Jumping off rocks: Why kids need outdoor play to thrive

Jumping off rocks. Climbing trees. Hanging upside down. Spinning so fast it would make an adult dizzy.

Meet Angela Hanscom, an occupational therapist who has come to the conclusion that children need adventurous activities to develop a healthy sense of body and mind. Not only do children need way more movement than our sedentary society allows them, she suggests, but they need precisely the kinds of movements that make adults gasp, if they are going to thrive. 

Often brought into classrooms to solve behavioral issues, Hanscom realized that children today do not get enough free play, exploration and exercise to allow them to focus properly in school. She began using movement as therapy, helping kids heal through spinning too fast on the merry-go-round and flying too high on the swings. 

Hanscom, a mother of three, founded TimberNook in 2013. It began as an experimental therapy program in her own backyard before expanding to three woodland sites in Maine and spreading to franchises nationally. She recently discussed her philosophy of child development, which is also the theme of her book, “Balanced and Barefoot: How Unrestricted Outdoor Play Makes for Strong, Confident, and Capable Children.”

credit: TimberNook

How dangerous is it for children to be too sedentary?

The current research is that kids sit in chairs for about nine hours a day. Being driven to school, being driven home from school, sitting for hours. And then they go home and they have homework. They might have some sports, but a lot of times they’re still in an upright position. What really needs to happen is kids need to spin in circles. They need to go upside down because inside the inner ear are these little hair cells, and when we move in rapid ways, the fluid in the ears moves back and forth, stimulating those hair cells and developing what we call the vestibular sense. If that’s underdeveloped because kids are not moving enough, then what happens is it can affect what we call sensory integration, which is basically organization of the brain so they can learn.

Why is it important for kids to climb trees and jump off rocks?

It helps you know where your body is in space so you can stay in your seat without falling out. That’s actually an issue. Kids are literally falling out of the chairs in school now. The way we treat that as occupational therapists is that we have kids spin in circles, and that helps them gain more body awareness so they can navigate their environments effectively. 

Sometimes I’ll see a kid spinning in circles and I’ll hear an adult say, don’t spin. You’re going to get dizzy or get off that rock, you’re going to get hurt. But if we, as adults, keep them from moving in those ways, we have actually become the barrier to the neurological development that needs to happen so they can become safe in their environment. 

credit: TimberNook

Some may call your style of outdoor therapy radical and progressive, others might see it as common sense. How do you describe it? 

I think of it more like a restoration. I don’t think this is a progressive idea. As an occupational therapist, for me, the true occupation of a child is play. And outdoor play is a really meaningful one for most of us. Most of us have fond memories of it, but it’s also really at risk. … That’s why it’s so therapeutic. That’s why a lot of therapists will train in this, because they see how healing it is. It’s giving children what you had, what they were always meant to have.

It’s actually a very traditional approach, as opposed to something radical.

Yes, we’re just trying to protect a tradition. We’re saying you can’t touch this. For instance, when we go into schools, teachers aren’t allowed to go into playtime and do teachable moments. We save that for later. This is their time where they have to figure things out. The children need that time. 

Have you sort of recreated your own childhood?

Growing up in Vermont, it was a bunch of kids, we’d have like five or six of us. But at TimberNook, it’s like 25 children out in the woods creating societies with natural materials. It’s a dream come true for kids. It’s outdoor play for hours. It challenges them to think creatively. 

When did you start collaborating with schools?

We started going to schools with TimberNook in 2017. That was a fascinating process. We’re in 10 schools now, but one in particular, Laconia Christian Academy, is really doing it right.  They started it five years ago, and they did it once a week for two hours, TimberNook time at school, and immediately saw benefits. So they increased it to four hours of woodland time. 

It’s a very academic school. So when they saw the benefits, they took their half an hour of recess and went to an hour, on top of their four hours of TimberNook time. 

Did increasing play time have an impact on academic performance?

During the pandemic they saw no change in academics. If anything, they saw an increase. The headmaster said, we’re seeing joy, we’re seeing kids more resilient, stronger, able to figure out their own problems. So that’s been really interesting. We’re researching that now with the University of New Hampshire on how it’s changing the culture of schools. That study is just starting, but it’s really going to be fascinating, because I think it’s time to rethink what we’re doing in schools. 

What lured kids away from playing outside? Screens? Or parental fear of dangers outside?

One of the biggest factors is due to fear. Fear is something that we cannot see, but it is one of the major reasons why parents and schools aren’t providing enough outdoor play time. Fear that there isn’t enough time for play in school settings. The tendency to feel schools need to push more academics. Fear that children will miss out if not playing enough sports at a very really early age. This leads to overscheduling of children for sports. … Screen time is also another major factor. It is highly addictive and is replacing a lot of good old-fashioned playtime. The kind where children are digging in the dirt for hours, rolling down hills, developing the muscles and senses for healthy child development.

For a lot of families, the pandemic meant forcing your kid to stare at a screen for hours for remote learning, and now it’s hard to walk that back.

We’re in a bigger hole than we were before. I think the pandemic unveiled a lot of the issues and then just made it worse, unfortunately. 

Are you optimistic that we can try to make that change as a society? 

I really think people are waking up. I think the time is now, there’s so much interest, and everyone you talk to now knows that this is an issue.