Links to Natural Play Resources

You may find the following educational resources helpful.

• Activities for young children: confusing website, but good listing of over 3400 activities to do with young children, many of which relate to nature and the seasons.

• Botany:internet directory
• Bird art for the garden: very graceful birds of PVC :( ...but nice!
• Butterfly gardens
• Bench Swing: Free Standing Arbor Swing: Step- by-step, do-it-yourself guide. For other project guides, use the "Search", top left.
• Children's Play in Natural Environments: A fact Sheet
• Children's landscapes in Norway
• Children, Youth, & Environments
• Children & Nature Network: its goal: establishing a global community of people and organizations committed to working together to reconnect children with nature
• Developmentally Appropriate Gardening for Young Children by Vicki Stoecklin
• Developing Adventure Playgrounds
• Early Childhood Care and Education Resources
• EIC: Using the Environment as an Integrating Context (EIC) for Learning; EIC is an education model that employs natural and community surroundings as the context for learning while taking into account “best practices in education.”
• enabling landscapes
• edible landscaping
• Earth-Friendly clothes for kids
  • Soul Flower
  • Babysoy

• Globe Project: Uses a worldwide community of students, teachers, scientists, and citizens working together to better understand, sustain, and improve Earth's environment at local, regional, and global scales. Friendly website.

• Environmental art: great UK site showing children creating natural art following Andy Goldsworthy's ideas. Make sure to follow the link at page bottom.
• Fast Growing Trees: Great site for people who want well-established natural playgrounds in a hurry!
• Fast plants: fast-growing plants for research and education purposes, vetted by the University of Wisconsin
• Fencing: Unobtrusive, do-it-yourself fencing that is just the thing for child care centers wanting to avoid unattractive chain link fences.
• Ground Covers: Great little brochure about ground covers: a plant list and info about where to plant, foot traffic tolerance, speed of growth, and growing conditions
• Gardening ideas for kids: A comprehensive list of web resources for gardening with children"
• Garden Community Gardening for people of all ages, abilities and lifestyles
• Grass (self-replicating!!!), an answer to tough-use areas?
• Green Pages (same as Yellow Pages, but about "green" companies)
• Greening Schools - Students excited about their Natural Playground may broaden their interests to other sustainable School projects and check out this website.
• Green Street: fascinating Canadian Site; well done!
• Herb Gardens: Starting a garden for kids, growing, ideas, resources. Nice site.
• Hidden Harvest: This award- winning, non-profit group teaches gardening in low income areas!
• Invasive Plants: National Park Service, Invasipedia New England
• Interactive sculptural environments
• Learning through landscapes
• Maintenance Guide for Natural Playgrounds
• Math in nature: Math lessons for natural playgrounds. Make sure to follow links at page bottom.
• Moss Acres: moss gardens; see also bigdipper
• Musical Instruments: make your own:Here and Here
• Nature Kindergarten: a look at Scotland's first nature kindergarten, with recommendations,study guides on using an outdoor classroom
• Natural gardening/landscaping materials: willow fences, etc., and then look through the outdoor gardening menu on the left
• Path Stabilization: DirtGlue stabilizes soil to make natural-looking paths.
• Playground Physics (and other resources) introduction to basic concepts in classical mechanics for upper elementary and middle school grades (4-7) relating the experience children have on the playground to basic physics concepts. Some refit req'd to use items that are all natural.
• Poisonous plants:
  Simple list
  Searchable Data Bases: Colorado State University
  USFDA
• Put up posts without digging holes! SeePin foundations!
• Rainwater Harvesting
• Play Naturally: A review of Children's Natural Play
• Rare plants in US
• Ropes
• RoSPA British site discussing playground safety in a more generous, common-sense way than here in the US.
• Sandpits: a fun account of how a large sandpit developed, with helpful hints
• Shade Planting
  • Deep Shade Plants: Great list, lots of info, but hard to sort through
  • Gardening in the Shade

• Societies: a comprehensive list of plant, garden, & related societies
• Sustainable Horticulture: UNH's Growing a Green Generation horticulture curriculum for pre-school to kindergarten age children
• Training in Natural Play: outdoor play training courses at the University of Gloucestershire may be a bit of a stretch, but at least it's being done!
• Therapeutic landscapes
• Trees for kids: all about trees; fun, interactive
• Tree Houses: fun, one-of-a-kind, universally accessible tree houses are beautiful additions to natural play environments.
• tree ID
• Urban forestry General tree info for urban areas
• USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service: soil surveys & maps, free help from the "Earth Team" to conserve environment; plant ID
• Water Gardening
• Willow structures for tips on building. Places to buy willow rods; Bluestem Nursery. Also buy Salix viminalis at local nurseries.