Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder by Louv, Richard (the two towers ebook .txt) 📕

Go Outside: Over 130 Activities for Outdoor Adventures, Nancy Blakey (Tricycle Press, 2002)

Golden Field Guides series (St. Martins)

How to Build an Igloo: And Other Snow Shelters, Norbert E. Yankielun (Norton, 2007)

I Love Dirt!, Jennifer Ward (Trumpeter, 2008)

The Joy of Hiking: Hiking the Trailmaster Way, John McKinney (Wilderness Press, 2005)

Keeping a Nature Journal: Discover a Whole New Way of Seeing the World Around You, Clare Walker Leslie and Charles E. Roth (Storey, 2003)

The Kid’s Book of Weather Forecasting: Build a Weather Station, ‘Read the Sky’ and Make Predictions!, Mark Breen and Kathleen Friestad (Williamson, 2000).

My Nature Journal, Adrienne Olmstead (Pajaro, 1999)

National Audubon Society Field Guides series (Knopf)

Peterson Field Guides and Peterson First Guides series (Houghton Mifflin)

Rock and Fossil Hunter, Ben Morgan (DK Publishing, 2005)

Roots, Shoots, Buckets and Boots: Gardening Together with Children, Sharon Lovejoy (Workman, 1999)

The Sense of Wonder, Rachel Carson (HarperCollins, 1998)

Sharing Nature with Children, Joseph Cornell (Dawn Publications, 1998).

Shelters, Shacks & Shanties: The Classic Guide to Building Wilderness Shelters, (Dover, 2004)

Sibley Field Guides series (Knopf)

Summer: A User’s Guide, Suzanne Brown (Artisan, 2007)

Sunflower Houses: Inspiration from the Garden, Sharon Lovejoy (Workman, 2001)

Take a Backyard Bird Walk, Jane Kirkland (Stillwater, 2001)

Track Pack: Animal Tracks in Full Life Size, Ed Gray and DeCourcy L. Taylor, Jr. (Stackpole, 2003)

Tracking and the Art of Seeing: How to Read Animal Tracks and Sign, Paul Rezendes (Collins, 1999)

Treehouses and Playhouses You Can Build, David and Jeanie Stiles (Gibbs Smith, 2006)

Unplugged Play, Bobbi Conner (Workman, 2007)

Young Birders’ Guide to Birds of Eastern North America, Bill Thompson III (Houghton Mifflin, 2008)

For additional books, see Suggested Reading

Suggestions for Transforming Our Communities

45. Discover what your community’s nature-oriented and educational organizations can do to help get your child outside in a safe environment.

46. Face the fear. In most neighborhoods the perception of stranger-danger exceeds the reality. Teach your child to watch for behaviors, not necessarily for strangers. According to family psychologist John Rosemond, “Telling a child to stay away from strangers is relatively ineffective. ‘Stranger’ is not a concept young children understand easily. Instead, children ought to be taught to be on the lookout for specific threatening behaviors and situations.” This view is supported by the U.S. Department of Justice.

47. Know your neighbors. Invest in the life of the block and the surrounding community. Create a play-watch group and ask fellow parents to sit on front stoops or porches several hours a week, available at a distance as children play. Such parent groups can take children on trips to local or regional parks.

48. Join or create a “nature gym.” In the United Kingdom, families and individuals are banding together for regular exercise in nature. Another opportunity is offered by the California-based organization Hooked on Nature, which helps families and individuals form “nature circles” to meet and explore their relationship to nature. A nature circle guide is available at www.hookedonnature.org.

49. Support scouting, 4-H, and other traditional programs—and encourage them to deepen their commitment to connecting kids with nature. One example: in 2006, Camp Fire USA, Central Ohio Council, launched Vision 20/10: Reuniting Children and Nature to bring “10,000 kids into the woods by 2010.” Also consider supporting new, nontraditional scouting organizations.

50. Help green your city. Push for better urban planning in developing and redeveloping areas, including tree-planting guidelines, more natural parks, and walkable neighborhoods. Lobby for affordable public transportation, so that urban children and families can easily reach nature areas. Developers and builders: create green communities, or, better yet, renovate decaying neighborhoods with green oases that connect children and adults to nature.

51. In your neighborhood challenge conventional covenants and restrictions that discourage or prohibit natural play. Rewrite the rules to allow kids to build forts and tree houses and to plant gardens. Make sure they have access to nearby nature.

52. Help naturalize old and new urban parks. During the last two decades, designers of natural play areas have become skilled at creating living landscapes for parks with high foot traffic. Such areas can be distributed throughout every city.

53. Reinvent the vacant lot. Developers often leave set-aside land—slices of property not large enough to be playing fields, not located conveniently to be pocket parks, but that can serve well as islands of wildness. These and other urban and suburban plots can be transformed into adventure playgrounds or “wild zones” (www.wild-zone.net).

54. Nature centers, nature preserves, and wildlife sanctuaries: Review programs and facilities to see how to provide more unstructured play for young children and how to encourage teenagers to volunteer. Pay as much attention to parents as to children, particularly younger adults who are decreasingly likely to have had much experience in nature when they were children.

55. Conservation organizations: Build a future environmental constituency by supporting programs to get kids outside, not only to learn about conservation but to experience the joy of nature. Become involved in regional campaigns to reconnect children with nature; measure children’s engagement in nature and include this information in reports about endangered or threatened species.

56. Protect open space by promoting the health and education benefits of nature, especially for children. Pledge to dedicate a portion of any proposed open space to children and families in the surrounding area, with, ideally, nature centers to provide education for schools, including outdoor-oriented preschools. Download the “Health Benefits of Parks” article by the Trust for Public Land (www.tpl.org).

57. Recruit families to volunteer on the annual National Public Lands Day. In 2006, a hundred thousand people built trails and bridges, planted trees and shrubs, and removed trash and invasive plants. For information see www.publiclandsday.org.

58. Religious organizations, take a leadership role. In Houston, for example, inner-city churches, nonprofits, and Texas Parks and Wildlife Department work together to take inner-city kids camping, fishing, and hiking. Their goal: the development of life skills and strong moral character through shared experiences in nature.

59. As a young person, become a “natural leader.” Help organize regional campaigns, or volunteer at nature centers or with such programs as the Sierra Club’s Building Bridges to the Outdoors and Inner City Outings, the