Benefits of Outdoor Play

There are many benefits to playing outdoors, both physically and mentally. Students that have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder tend to concentrate better in the outdoors. “By bolstering children’s attention resources, green spaces may enable children to think more clearly and cope more effectively with life stress” (Wells in Louv, 2005, p.g 103). A study done by Grahn (1997) states, “Children who play regularly in natural environments show more advanced motor-fitness, including coordination, balance and agility, and they are sick less often” (Fjortoft, 2001). When children play, the amount of things they learn is staggering. Outdoor spaces promote physical growth (i.e. balancing, climbing, feeling, manipulating, molding, exploring, and digging), emotional growth (i.e. fantasy play, role-playing, creative self-expression, and group participation), social growth (i.e. copying, explaining, cooperative projects, planning, obeying rules, and solving conflicts) and cognitive development (i.e. spatial orientation, making things, observing, using tools and social experimentation) (Rivkin, 1995)

Fjortoft, I. (2001). The natural environment as a playground for children: The impact of outdoor play activities in pre-primary school children. Early Childhood Education Journal, 29(2), 111-117.

Louv, R. (2005). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill.

Rivkin, M. S. (1995). The great outdoors: Restoring children's right to play outside. Washington, D.C.: National Association for the Education of Young Children.