourage your kids to build a tree house, fort, or hut. You can provide the raw materials, including sticks, boards, blankets, boxes, ropes, and nails, but it’s best if kids are the architects and builders. The older the kids, the more complex the construction can be. For understanding and inspiration, read Children’s Special Places, by David Sobel. Treehouses and Playhouses You Can Build, by David and Jeanie Stiles describes how to erect sturdy structures, from simple platforms to multistory or multitree houses connected by rope bridges.

11.  Plant a garden. If your children are little, choose seeds large enough for them to handle and that mature quickly, including vegetables. Whether teenagers or toddlers, young gardeners can help feed the family, and if your community has a farmers’ market, encourage them to sell their extra produce. Alternatively, share it with the neighbors or donate it to a food bank. If you live in an urban neighborhood, create a high-rise garden. A landing, deck, terrace, or flat roof typically can accommodate several large pots, and even trees can thrive in containers if given proper care.

12.  Raise butterflies—from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to emerging monarch. The website for Chicago Wilderness’s Leave No Child Inside initiative tells how to do it.

13.  Collect stones. Even the youngest children love gathering rocks, shells, and fossils. To polish stones, use an inexpensive lapidary machine-a rock tumbler. See Rock and Fossil Hunter, by Ben Morgan.

Copyright. Used by permission

For more information, see solutions presented throughout Last Child in the Woods. Also, visit the nonprofit Children & Nature Network for more ideas for your family and community, including an action guide for change as well as to read state and national news and the latest research.

Family camping. My son, now 42 was 6 months old the first time our family went camping, and we’ve been doing it ever since. Now he brings his daughters too, and our two daughters bring their kids too. We have a great time. We don’t bring anything electric to distract us from enjoying the outdoors. You can start with a tent and today’s models are so much better than what we began with, and you can actually keep dry in rainy weather. You can get by with not much “gear” because what you absolutely need you probably have in your home. Begin small, camp for one night to start,and enjoy yourself. I recommend state and national parks without all the attractions that some commercial campgrounds offer. It forces you outdoors and after several times, I believe you’ll be hooked.
–Bob Rowe

Two of my Oklahoma grand daughters are being home schooled. One morning I had the honor of being their science teacher. So I took the 9 and 7 year old girls outdoors. We walked like foxes, (watching where we put our feet) and viewed things like owls (focusing our eyes straight ahead, thus maximizing our peripheral vision). We startled a covey of quail (causing us to jump too) and saw lots of other birds. One morning 7 year old Rachel came running into the house and said: “Grampi, come quick, there’s a hawk on the ground catching grasshoppers” Sure enough. We sat on a lawn chair together and watched the free show and I got some of the best pictures of a red-tail hawk ever.
–Gary Fawver

Don’t be afraid to let you children have strange ‘pets’. Our Kim loved the outdoors and would catch various creatures and put them in her aquarium to ‘obseve’. One particular neat experience we shared was when she caught a large female praying mantis. Kim arranged the aquarium with the type of plants that the mantis was found on and even caught various foods for her. Eventually the mantis laid eggs (in 2 beautiful symmetrical lines). We were able to see the baby praying mantis hatch…and for many days we talked about how delicate and beautiful God made these little insects. We took pictures so she would have a memory of one of her many strange ‘pets’.
–Karen Crepin

Photography With Kids

Get a kid-friendly digital camera. [Or teach them to use yours--risk and all! I make sure my grandkids have the strap around their wrist. I'm amazed how even a five-year old can learn to center and square up a photo]. Help them make photo collections that they will be able to see on a computer. Stationary things are best for the younger kids: wildflowers, leaves, trees, and geographical features (creek, river, swamp, lake, wetland, forest, mountain, valley, etc.). As your child’s skill and age increases, progress to insects, birds, and animals. They can even make their own field guides [Trees, leaves, and wildflowers work best; animals and birds are not cooperative!]

Photograph plants as they grow and then play them back when the plant is mature. Better yet, do it with plants that the kids grow. Always be growing plants inside with as many as possible growing from seed. Make the children aware of the miracle of growth: Mix seeds, soil, air, sun, and water—and “voila,” you have a plant!

Pick a tree that changes with the seasons, and shoot a picture of it every month from the same place, angle, framing aspect (wide and/or tele). Play them back at the end of the year.

Click on the collage below to see the full-sized photos of an old apple tree I selected to shoot over the course of a year:

Do photo “hide and seek”: Take a picture of something outdoors, show the child the photo on the camera, and have them go look for it. [I started this by doing it indoors with my grandkids. They loved it. I would have them close their eyes in a closed room, and I would then go out and take close-ups of things around the house. I'd then go back to where they were and show them the pictures one at a time until they could go find it. Even our three-year old was able to recognize and recall the location of very small details -- like the brand logo on the oven].

Adopt-a-tree: Have the kids adopt a tree nearby. Depending on the logistics and the number of kids you care for, you can adopt one tree for all or a tree for each. Have them check their tree often and look for the birds that use it and/or nest in it. Have them look for insects or leaf damage from bugs or disease. Make sure, of course, that they know what kind of tree it is. Seasonal changes should be noted. Have older kids make a journal on the tree with photos.

Adopt-a-place: This is of broader scope than just one tree. Set boundaries of one place that your child will get to know in every way possible through all seasons—from tree or bush tops to beneath the surface of the soil. Help them to identify as many plants, animals, insects, and soils as possible. Have them journal the changes and note what weather does to their place.

A Good Goal: “Every Day Outside.” Make it a goal to have your kids experience the outdoors every day of the year. “The weather outside is frightful” but the kids can find it delightful! “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these” parents from getting their kids outdoors at least once each day. This isn’t just running them from the house to the car. It means getting out and deliberately examining what’s happening in the creation. It is important to make your children aware of what’s going on in the natural world every day: windy or calm, sunny or cloudy, wet or dry, hot or cold, humid or arid, where the sun and moon are, what the birds are doing, what the natural sounds and scents are. Be bold, dress the kids appropriately, and go out and experience rain, fog, snow—even blizzard-force winds (dressed appropriately and close to safety, of course). [At least one time each year, I get my warmest gear on and go sit outside in a howling snowstorm for as long as I can take it. John Muir did this in a Sierra windstorm--up in a tall tree. Nearly killed him, but he DID get to feel what it was like to be a tree in a windstorm!]

Make your own weather station and have older kids make written records of daily conditions. If you have a TV, watch The Weather Channel with them once a day and see how close your own weather station is to what is reported on TV.

Make sure your child knows where their food comes from. Go to a dairy farm or a poultry farm. Show them wheat fields, corn fields, soy bean fields and explain which of their foods comes from each. [Which, of course, requires some learning on the part of the parent or other caregiver!] Make the children you care for aware of the importance of water to their lives: Rain, clouds, humidity, soil moisture. They should know what happens to the stuff they flush, where storm water goes, where their drinking water comes from. Take a tour of the local water treatment plant and waterworks plant.

Make sure the children understand what happens to the trash that comes from your home. [In Grand Rapids there is a very efficient and low-polluting incinerator that produces electricity from tons of trash---and they provide educational tours.]

Seek to observe the Sabbath Principle with your child. [We will need lots of tips from the WOC community to learn the many ways to do this.]

Games, games, games! Make everything a game. Pretend you are an animal and have your child guess what animal it is. Do treasure hunts using natural things as waypoints (tree, bush, grassy spot, and so forth). Climb trees with your child. [Trees are our Creator's "monkey bars!].

Safe free play. Because there is so much risk from evil people today, parents seldom allow their children to just “go outside and play” as my generation did. But kids do need free play: maybe playing house under a pine tree or making a hut under low-hanging bushes. Parents just have to make a point be outside with the kids—which is not a bad thing. Around the house, this is fairly easy. But kids also need to get out in the boondocks too. Here is where community comes in. Sets of parents can take their kids out to wild areas they have examined to make sure there are no high risks like deep rushing streams, patches of poison oak or ivy, obvious stinging insect nests, and so forth. Then individual adults can space themselves out on a perimeter that allows them to keep an eye on the kids as they play. The length and depth of this experience can vary with maturity and experience—of the kids and the parents! Safety tape from the hardware store, in fact, can be tied to trees and bushes to set boundaries. “Soft” parents or grandparents can bring along lawn chairs and read books and magazines as the kids play. “Tough” ones can prop themselves against trees or sit on “tuffits” like Miss Muffet. [Better to read than books and magazines, however, are field guides to natural features that surround you. No parent knows everything about the local flora and fauna.] All sorts of teaching can go on before, during, or after free play. Nothing lifts a mom or dad’s spirit like watching their kids grow in wonder as they discover the world outdoors.

Make low power microscopes out of old lenses. Never pass up a garage sale bargain on old projectors—the lenses of which make great microscopic viewers. [Here's my batch--from big to tiny]:

Attach your video camera to a TV as a substitute for binoculars or microscope. You know those cables that came with your camera that you never use!? The ones with plugs colored red and yellow. Plug those into your camera and the other end into the back of most TVs which will have with sockets color—matched to the plugs. On your TV menu select “video.” When you turn your camera on, you should see what’s on the camera—either live or already recorded. You might have a birdfeeder nearby or some animals visible through a window or a door that you can zoom in on so your child can get a close-up look. While you can record the animal and then play it back, it enhances your child’s understanding of real-time events to have the camera in its reading mode so they can look out the window or door and back at the TV to see what is happening live. That’s the binocular effect. But you can also use your camera in macro mode to get up close to a bug or something small. This is especially helpful with children who are afraid of insects.

GAMES:

“What Doesn’t Belong?” Along a natural trail, place unnatural items in spots both easy and hard to spot (depending, too, on the age and experience of the children). The number and nature of the items will also vary in reference to age and experience. Here are some things you can set out: pop/soda cans, plastic bottles, candy wrappers, caps and other small clothing items, Styrofoam cups, and so forth. After you have done your “planting,” take the child/children on the walk. If there are more than one, have them first silently observe (so each can be looking) and then report when you go back through. In the end, of course, each item should be retrieved and properly disposed of.

“Find The Bottle!” [This was a blast with even our preschool grandchildren.] In a fairly clear natural area, hide a bottle beneath something natural, but unnaturally indicated: [I took two grandchildren to one of the typical red-oak sandy clearings around us. While they closed their eyes, I buried the bottle and then make a ring of twigs around it. A real easy find. Next, I set a sort of twig arrow down, but not too close. Then I placed a few more leaves over it than was natural for the spot. Next, I just made a fairly small depression in the sand over it. Finally, I tidied up the whole clearing with a leafy branch and then buried the bottle with only the very tip of rim showing.] This helps to make the children aware of what is natural and not natural—becoming real nature sleuths. As the kids become older and more experienced, you can make it harder. Finally, you can graduate to the sport of orienteering [ http://www.orienteeringunlimited.com/aboutorienteering.htm ] and geo-caching [ http://www.geocaching.com/ ].

What to Teach Children About God and “the Environment”

1. It was created by God.
(Gen. 1-2; John 1:3; Col. 1:16-17)

2. It is owned by God.
(Psa. 24:1; 1 Cor. 10:16, Psa. 104:24)

3. It is loved by God.
(Psa 145:17 NIV; Psa. 36:5)

4. It is sustained by God continuously.
(Gen. 8:22; Psa. 145:17; Psa. 104, Psa. 36:5-6;
Matt. 6:26; Col. 1:17)

5. It was placed under man’s dominion.
(Gen. 1:28; Psa. 8:6-8, Heb. 2:8, Psa. 145:13)

6. It was assigned to man for care and servant leadership.
(Gen. 2:15)

7. It was altered by sin at the Fall.
(Gen. 3:14-19)

8. It was altered again by the Flood.
(Gen. 8-9)

9. It provides needs for all people throughout time.
(Psa. 104:13-15; Matt 6:25-24; Zech. 10:1)

10. It is considered less valuable than people.
(Matt. 6:26)

11. It has been redeemed by Christ.
(Rom. 8:18-23; Col. 1:20)

12. It will be restored, reconciled to God, and unified
at Christ’s return.
(Isa. 11:6-9; Rom. 8:18-23; Col. 1:20; Eph. 1:9-10)

13. It will be assigned its destiny by God, not man.
(2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 21:1)

Implications of these biblical truths:

We do not own the earth and can never ultimately “possess” any part of it. When we buy and sell land, we are only assigning temporary care to “owners” who are expected by God to use it carefully, frugally, and justly for His glory. We should not deliberately destroy the land’s capacity to do its assigned work: to produce needed elements (fruit, oxygen, water filtration, moisture, etc.) for the health and survival of all that depend upon it. Our task is stewardship, which acknowledges that we are accountable to the Master for the creation’s health and for how we use its fruit (profit).

Since it was made by God, is sustained by God, is loved by God, and will be restored by God, we must use it with reverent care and respect. We must always be thankful for our parents and their parents for their care of it and be careful to hand it on to our children and their children as little damaged and diminished as we can. Our worship is of the Creator, not the creation. But, we must also remember that with the astronomical wonders above we “join with all nature in manifold witness to [God's] great faithfulness, mercy, and love!”

Mankind is expected to establish communities and cultures upon the earth that use the land and its produce with as little waste and destruction as possible. All creatures are made by God and must be respected as His creation. When we use the earth’s produce, we do it with gratitude and with the understanding that all His creatures, beginning with—but not limited too—mankind, have a right to occupy and make use of their allotted portion of it.

As much as possible we should attempt to treat the earth now as we will be expected to treat it at its restoration in the coming Kingdom. While “our citizenship is in heaven,” we cannot forget, as T.S. Eliot reminds us, that such citizenship “is our model and type for our citizenship below.”

Children need to know that the earth we see now is not like it was at the creation (because of the Fall, the Curse, the Flood, and the ravages of time), and it is not now what it will be at the restoration (the “peaceable kingdom” of shalom). Nonetheless, we also must show them how it still demonstrates to us the power, divinity, beauty, and awesome creative nature of God. For that reason alone, we should tend faithfully to our stewardship tasks.

Children could think of their use of the earth as a school project that will be graded by the divine Teacher at the end. Here’s another helpful analogy: If all of us as God’s children offer up our work as art to the Heavenly Father, we can know that regardless of how imperfect and immature it is, He will post it on His fridge.

To be added to regularly by the WOC community . . . .

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