Willow Glen Resident

Letters & Opinions

Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder

By Moryt Milo

Down the street from my home in New York was a road that was cut through the middle by a creek. The creek, which meandered for miles, was bordered by a corral-style wooden fence. It was easy to slip through and explore the wonders below its banks. As a small child, I spent hours in this natural wonderland. There were secret hideaways all along the creek where minnows, tadpoles and frogs clustered. Often I would take a cup or small bucket and fill it with frog eggs or tadpoles in various stages of evolution. I would carry home my treasures, which I meticulously poured into a plastic pool my mother had inflated for me in the backyard. Eventually the tadpoles would sprout four legs and disappear from the makeshift pond. When I was 6, I couldn't figure out how they disappeared. Later, I realized their new-found mobility carried them back to the creek. Occasionally, I would take my butterfly net down and find a prize--a giant frog--the real reason for canvassing the water. I would scoop up the frog and bring it home. My mother never frowned upon this behavior or discouraged my explorations. I was lucky; I lived surrounded by nature.

It's hard to imagine that in just one generation capturing fireflies in a jar, building treehouses or hiking through the woods is no longer part of our youth.

In California, we are luckier than most, because we still have acres of open preserve and forests to hike through with our children. But most families no longer put discovering nature at the top of their child's to-do list. Instead, being outdoors is for organized sports or specialty camps, not creative play. Our child's freedom to roam is hampered, too, by the fear of strangers and the unknown.

Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods, makes the startling point that baby boomers--those born between 1946 and 1964--may be the last generation of Americans to "share an intimate, familial attachment to land and water."

I hadn't thought of that until I read his book, and reminisced about my own childhood experiences. Perhaps it's why I have instinctively integrated nature into my children's lives, and why they have learned to regard it as natural. They have spent their summers backpacking in Yosemite, Trinity Alps and Sequoia National parks. I have always notice a sense of calm within them when they return. This summer that sense of comfort in the forest was apparent when my son reported, "There were so many snakes. We watched one crazy snake slither up inside the bark of a tree and then slither down during one of our camp fires."

I was a bit freaked out, but my son took it in stride.

Yet for most children today, Louv says, "nature is more abstraction than reality. Increasingly, nature is something to watch, to consume, to wear--to ignore."

He cites television commercials that show families speeding through a magnificent forest as the children sit in the backseat watching a video in the family's new SUV.

The balance between child and nature has developed into what Louv calls "nature-deficit disorder," which is compounded by the fact that we are losing those knowledgeable in the field of natural sciences to age. If there is no one to carry on, then the field of natural sciences will vanish. The next generation will not be able to identify species or notice what is new, old, endangered or evolving. Instead science will splinter into specialties such as microbiology or theoretical ecology. Like the family doctor, the naturalist will become extinct, unless we start reintroducing children to the basic wonders of the outdoors.

Louv's book is an absolute wake-up call for parents. It is well researched and not written in a lecturing tone. Yet Louv has clearly sounded the alarm. Children need to reconnect with nature for their health, their creativity and for the preservation of their future.

Louv will share his ideas Aug. 17 at 6 p.m. at San Jose City Hall, 200 E. Santa Clara St. The lecture is free.

Moryt Milo is the editor of the Willow Glen Resident. She can be reached at 408.200.1051 or via email at mmilo@community-newspapers.com.