Thought for the Day

'Man's heart, away from nature, becomes hard.'Luther Standing Bear 1858-1939

The Lakota knew that lack of respect for growing, living things, soon led to lack of respect for humans too.


'What is the extinction of a condor to a child who has never seen a wren?' Naturalist Robert Michael Pyle

I am currently reading a book by Richard Louv called 'Lost Child in the Woods' about saving our children from what he has coined as ' Nature Deficit Disorder'. Basically,he is arguing that there is no substitute for the joy and freedom a child experiences playing and exploring a wild, natural habitat near to, if not in, their own back yard. He is also arguing that this ablity to access the natural world free from the constraints of adult supervision, the restrictions of urbanisation and increasing dependence on computers, is becoming more and more limited. Add to this adult fears of leaving children to play alone, limited access to free, wild land and the demise of group activities which encourage young people to explore ie: scouts and guides with their camps; as well as restrictions imposed on education by health and safety regulations, and there is a real problem emerging for today's children who may know the names of each new computer game, but not those of the trees and flowers in their own locality...that's if there are any.Subjects like Biology and Geology are also now specialist subjects integrated into general subjects so children are not getting any specialist knowledge of the names of plants and animals. As the quote says if they do not know what a wren is then how can we expect them to be interestedin the plight of the condor and wider envirommental issues. Children, according to Louv, are not making these vital connections.Louv is writing in 2005 and his arguments centre on the plight of American children.

Thankfully there is a growing awareness in the UK that children are in desperate need of outdoor activities and risk taking play. Bushcraft courses and environmental education is apparently on the increase with new projects like 'Plan-it Earth' in west Penwith invitng the community and especially schools to see nature as the source of education. As Wordsworth says:'Let Nature be your teacher..'Hopefully, this sort of community programme will take root but it is still dependent on funding and also can only work with those schools like cape Cornwall who want to allow that sort of educational experience to take place...it is not the norm. Also with increasing and pressing need for housing, roads and even new towns where will children go to play and in any case, will their parents allow them? It is an interesting question....where I live there is a playing field and many open fields right next to a large estate...do I see groups of children happily playing, making camps, running, playingball or hanging out on the grass? The answeris so far, no. I saw a couple of boys playing rugby, some boys round a motorbike and a few children playing on their bikes...but I am aware that the only person who uses that green space on a regular basis is either your average dog walker doing the obligatory round of the field or interestingly the local gypsy in a very speedy horse and cart ( I can't think of the correct term...senile moment!}It is only gypsies who still have this love of freedom in the outdoors....and by gypsies I am not referring to travellers. Everyday when I see him he seems to symbolise that wild, freedom with his deeply tanned skin and black hair...trotting or cantering or racing at speed around that field. Where are the children???Indoors on their playstations racing cars, planning military attacks, collecting new cages for their fantasy pets or losing weight playing baseball on Wi. What's there to do outdoors...it's boring!

Hopefully,living in Cornwall we can still go down to the woods today, let our children play and not be afraid of the Blair Witch or the odd bear on a picnic...hopefully....

Blessed be xxx