Skip to main content

Get Out!



I go out for recess three times a day. Almost every single day. If it’s drizzly, we wear raincoats and rain boots. If it is cold, we bundle up, and perhaps we don’t stay out as long. When it is hot, we wear sunscreen and sun hats and bring iced water so kids can have lots of drinks. Would I do this if I didn’t work with children? Of course not.

Would my life be diminished? Absolutely.

Children need outdoor play like they need food and drink and rest and love. On days when we can’t get outside enough our students are miserable. They needs to run, climb, negotiate uneven surfaces, balance, ride trikes, scooters, push and pull things, crawl, hang, twist, spin, and dig in the sand and dirt. It is nutritional for them.

If you have kids in your life please make sure that you give them the gift of outdoor play during those times when they are not at school. It is far too easy to feel that you are too busy or that the weather is incompatible with going out. It almost never is. You just have to believe it’s the most important thing, and then live accordingly. 

Child-directed, large motor, outdoor play cannot be replaced by gymnastics classes, or soccer teams, or any of the myriad directed activities that children are scheduled into by well meaning parents. Like the expensive toys we buy to make our children happy, it’s almost always the empty box that sparks imagination and play. Outdoor play is that empty box that our children fill with their own ideas and meaning.

To bring this back to a HoCo local focus, where are the places in Columbia/HoCo that you enjoy exploring with your children outdoors? Parks? Playgrounds? Pathways? 

I could write another complete and detailed post about how crucial outdoor play is to the development of all those things that children will need for school success, but I’m not going to do that today. Today it is enough to say your children need this - - like breathing - - and you will enable them to be their better selves if you foster daily outdoor play in their lives.

It may change your life for the better, too. 

*****







Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents.  When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...
1 comment
Read more

They Can Wait

This is not a typical Saturday post. That’s because, in my community, it’s not a typical Saturday.  Oakland Mills High School, after years of deferred repair, needs massive renovation. It’s pretty simple: when you don’t fix a problem it gets bigger. The school system itself said the the OMHS school building was  "no longer conducive to learning" back in 2018.  2018 .  But Thursday the Boad of Education voted to push it out of the lineup of important projects which will be given the go-ahead to proceed soonest.  In my opinion it’s a terrible decision and sets a dangerous precedent. To explain, here’s the advocacy letter I sent in support of Oakland Mills High School. I was rather proud of it. I am writing to ask you to proceed with needed renovation at Oakland Mills High School in the most timely and comprehensive manner humanly possible. I have read the letter sent to you by the Oakland Mills Community Association and I am in complete agreement. You are extremel...
1 comment
Read more

Columbia Chance Connection

  Last night, as my husband and I were about to sit down to dinner, our front door swung open and a cheery voice announced, “I’m ba—ack!”  We weren’t expecting anyone. Clearly the only people who’d walk right in to our house would be one of our offspring. I had my reading glasses on so I wasn’t seeing too clearly. It seemed too tall for our youngest, but we knew our eldest was at work. I took off my glasses to see a friendly but confused face scanning our living room. When her gaze landed on us we all had a sudden realization. We didn’t know eachother. “Oh I’m so sorry! I’m in the wrong house! My daughter just moved in and she needed hooks for the kitchen so I ran out to get them.” She waved the package. “All these houses look the same and I don’t know the neighborhood yet. I thought this was my daughter’s house.” We were all getting a bit giggly. “That’s okay. For a quick second we thought you were our daughter,” said my husband. I told her our names and said she should defin...
Post a Comment
Read more