There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom's Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids (from Friluftsliv to Hygge)

by Linda Åkeson McGurk

Many thinkers in the children-and-nature movement believe that in order to develop this type of affinity for nature, children need to engage with it hands-on, using all their senses. And when they do, they don’t always comply with the leading American outdoor code of ethics: Leave No Trace. Leave No Trace was originally developed as a guide for recreating responsibly in the backcountry and has been crucial to protecting heavily used and particularly vulnerable areas from getting loved to death. But when the principles are interpreted literally and applied indiscriminately, they also have some unintended consequences for children, who are typically experts at leaving traces everywhere, from muddy footprints on newly cleaned floors and random holes in the yard, to small rocks and various debris in the washing machine. Not because they have any malicious intent, but because that’s just how kids roll. I’d noticed in the US that some adults had taken the Leave No Trace principles to an extreme and sometimes lectured children for infractions as small as collecting rocks or picking common flowers, telling them that “the flowers are food for the bees” and asking the classic question, “What would happen if everybody picked a rock?” Some researchers believe this strict interpretation of Leave No Trace can limit children’s opportunities to make meaningful connections with the natural world and may even exacerbate the perceived separation of humans and nature.