A famous mountaineer once said, “Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt.” John Muir knew what he was talking about. When parents find it exhausting to wrestle away screens and gadgets from their children, one wonders what has happened to the olden days when kids were curious enough to conjure up stories, enact adventures, chase tadpoles and climb up trees. Today we create adventures on phones and fight dragons in video games and have somewhere lost our imagination to technology, or have we not?
Research has shown that there are numerous compelling benefits of encouraging your children to play outdoors. On speaking to 850 mothers in the US, it was analysed that their children were much less physically active compared to when their mothers were the same age. The technological distractions today and the inability to make outdoor activity fun is considered one of the primary reasons.
Indeed, to find a balance between studies, sleep, indoor entertainment and physical activity outdoors is like treading a narrow path but if we can do so, there is a world of good health, longevity, and brain-boosting effects that playing in nature can bring us.
The benefits of playing outdoors are as follows;
1. Physical development is paramount. Playing in the open, on uneven surfaces and diving into activity can result in the activation of large muscle groups and can keep your children healthier and fitter compared to children who play indoors.
Fitter children mean low obesity rates and your child is healthier and stronger with a balanced body mass index ( BMI). The World Health Organization asserts that a healthy weight for your child needs to be between 5-85th percentile BMI. An effective way to maintain this is a daily activity that is fun and engaging among other things.
2. Playing in the sunlight gives them a boost of Vitamin D that not only improves cognitive ability but also enhances learning capacity and energy levels. Low levels of vitamin D are associated with tiredness, fatigue and brain fuzziness that impairs clarity and memory.
According to research, children who spent more time outside had better eyesight and could see things near them much better than those who did not play in the sun. When a 6-year-old was exposed to 40 minutes more in the sun, there were fewer chances of them developing myopia. (Goldschmidt and Jacobsen 2014.)