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Young children, the outdoors and nature
Young children, the outdoors and nature

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3.1 Message 1: The outdoors can offer possibilities not found indoors

A child reaching for a leaf.

Natural features appear to be very important in encouraging rich opportunities, as does access to diverse local ecosystems (Moore and Cosco, 2014). A natural environment supports children to engage in multisensory ways different to those available indoors. Practitioners in Colorado found that the outdoors presents wonderful opportunities for babies to learn about nature as they ‘used their eyes, hands, feet, mouths and entire bodies to experience the minutiae’ (Hall et al., 2014, p. 198).