By Sandra O’Brien
Summer is an ideal time to get outdoors and explore the natural world around you. From discovering insects in your backyard or neighbourhood park to searching for shells on the beach or hiking through a forest, there is so much the natural world has to offer young people. According to scientific studies, spending time outdoors in nature reduces stress and anxiety, improves mood, attention, concentration and memory, gives us a sense of meaning, brings joy and calmness, increases our physical activity and improves our mental health later in life. With all those advantages, who wouldn’t want to get outside and enjoy some fresh air? And since there is no shortage of Canadian children’s books about the natural world, let’s look at some titles that will support parents, teachers and caregivers as they explore the world outdoors with children.
A fun activity to do with kids in a backyard or school yard is to place a hula hoop on the ground for each child and have them explore the area within their hoop to see what insects and plants they can find. Be sure to encourage kids to check out what’s in the air above their hoop and dig down under the grass or dirt to see what’s below the surface, too. Then kids can share their findings with one another. Younger children can draw what they see, and older kids can write and/or draw their findings. A wonderful book to accompany this activity is Bompa’s Insect Expedition by David Suzuki and Tanya Lloyd Kyi, with illustrations by Qin Leng (Greystone Kids). As Bompa, Nakina and Kaoru venture into their backyard to discover insects living there, they discover a bumblebee, a dragonfly, a caterpillar, ants and mosquitoes. The children ask their grandfather questions, and he teaches them more about insects and the reasons they are so important to the natural world. There’s also a diagram of an insect with its parts labelled and a drawing that shows you what to pack in your backpack before you head out on your insect-finding adventure. A final section in the book introduces children to other insects, explains how they can help insects thrive and challenges them to see how many different insects they can find within the pages of the book.
On Our Nature Walk: Our First Talk About Our Impact on the Environment by Dr. Jillian Roberts and illustrated by Jane Heinrichs (Orca Book Publishers) is another excellent resource to read with primary-grade children. This book encourages youngsters to spend time outdoors as it helps them to develop their love and appreciation for nature. The book talks about some of the challenges we’re facing on Earth right now and introduces children to other young people who are fighting to protect the planet. Children are encouraged to spend lots of time playing outside, to explore their community and ask lots of questions about the world around them. The book also explains that there are problems even young children can fix like picking up garbage, using recycled materials, growing their own vegetables, walking or riding a bike when they can, giving gently used books instead of goodie bags at their next birthday party, turning off lights, unplugging electronics when not in use and using reusable jars and containers. This book is presented in such a way as to give children hope that they can change the world they live in by using their imagination to solve problems.
Another great way to get kids to spend time outdoors is to plant a garden that will attract bees. Follow That Bee! A First Book of Bees in the City, written and illustrated by Scot Ritchie (Kids Can Press), is another great book to read to primary-grade students. Not only will students learn about bee-friendly plants, but they’ll discover where wild bees like to build their nests, about different types of bees, what their body parts are called, how bees communicate with each other and much more. A glossary of important words about bees is found at the back of the book, and the book explains how to “bee” a good neighbour by making a bee bath in your garden. It also encourages us to let the dandelions grow; bees love them.
Peggy Kochanoff has written an excellent series called Be a Nature Detective (Nimbus Publishing), which contains eight titles that encourage outdoor exploration. These books will guide children towards all sorts of exciting discoveries in the natural world. In each book, questions are posed, and then the answers are presented in the subsequent pages. Adults can then encourage children to ask their own questions and search for the answers. These books are beautifully and accurately illustrated to help children identify things they discover in nature, and a glossary of helpful terms is located at the back of each book.
In Be a Wilderness Detective: Solving the Mysteries of Fields, Woods, and Coastlines, children will learn about scat from different animals, that weird growths on some plants are called galls, how animals survive the winter, and so much more. This would be an excellent book to read before heading out to explore a field, forested area, or coastline. Be a Pond Detective: Solving the Mysteries of Lakes, Swamps, and Pools teaches children about the animals, insects and plant life found in these aquatic areas. Fascinating questions like “Do dragonflies bite?” and “What are the differences between frogs and toads?” are explored. Be a City Nature Detective: Solving the Mysteries of How Plants and Animals Survive in the Urban Jungle is a great book for city kids to delve into. From bedbugs and cockroaches, rats and squirrels, gulls, pigeons and starlings to a whole host of plants, this book teaches kids that there’s lots of nature to explore in a city, too.
Being prepared for the weather when you’re venturing outdoors is always important, but kids might have questions about the weather. Be a Weather Detective: Solving the Mysteries of Cycles, Seasons, and Elements is a great place to start your investigation of this topic. This title discusses snowflakes, clouds, acid rain, rainbows, hurricanes, the greenhouse effect, the seasons and more. This book also has some fun weather activities to do with kids, like making your own rainbow, creating a cloud in a jar or making a rain gauge. Learning about the weather and how it can change will help students be better prepared to face the elements while they’re becoming weather detectives.
Other books in this series include Be a Close-Up Nature Detective: Solving the Tiniest Mysteries of the Natural World, which focuses on three habitats: a tree, a beach, and a log and explores some of the smallest things we find in nature; Be a Camouflage Detective: Looking for Critters That are Hidden, Concealed, or Covered is a great title for nature detectives who want to go a step further in their explorations; Be a Beach Detective: Solving the Mysteries of Sea, Sand, and Surf for those who live near an ocean; and Be a Night Detective: Solving the Mysteries of Twilight, Dusk, and Nightfall for those who want to do some exploring after dark.
Author Melissa Mollen Dupuis is from the Innu Nation, and in her book Nutshimit, illustrated by Elise Gravel (Scholastic Canada), she talks about how important the natural world is to the Indigenous peoples of Canada. Melissa takes students on a walk through the forest, encouraging them to activate their senses to observe everything around them. She describes it as taking a ‘forest bath’ and talks about the trees and forests and the animals that inhabit them. She explains how Indigenous people use various items they gather from forests and the relationship they have with the animals and fish found in forests and streams. There is also an activity book that accompanies this title that allows children to consolidate their knowledge through drawing and writing what they’ve learned from their adventures outdoors.
The Canadian Kids’ Guide to Outdoor Fun by Helaine Becker and illustrated by Claudia Dávila (Scholastic Canada) is a fun resource that includes many activities that encourage kids to get outdoors during the summer. Divided into four sections, this guide offers ideas for outdoor play, water fun, indoor activities when you need to shelter from the sun or rain, and suggestions for things to do at night or around the campfire. You’ll discover how to make lemonade and campfire treats, play watermelon soccer, card games, word games, learn fun songs, and so much more. This fabulous resource is sure to keep kids of all ages entertained throughout the summer.
For Older Children
If you’re studying trees and birds with junior grade students, two other beautiful books you’ll want to add to your nature library are Nature All Around: Trees and Nature All Around: Birds by Pamela Hickman and Carolyn Gavin (Kids Can Press). Taking a more in-depth look at trees, Nature All Around: Trees teaches students about the different parts of trees, the different kinds of trees, leaves and nuts, what happens to trees from season to season, about the different forest regions in North America and about the different insects, birds and mammals that inhabit trees. In Nature All Around: Birds, students will learn about the body parts of a typical adult bird, a bird’s life cycle, different types of nests, birds by the sea, how birds behave in each season, endangered birds and how to make a bird feeder. Each book contains a glossary of terms at the back. These books are filled with interesting facts and beautiful artwork, making them ideal for beginners in tree and bird watching.
In Get Outside! How Humans Connect with Nature (Orca Book Publishers), author Leah Payne explores ways in which we can become closer to nature and improve our lives, buildings and communities. She also introduces readers to some amazing people who are working to deepen our connection to the world, so we can learn how to nurture nature and let it nurture us. She discusses how volunteering as a citizen scientist can be a fun way to connect with nature while conducting real science for organizations, governments, or universities. Projects might include identifying birds in your neighbourhood or testing water quality. The Butterflyway Project, run by the David Suzuki Foundation, encourages people to plant pollinator patches—small gardens filled with native plants that attract and support pollinators like butterflies.
In chapter four of this book, you’ll also find lists of activities to inspire you to play in nature and hobbies that you can get involved in. Activities might include drawing or sketching plants, creating a nature mandala, making snow forts, snowmen, or snow angels in winter or simply sitting down and feeling the soft moss under your fingers, taking a deep breath and enjoying the moment. Hobbies might include taking photos of nature, practicing tai chi outdoors, trail riding on your bike or learning how to kayak, canoe or paddleboard. The possibilities are endless, and the benefits of spending time outdoors are numerous.
In Design Like Nature: Biomimicry for a Healthy Planet by Megan Clendenan and Kim Ryall Woolcock (Orca Book Publishers), parents and teachers can introduce the concept of biomimicry to older children. Biomimicry is the process of designing and producing materials, structures and systems that are modelled on living organisms and natural processes while taking care of the Earth. This book teaches children how they can use biomimicry to reconnect with the natural cycle, look at nature with new eyes, and think about how they can help everyone learn from nature. By mimicking nature, we can create more environmentally friendly ways to generate energy, such as self-healing concrete, or utilize materials like bananas to produce plastic, as 16-year-old Elif Bilgin from Turkey has done. And this book is full of many more fascinating ideas that people have learned from nature. Fun ways to teach students examples of biomimicry would be to huddle together like penguins do to stay warm while playing outdoors, kick like a dolphin to swim faster, or camouflage yourself to stay hidden during a game of hide-and-seek. Parents and teachers can then challenge students to come up with other ways they can mimic nature.
Listen Up! Exploring the World of Natural Sound by Stephen Aitken (Orca Book Publishers) can be used to teach young people about the sounds they hear in the natural world and how the sounds of human activity are invading natural landscapes. There are three different types of sound we hear in the world today. Biophony refers to the sounds of organisms such as the twittering of birdsong, the rhythmic chirping of crickets, the croaking of bullfrogs or the thrumming of cicadas. Geophony is produced by non-living elements such as the whistling of the wind, the babbling of a brook or the pitter-patter of rainfall. And finally, anthrophony (sometimes called anthropophony) is the sound created by human activity—highway traffic, personal watercraft, airplanes or construction machinery. If we take children outside in a natural setting to sit down and listen, they’ll hear the soundscape. They may hear the haunting call of the loons on the lake, the waves lapping up on the rocks at the shoreline, the buzzing of a bee as it flies by, the chattering of the squirrels in the trees or the chorus of morning birdsong.
A fun activity to do with kids might be to create a bingo game to see how many different sounds they can hear as they sit quietly at the base of a tree and just listen. Students could then create their own soundscapes by recording the sounds they hear in nature and playing them back to their friends or classmates to see if they can identify the various sounds. Finally, the author wants young people to increase their awareness of how to reduce the impact of the noise of human activity on the natural world. Aitken says the greatest thing you can do to help in the conservation of soundscapes is to fine-tune your ability to listen and to stand up and let your voice be heard so that birds have quiet places to land during their migrations, insects can hear other members of their swarm, and primates, mammals, fish and rodents have healthy sound environments in order to survive.
Natural Art Activities
Two books that encourage budding artists to explore the natural world are Jessica Rose and Jarett Sitter’s Let’s Get Creative: Art for a Healthy Planet (Orca Book Publishers) and How to Be a Color Wizard: Forage and Experiment with Natural Art Making by Jason Logan (MIT Kids Press). In Let’s Get Creative, you’ll read about artists who work with the environment rather than disrupt it and who use natural materials and sustainable practices. Many artistic activities are mentioned in this book and one such activity is to have children make their own paint and dye for art projects by using natural items like red cabbage, turmeric, blueberries, beets or cocoa. Another thing they can do is create a rain garden that will help reduce flooding, improve soil and water quality, reduce erosion and provide food and a place for wildlife to live. In How to Be a Color Wizard, you’ll find secret recipes, magic formulas and wild experiments that will delight children and adults alike. First, you’ll get to discover what kind of wizard you are, then you’ll learn the seven laws of safe sorcery, and finally, you’ll start gathering the items you’ll need to begin your experiments. Filled with wonderful ideas that can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours, kids fascinated by colour will love this book.
Time spent outdoors and interacting with nature can create wonderful learning opportunities for kids and adults alike. And it doesn’t matter whether you live in a city or a rural area, on the coast or in the mountains, nature is all around and just waiting to be explored. Hopefully, the books mentioned above will provide parents, teachers and caregivers with lots of inspiration to do just that this summer.
Sandra O’Brien is the former Editor of Canadian Children’s Book News, who is enjoying spending more time with her dogs, Alfie and Audi, gardening and quilting.