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The New Nature Movement

Field Notes from the Future: Tracking the Movement to Connect People and Nature

Last Child in the Woods & The Nature Principle

"Last Child in the Woods" introduces the concept of nature-deficit disorder, offering practical actions for families and communities. "The Nature Principle" extends the issue to adults and reports the restorative power of the natural world.

Tag: "Education"

Comments: 9

PEACE LIKE A RIVER: There’s a Time for Hyper-vigilance and a Time to Pay a Different Kind of Attention

By Richard Louv on April 1st, 2013

PEACE LIKE A RIVER: There’s a Time for Hyper-vigilance and a Time to Pay a Different Kind of Attention

Thinking about Newtown. Chased by an unending stampede of 2,000-pound automobiles and 4,000-pound SUVs, we cocoon inside our homes. The assault continues. Unsettling, threatening images charge through the television cable and overwhelm us. Hyper-vigilance trumps mindfulness. Where do we find respite? The poet Wendell Berry offers direction: When despair for the world grows in me [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns • uncategorized

Comments: 7

Photo/BarbaraLN

By Joseph A. Baust on March 8th, 2013

INDOOR EDUCATION FOR OUTDOOR LEARNING? What’s wrong with this picture?

For every profession there is a training component that includes providing experiences necessary to be able to know the craft. Surgeons work in the operatory as assistants and are mentored. Plumbers and carpenters spend time as apprentices even after an extensive time learning their crafts in technical schools. Likewise musicians study music theory and history; [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 5

“SITTING IS THE NEW SMOKING” — What We Can Do About Killer Couches, Sedentary Schools, and the Pandemic of Inactivity

By Richard Louv on March 2nd, 2013

“SITTING IS THE NEW SMOKING” — What We Can Do About Killer Couches, Sedentary Schools, and the Pandemic of Inactivity

Sitting is the new smoking. That’s a useful new buzz-phrase for what some health experts are calling the “pandemic of inactivity.” In January, the Harvard Business Review published “Sitting is the Smoking of Our Generation,” an article by Nilofer Merchant. “The common denominator in the modern workday is our, um, tush,” wrote Merchant, a corporate director [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 3

PEACE IN NATURE: Aylee Tudek, 16, Shares Her Sense of Wonder

By Aylee Tudek on December 10th, 2012

PEACE IN NATURE: Aylee Tudek, 16, Shares Her Sense of Wonder

“If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 7

WHAT’S GOOD IN YOUR HOOD? Nearby Nature and Human Hope

By Akiima Price on November 26th, 2012

WHAT’S GOOD IN YOUR HOOD? Nearby Nature and Human Hope

I grew up in an urban area that happened to have trees, grass and butterflies. While it allowed me to spend some of my childhood in nature, it did not protect me from the pollution, crime and other happenings in and around my neighborhood, the ones that eventually altered the wellness of my community. Little [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 8

HOW CITY KIDS WILL SAVE THE PLANET

By Mary Hardcastle on October 21st, 2012

HOW CITY KIDS WILL SAVE THE PLANET

This is a story about how city kids will save the planet. I am sitting in a circle under a large oak tree in Baltimore City’s Patterson Park with fifteen 1st graders. We pass nature objects around the circle and they use their five senses to explore each object. Then Jamal spots something moving in [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 10

MUD IS GOOD! Ten Easy Ways to Connect Your Family to the Joy of Nature

By Richard Louv on October 19th, 2012

MUD IS GOOD! Ten Easy Ways to Connect Your Family to the Joy of Nature

Short on Vitamin N? Here’s a brief list of nature activities to help you connect your kids, and yourself, to the health and cognitive benefits of nature time. (For a more complete collection of 100 actions, for families, schools, and communities see Last Child in the Woods, from which the following suggestions are drawn.) Invite native [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 11

SMART PILLS VS. NATURE SMART: Want Your Kids to Do Better in School? Try a Dose of “Vitamin N”

By Richard Louv on October 10th, 2012

SMART PILLS VS. NATURE SMART: Want Your Kids to Do Better in School? Try a Dose of “Vitamin N”

A few years ago, I ran across a particularly intriguing photograph on the  back page of a magazine. The photo showed a small boy at the ocean’s edge. Beyond him you could see a gray sky, a distant island, and a long, even wave approaching. The boy had turned to face the photographer. His eyes were [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 6

FORWARD TO NATURE: The New Nature Movement Isn’t About Going Back to Nature, but Forward to a Nature-Rich Civilization

By Richard Louv on September 28th, 2012

FORWARD TO NATURE: The New Nature Movement Isn’t About Going Back to Nature, but Forward to a Nature-Rich Civilization

This column is adapted from an essay that originally appeared in the book, “Thirty-Year Plan: Thirty Writers on What We Need to Build a Better Future,” published by The Orion Society, 2012, in which writers imagine the future. These ideas are explored in greater detail in Richard Louv’s 2011 book,” The Nature Principle.” For many [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 10

ALL CHILDREN NEED NATURE, WORLDWIDE: Three Major Advances at IUCN World Congress

By Cheryl Charles on September 26th, 2012

ALL CHILDREN NEED NATURE, WORLDWIDE: Three Major Advances at IUCN World Congress

All children need nature. More people are recognizing that need — and working to restore its experience in children’s lives throughout the world. Along that line, I have some good news to report. But first, some background on the Children & Nature Network’s (C&NN’s) international role. When Richard Louv and others of us founded the [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 7

NATURE ON DEMAND? A Leading Ecopsychologist Compares Real Nature With Tech Nature

By Patricia Hasbach on August 15th, 2012

NATURE ON DEMAND? A Leading Ecopsychologist Compares Real Nature With Tech Nature

Standing at my neighbor’s kitchen window, I am mesmerized by the tiny bird hovering at the glass feeder filled with pink tinted sugar water. LaRue tells me it’s a Ruby-throated Hummingbird and she shows me its picture in her well-worn copy of Peterson’s Field Guide to Eastern Birds. I was five years old. Later that [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 24

NATURE’S NEURONS: Do Early Experiences in the Natural World Help Shape Children’s Brain Architecture?

By Richard Louv on July 26th, 2012

NATURE’S NEURONS: Do Early Experiences in the Natural World Help Shape Children’s Brain Architecture?

What role do early childhood experiences in nearby nature play in the formation of brain architecture? It’s time for science to ask that question. In January, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof reported on the American Academy of Pediatrics’ “landmark warning that toxic stress can harm children for life.” This was, he wrote, a “’policy [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 10

FIVE GREAT WAYS TO NURTURE YOUR INNER HUNTER & GATHERER: Wildcrafting, Wildwatching, Birding, Cloudspotting, Stargazing

By Richard Louv on July 16th, 2012

FIVE GREAT WAYS TO NURTURE YOUR INNER HUNTER & GATHERER: Wildcrafting, Wildwatching, Birding, Cloudspotting, Stargazing

Most of us have some kind of barrier to getting outside. Time, work, lack of knowledge. But biologically, we’re all still hunters and gatherers. So how do we feed that gene? Hunting and fishing are the traditional ways. Many families bond through these outdoor activities. In fact, fishing is still the number one gateway activity [...]

Columns by Richard Louv • Featured Columns

Comments: 13

ARE SCHOOLS BREAKING CHILDREN’S SPIRITS? Life and Learning Beyond Walls

By Kelly Keena on July 10th, 2012

ARE SCHOOLS BREAKING CHILDREN’S SPIRITS? Life and Learning Beyond Walls

When starting out as a teacher, I heard Joseph Cornell say that keeping children inside one room five days a week is akin to breaking a horse. I’m haunted by that analogy. Our tendency is to keep children in, especially as academic demands only increase. And for discipline or missed work what do we do? [...]

Briefs & Commentary

Comments: 0

TRUST IN OUR CHILDREN: A Challenge to Schools and the Land Trust Movement

By Pamela A. Morgan on July 9th, 2012

TRUST IN OUR CHILDREN: A Challenge to Schools and the Land Trust Movement

“I used to think the woods was just a whole bunch of trees.” — 4th Grade Student. About four years ago I attended a PTA meeting at my children’s school, something I rarely have the time to do. But I think I was meant to be at this meeting, because one of the agenda items [...]

Briefs & Commentary

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