即时发布
Spending time in nature can have mental, physical and social benefits for children. While schools offer a chance for students of all backgrounds to get outside in nature, researchers from North Carolina State University found natural spaces like woods or gardens were relatively rare in a small sample of elementary and middle schools in Wake County.
出版在日记中Urban Forestry & Urban Greening该研究发现，对于确实有绿色自然空间的学校，教师在帮助孩子体验和享受这些自然领域的过程中发挥了关键作用。
该研究的首席作者Zhenzhen Zhang说：“当孩子们年轻时与大自然联系时，它可以提供终身利益。”研究生in forestry and environmental resources at NC State. “We wanted to know – how can we promote children connecting with nature using the most accessible green space they might have, which is the school yard?”
在研究中，研究人员访问了韦克县的八所小学和一所中学，看看他们是否有花园，树林，运动场或游乐场。他们还测量了每所学校户外的不透水表面，混凝土和沥青的百分比。他们还调查了学生和老师，以了解学生意识到并使用了自然户外空间的程度。
They found all nine schools had athletic fields, and all of the elementary schools had playgrounds. Just three schools had woods, some of which were blocked off by a fence, and six had gardens. Researchers noted that while having athletic fields and playgrounds was likely a result of standard school system landscape design plans, the presence of green natural spaces was not.
“For woodlands, the school system told me they try to keep as many trees they can if the trees already exist on the property, but it depends on the school,” Zhang said. “For gardens, it depended on whether a school wanted to have that feature. But the playgrounds and athletic fields are required for every elementary school.”
当他们在这些学校调查了199个三年级至六年级学生和14名老师时，研究人员发现，最频繁的户外活动学生参加的是休假，他们说他们平均每周做几次，并参加体育运动，每周一次发生一次体育运动。最不常见的活动是探索每年不到一次或两次的木材，或在花园里度过的时间平均每月不到一次。
学生were also less aware of the natural spaces at their schools compared with playgrounds or athletic fields.
“游乐场擅长使孩子活跃，我们知道这具有心理健康益处，但自然空间提供了一些不同的东西，”研究合着者说。Kathryn Stevenson，北卡罗来纳州公园，娱乐和旅游管理副教授。“我们想知道什么是什么驱使孩子与这些自然空间互动，因为我们知道他们提供了心理健康和学习优势，而不是游乐场和田野所能提供的。”
当他们研究与学生是否在树林或花园里度过的因素时，他们发现在环境教育接受培训的老师与学生说他们是否在学校探索树林有关。
”老师在encouragin扮演着重要的角色g kids to go outdoors and use woodlands,” Stevenson said. “Environmental education workshops can help teachers overcome barriers to using those spaces, such as knowing whether using woodlands is safe, or knowing how to use them in teaching, and knowing how the outdoors can benefit student learning.”
他们还发现，探索树林与学生认为自己是一个很好的学习场所有关。他们还看到，将儿童带到户外活动的老师经常增加学生意识到学校里的花园的可能性。
研究人员说，教师是进入自然领域的学生的一个因素也就不足为奇了。调查结果表明，需要为教师提供鼓励户外学习和游戏的知识和技能，并暗示，如果教育工作者和父母希望孩子获得与户外活动相关的好处，则需要对学校设计的政策有意地对户外空间有意。
张说：“我们发现老师可以成为将学生与基于自然活动联系起来的大推动者。”“我们还发现，老师可以影响孩子的想法，即林地是一个学习的好地方，这就是为什么老师是影响学生去户外活动的真正重要因素。”
研究”课程,探索地理d demographic factors of nature use by children in urban schoolyards in Raleigh, NC, USA,” was published online inUrban Forestry & Urban Greening。除了张和史蒂文森，它还由凯瑟琳·马丁（Katherine L. Martin）撰写。它是由北卡罗来纳州水资源研究所和北卡罗来纳州的赠款资助的，在联合研究生研究资金机会下。
-oleniacz-
注释编辑：The abstract follows.
“探索儿童在美国北卡罗来纳州罗利市的城市校园的自然使用的地理，课程和人口统计学因素”
作者：Zhenzhen Zhang, Kathryn T. Stevenson and Katherine L. Martin
出版online inUrban Forestry & Urban Greeningon Sept. 1, 2021
doi：10.1016/j.ufug.2021.127323
抽象的：Experience in nature provides a host of benefits to children, but today’s children who live in urban environments spend less time with nature compared to previous generations. Because children spend a large amount of time at school, greening schoolyards is one strategy for providing children with more access to nature and its benefits. However, installing nature-rich spaces in schoolyards may not guarantee their use, and research is needed to understand how the physical make-up of schoolyards may interact with teacher and student-related factors to predict use of natural elements on schoolyards. We inventoried 9 urban schoolyards and surveyed an associated 199 3rd-6th grade students and 14 teachers to measure children’s awareness and use of nature-rich vs. traditional outdoor spaces as predicted by teachers’ behavior (i.e. taking students outdoors) and environmental education related training, student demography, and schoolyard physical environment. We found that children were less aware of nature-rich spaces (gardens 69 %, woodlands 28 %) compared to traditional outdoor spaces (playgrounds 73 %, athletic fields 77 %) and spent less time there (once a month versus several times a week). However, teachers taking children outdoors (p = 0.001) and trained in environmental education (p = 0.10) positively predicted student awareness of gardens. Teacher training in environmental education was also predictive of children exploring woodlands (p = 0.04), highlighting the importance of teacher training in successful green schoolyard efforts. We provide a glimpse of schoolyards as places for urban children to access nature’s benefits by studying different school factors that influence children’s nature-based activities. Simply implementing natural spaces in schoolyards cannot guarantee the use of natural spaces by children. Providing institutional support and professional development for teachers may help to enhance children’s awareness of different nature-rich areas and promote nature-base activities in schoolyards.
- 类别：
这是一个很棒的研究！