"Nature and Us" ESD Center
Early Childhood Education for Sustainable Development
Film "Nature As Developing Environment:
Learning from Trees, Water and Earth"
How to use a simple walk in a part for education of young children
In our family children are traditionally brought up in close contact with nature. Partly this is due to the fact that Natalya and Igor's professions are closely connected to nature studies. We are positive that a child needs contact with nature for physical and psychological development. And
that is not all. When you take a walk in nature you can make stories, count things, give your child some tasks to perform, help her or him learn colors, teach her to see beauty in nature – that is, contribute to child's comprehensive education.
Fragments of the film have been shown to university students, teachers, kindergarten pedagogues and university professors during university lectures and seminars. The pedagogues told that, indeed, many parents, whose children attend kindergartens, spend very little time outdoors with their children. Common opinion is that children should learn, primarily, at a desk, fulfilling tasks that would prepare them for school. Of course, there are parents who play with their children in the parks and other green areas, but not all of them know how to use simple things like leaves, trees, holes in the ground, for the development of their child. Many of those who had watched the film said that they, as parents, were surprised to learn how many things can be done in a park together with children, that they would actually use what they saw, and that they would show the film to parents they work with.
