The impacts of nature play versus non nature play for preschoolers

I love it when a random question helps me discover something new. I started listening to Seek: How curiosity can transform your life and change the world by Scott Shigeoka. This inspired a random search through the research literature for articles on curiosity and sustainability. I thought the first one I found was super interesting.

Ernst and Burcak (2019) compared growth in children’s curiosity, executive function skills, creative thinking, and resilience between a play-based nature preschool and a play-based non-nature preschool. There are limitations to the study, such as non-randomization which could mean there are other factors at play and there was minimal diversity in the children in the study. However, the results of these pilot studies indicate that periods of unstructured play in outdoor natural settings supports taking initiative and having persistence, exploratory behaviour, and the development of creative thinking. These were all shown to be higher than found in children in the play-based but non-nature preschools. In addition, they showed development of executive function skills that are required for goal-directed behaviour at similar rates to the non-nature preschools and above the national norms.

One of the important factors was that there was unstructured nature play. This means that the children had the freedom to interact over an extended period of time. During this time they were seen as capable and autonomous decision-makers. As the authors stated, “unstructured nature play in the nature preschools affords diverse and expansive opportunities for young children to take appropriate risks, set their own goals, problem-solve, and choose roles and activities that support positive peer relationship and produce feelings of comfort and competence” (Discussion, para. 5).

I want to add some thoughts on this from my perspective of teaching undergraduate students. I have no background on what my students experienced growing up in terms of nature play, although I’m now tempted to ask. But from someone trying to help people grow into sustainability leaders in a wide range of fields, the skills that are associated with nature-based play are so essential. So many students have been trained, largely by school, that school isn’t about curiosity but about meeting the teacher’s requirements. I’ve done this myself all the way through grad school in a few cases. As a result, they often don’t come across as capable and autonomous decision-makers. I use an approach to grading in my classes where I set out what bundles of work have to be completed to an appropriate standard in order to earn a specific grade. The students then have the autonomy to decide what grade they are aiming for. A few semesters ago, a student shared that they felt like having autonomy over their grade helped them to feel like they also had the ability to contribute to sustainability in the broader world. More and more, I question our focus on content in education. Yes, there are certain things that are important content to learn but being able to take initiative, come up with new ways to solve problems, build relationships, take risks, and set their own goals are the things that you can’t look up or ask ChatGPT to provide an answer for. What would happen if we all, at every age, got to engage in some unstructured nature play?