Spending time outside has always been a top priority. What that looks like for us has changed as our kids have gotten older. For the last few years, spending time in nature has been a focus of our homeschool experience. Starting this month, we’re jumping in on a year long challenge to spend 1000 hours outside with an emphasis on nature outings.
The Sad Statistics about Kids in Nature
Scott Sampson, author of How to Raise a Wild Child, notes that “The average North American child currently spends about 7 hours a day staring at screens, and merely minutes engaged in unstructured play outdoors, a dramatic transformation from the past generation.”
I often wonder how much of that screen time is because of technology replacing books in school. However, it doesn’t take much to notice that kids are on screens for long periods of time outside of school. I’ve even seen elementary aged kids playing with their parents’ phones while at museums and zoos.
We have 10 other families within a block of us that have late elementary to middle school kids. Only 3 of those families have kids that play outside regularly. However those kids aren’t allowed outside Monday – Thursday because of homework. They spend all day inside for school and then stay inside doing homework and structured sports.
This has become a normal childhood. THIS is why is challenge is so important!
The 1000 Hours Outside Challenge
We’re joining the 1000 hours outside challenge to help keep us on track with heading outdoors. I printed off two copies of their tracker so that we can track our total time outside on one and our outside nature time on the other.
Even though it feels like we spend a lot of time outside, I think hitting 1000 hours might be a bit of a challenge. It breaks down to just shy of 20 hours a week or about 2.75 hours a day. It will be easier with the weather cooling off this time of year. It’s difficult to get the kids outside when it’s over 100 degrees! We will really rack up the hours in the spring and fall which will make up for the other times of the year.
Kids in Nature Challenge
There’s a huge difference between my kids drawing with chalk in our driveway and hiking a forest trail. I want to see more of the outside nature time! I’m setting a goal of 500 hours of NATURE time in one year that will be part of our 1000 hours outside goal. That’s just shy of 10 hours a week of nature time.
I’m counting our kids’ NATURE time as…
- working, playing, and exploring in the garden
- playing and picnicking at a local park away from the playground equipment
- hiking
- camping – It’s a great way to rack up hours and spend quality time out in nature!
- volunteer hours in nature such as trash pickup
- Field trips or other homeschool events that involve spending time in nature
Some of these ideas may be everyday experiences for families that live in a small town or rural area. 500 hours a year may not be challenging for those families, but we live in a suburban area right outside a large city. We can’t just ride our bikes to the edge of town to find a meadow or walk down the road to a creek. People living in urban areas often have to work harder to find natural areas to enjoy.
Related post – How to do Nature Study in a City
Sometimes when we find ourselves overrun by other things, unstructured outside play time gets neglected. However, that’s usually when we most need to spend time outside with our kids. It forces us to slow down and breathe a bit. This challenge will help us focus on keeping unstructured outside play time a priority for our kids.
Who’s going to join us?! I’ll be sharing our outdoors adventures on Instagram. Stop by to say hello over there!
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