The recreational and educational activities based on playing in nature contributed to increasing children's awareness by giving them endless opportunities for creativity and discovery. Moreover, natural play teaches children to solve problems through the experiences they perform on their own. Children's connection to nature supports and strengthens their social, emotional, physical, and mental health.
The child's connection to nature enhances the physical activity. It increases fitness for the child and makes children more inclined to acquire physical activity habits in the long term. Children's connection nature teaches children that the world contains an infinite set of things. Wildlife plays an essential role in developing children's imagination, awakening their curiosity, and it provides them with a sense of astonishment, imagination, and creativity. The creativity that nature creates in the child helps him create stories. Also, children associated with nature have a more remarkable ability to withstand stress than children who spend less time in nature every day.
Spending half an hour a day in nature increases the child's positive energy, relieves tension in children, and gives children calm and tranquillity.
Example of connecting children to nature
Children's learning based on play in nature develops children's skills. For example, shadow play is one of the plays that the child loves, it gives the child a love to go out into nature to play with his shade, as the child can play it alone and play it with a group of children. Also, this experience can release the child to the imagination. The child can also draw the shadow of his friend or draw the shadow of any object given to him (an animal, a rectangular, square). The child can form the shadow of some shapes by moving his body or fingers, forming a rabbit Etc. The shadow experience teaches the child that the shade is related to sunlight and time and that the child's shadow changes according to time. Sometimes the shadow is long, and sometimes it is short as the shadow follows and imitates the person's movements.
References:
The shadows of two (2) young children on the tarmac as they jump and play doing star jumps in the sunshine [Digital image]. (n.d.). Retrieved from
Shadow play [Digital image]. (2017). Retrieved from https://farmerpublishing.com/2017/10/24/shadow-play/
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