​David Sobel, author of Children's Special Places: Exploring the Role of Forts, Dens, and Bush Houses in Middle Childhood, has been working with, learning from, and writing about children for many years. Sobel, who teaches at Antioch University of New England, advises that it's best to introduce children to nature through age-appropriate outdoor activities. We don't need to overwhelm or burden young children by asking them to save the rain forests at age five.

" Young children do not have the coping skills to face the tragedies of environmental crises and problems. When faced with the loss of endangered species and environmental degradation, young children may respond with sadness, fear, and helplessness, which can lead to a defensive apathy," notes the North American Association for Environmental Education.

Sobel says that we must focus on teaching empathy for nature to children who are five – the age of our Kindergarteners. He notes the importance for young children to have the opportunity to play like animals, learn about animals, move like deer, and slither like snakes. He explains how to teach empathy for animals in an interview with Rae Pica for the BAM Radio Network. Listen to the interview here.

The Children & Nature Network published Thriving Through Nature: Fostering Children's Executive Function Skills. The 2015 report, by Chiara D'Amore, describes how time in nature from infancy through adolescence helps children to develop executive function skills. These skills include the ability to reason, plan, remember, use self-control and solve problems. Pages 10-12 provide a variety of nature-based activities that teachers of K-8 students may introduce outdoors. The report notes the recommendations of writer and educator David Sobel that "early childhood activities that foster a connection with the natural world should center on enhancing the developmental tendency toward empathy with nature, in middle childhood exploration should take precedence, and in adolescence social action should assume a more central role." Sobel explains these three stages of bonding with the earth in his article "Beyond Ecophobia" in Yes! Magazine.  

The Pennsylvania Land Trust Association produced the 2014 publication Nature Play: Nurturing Children and Strengthening Conservation Through Connections to the Land. Authors Ken Finch and Andrew M. Loza explain how nature play enhances children's cognitive and emotional development. On pages 30 and 31, they provide lists of age-specific nature-related activities for children. Finch and Loza explain the connection between immersion in nature during childhood and the decision as an adult to serve as a steward of the natural world. They discuss the importance of unstructured nature play, along with the design of natural playscapes. The publication also addresses safety and liability concerns.