I received an email this week offering “strategies” for getting your kids to go outside. The title was “One mom’s story: How I got my kids outside.” Really? Getting kids to go outside is now worthy of publication and mass e-mails? I guess the smart-aleck answer is to do it the same way my parents did when we were growing up and bouncing off the walls – send us outside and lock the doors! Maybe this makes me sound like an old man approaching 50 (no, that can’t be me!)
Without further ado, then, some of the highlights of the letter of “One Mom’s Story:”
We need to get this generation of kids outside, stat! And we can start TODAY.
I know it’s not easy. If your kids – like mine – are more resistant to leaving their indoor refuge, take small steps. The other day my daughter wanted to go shopping, so I chose an outdoor mall with beautiful landscaping.
An outdoor mall? My goodness, the kid probably needs a ventilator mask that vents Cheesecake Factory, Sbarro, and Pizza Hut with a bit of 16-plex buttered popcorn and Macy’s fragrance counter thrown in just to survive the walk from the car to the mall! To me that’s like saying – to get your kids to eat oatmeal raisin cookies, serve them up one ingredient at a time until they get used to it. If you start with brown sugar, that will be a small step.
Surely that article was tongue-in-cheek!
If not, I’d suggest the immersion approach – sending the kids to a wilderness camp.
A couple of years ago I spoke at a conference of college-age students at a woodland nature center and ate lunch with some of the attendees. When I commented what a beautiful place it was, one woman told me she would never, ever walk off of sidewalks because of dirt and bugs!
Amen, I don’t know that my parents ever locked the doors but when they said “OUTSIDE”, it meant just that outside. I guess I am one of the last of my generation. By that I mean I am only 29, I was whooped when I deserved it, was made to listen, my parents would turn the satelite/cable off in the summer, and we were only allowed 1/2 hour of phone time and 1 to 2 hours of tv/video game time a day! I have 5 kids myself now and they are raised the same way. I thank God my parents were PARENTS!