2.2 Nature Friendly Nurseries
In the next activity you will meet Professor Jan White whose work you were introduced to in Session 4. Here she is talking about a concept she calls Nature Friendly Nurseries.
Activity 3 Nature friendly nurseries
Watch the video, and then have a go at responding to the questions below.
Transcript
JAN WHITE: Increasing the amount that you have in your outdoor space, but with the notion not so much of increasing the presence of nature for child development, so we might have sticks and stones because they're good for those parts, so they're good for children's development. The real key idea for me with nature friendly nurseries is that children are able to spend their lives in relationship with the other elements of nature. And that they grow up experiencing themselves as part of nature.
So I think the big issue we have in our culture is, over the last few decades, is that we have seriously separated ourselves from the natural world. And we don't experience ourselves as being part of nature, this nature culture divide. And so with the new thinking around post-humanism, it's known as, the idea that humans aren't at the centre of the universe, or at the centre of everything, and that we are just one species embedded in a complex web of life.
What I want children to be able to do is to grow up experiencing themselves as part of that interconnected web. So they're immersed and embedded and emplaced in a nature filled environment, in the natural world. And as they grow up and they learn about themselves being an individual who's autonomous and has agency, they also know that they are an embedded part of this very complex, very fragile as well, web. That with things we do influence everything else, and whatever happens influences us. So growing up with the experience of sharing our world with the rest of the natural world.
So that children can develop an ecological identity, a sense of themselves as part of ecology, part of the world, part of the universe. And that they see other beings, other species, trees, plants, toads, snails, birds, they see those as kin, as part of their family. And when you grow up with that feeling, that they are my kin, then you can't possibly harm them. And you are internally driven, you don't have to think about it, you're driven to take care of it, and it can take care of you.
It's one of the things I'm aware of is how important nature is to me when I'm not feeling very good, and how well it puts me right. And I'm so grateful that somehow I grew up with the ability to let nature look after me. You know that when I'm not feeling good, that I can go to nature and feel better, and just get put right without having to think about it.
So I think it's not just about growing children who want to and can take care of the planet, it's that they can grow up being able to be taken care of by the other creatures that live with them. So nature friendly nurseries really is, what we're planning, this is a project from early childhood outdoors is that will help nurseries know practically, very practically how to increase the plant and creature life in their outdoor space.
- What do you understand by nature friendly nurseries?
- What do you think Jan means by a child’s ecological identity?
- What do you think about the idea that nature can care for humans?
Comment
The focus of Nature Friendly Nurseries is the biodiversity and natural richness of the outdoor space. Jan references the idea of the child being immersed, embedded and emplaced in nature. There is now strong research evidence that ‘spending time in natural environments as a child is associated with adult pro-environment attitudes and feelings of being connected with the natural world and is also associated with a stronger sense of place’ (Gill, 2011, p. 8).
Ecological identity here relates to the way in which children can experience a sense of being part of nature rather than separate to it. They understand that they share the world with the rest of nature. For this to be developed, natural elements need to be built into outdoor spaces for the youngest children, so they are able to ‘grow up green’ and to become ‘agents of care for the natural world’ (Chawla, 2009, p. 6).
The idea that not only can we learn to care for nature, but that nature can care for us, takes us back to the previous session. Here we explored the ways in which humans might need nature to flourish and how spending time in nature can restore our sense of health and wellbeing.