LINCK’s No Child Left Inside: Connecting Children with Nature Conference featuring Richard Louv
When author and journalist Richard Louv published his book Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder, its message that kids these days do not connect to the natural world spread like wildfire. Countless studies have concluded that children’s and adults’ exposure to nature can aid their ability to manage stress and think more clearly.
Environmental education and related experience, such as community service Dana Friedman, Richard Louv, Lisa Ott, Jane Jackson projects outdoors, can make a difference and, in the process, increase appreciation of the outdoors among participants in these activities.
Recognizing the importance of these findings, the North Shore Land Alliance and the Long Island Nature Collaborative for Kids (LINCK) (a project of the Early Childhood Institute) partnered to bring Louv to Long Island on Thursday, March 12, 2009 as the keynote speaker of LINCK’s No Child Left Inside: Connecting Children with Nature conference, held at the Islandia Marriott Long Island. The event, which drew over 300 hundred attendees including 20 Land Alliance members who were guests at the keynote address, was also sponsored by Computer Associates, the Rauch Foundation, and other organizations.
The conference included a number of hands-on workshops designed to enable educators, child care workers, and parents alike to get their children into the natural world (or, in some case, to take nature to them!).
As undeveloped land has become increasingly scarce, children’s exposure to the outdoors has waned. There is broad consensus that we do not protect what we do not love, and we do not love what we do not know. It is today’s youngsters who will be faced with tomorrow’s responsibilities for protecting land and stewarding our open spaces, so Louv’s visit to Long Island to share his knowledge with a local audience was timely.
Louv is the Chair of the Children & Nature Network, which supports organizations and individuals working to link children and nature, and is the author of seven books. Last Child in the Woods won the prestigious Audubon Medal (also granted to Jimmy Carter, Rachel Carson, and Robert Redford, among others) by the National Audubon Society earlier this year. It has earned top ranking from Discover Magazine, Spirituality & Health Magazine, and the National School Board Journal.