Discussion: in the woods as a kid?

Playing a lot in the woods as a kid seems to be a common theme among a few orienteers I have talked to, so I thought I'd 'expand the database'. Do you think its possible for us to determine if just about all kids play in the woods or that not so many do, and those that do are likely to become orienteers, adventue racers, etc.?

I think the research is pretty clear that kids are not playing in the woods much, and the negative impact seems to be significant.
Last Child In the Woods is a good source on the topic.

I played in the woods as a child, and love orienteering.

My kids played outside, some (though we don't have extensive woods around us), before video games took over, and they orienteered with us while they were growing up, but they're not currently orienteers, so it doesn't necessarily follow that playing in the woods means you'll become an orienteer.

As Last Child in the Woods notes, though, if we don't get the current generation of children 'out there,' there will likely be fewer orienteers in the future.

kid: running on trail thru woods
mom: "Slow down, you'll fall"
kid: run, run, slip, thump, splat

2 minutes later:
kid: running on trail thru woods
mom: "Slow down, you'll fall"
kid: run, run, slip, thump, splat

That was about 40 years ago at Mt. Airy. I'm still running thru the woods. And still falling.

Come run thru the woods of Mt. Airy for yourself (and maybe do your own slip, thump, splat) at OCIN's 25th Anniversary and Flying Pig XIII" on April 3-5

And I still grimmace when I hear parents telling their kids "Don't run" or "Slow down, you'll fall"!

My siblings and I spent hours and hours in the woods behind our house in central Ohio, doing things that would make our parents cringe if they knew. :-) It could be a predictor, but not a perfect one; my brother and I stayed outdoorsy while our sister was somewhat traumatized (she doesn't react well to things like poison ivy, nettles, insects) and now has a self-confessed "fear of nature."

I grew up going to my great uncle's cabin in Ontario every summer. It was 8 miles back dirt roads in the Rideau Lakes region. We would play, hike, swim, fish, and just enjoy the great outdoors. I really believe this is what set the foundation for my love of being outside. Unfortunately, neither cabin (2 uncles had them side by side) is still in the family, though we did go back a few years ago and rent a place on the other side of the peninsula.


That's me on the top... circa 1984!

My two childhood best friends and I played in the woods at home, too. One of them had a big patch of woods behind her house and we were always in there building forts & bridges. All the different areas, trails, and natural features had names that we made up. Sadly, the entire area was bulldozed a few years ago to make way for more housing that we don't really need.

As a kid, every waking hour of the summer holidays was spent exploring suburban wilderness. This led directly to a passion for geography and eventually to orienteering (post-running).

However, even though I exposed my preschool kids to all that outdoors while I played Mr Mom, none of it wore off. They became home bodies when in school and have never returned to the outdoors. I must have failed somewhere along the way.

I never went to summer camp when I was a kid. I couldn't see the point, because I had all the outdoors I needed at home. In the woods all the time.

An urban child here, with not much access to woods of any sort. The best option was the acre or two of scruffy woods between the fence and the railroad tracks. But there were (small) hills, trees to climb, and places to hide, which I and some (not all) of my friends certainly took advantage of, while effectively ignoring my parents' occasional warnings to avoid the woods due to the odd homeless person passing through.

I'm thankful to be old enough not to have been hamstrung by the current state of fear that prevents kids from doing anything outside. I heard an apropos clip on As It Happens last night, an interview with a mother who let her ten-year old walk a mile to soccer practice (in a small town) and had the police pay her a visit as a result. WTF - I remember walking three miles home on my first day of first grade!

But I've had a lifelong fascination with maps, and that drew me into orienteering as an adult. I spent a lot of time looking at maps, sometimes making up imaginary maps (don't laugh - so did JRR!), and directing the family vehicle on various trips.

I also heard the story on As It Happens. I found myself yelling at the radio.

I grew up an hour outside Philly and had a family that loved to camp and we did a lot of it. Also I was very into scouts and two weeks after graduation from HS had my first trip to Europe to visit an international Girl Scout house in Switzerland with my troop. As soon as Corinne was old enough for Girl Scouts I became a leader and we started our mother/daughter scouting advertures. It was a GS leaders training that introduced me to orienteering and I in turn I introduced Corinne to it at the age 10. She loved so much the first time I took her, she wanted to do the white course we had done together, again, instead we did the yellow course that day as well and the rest is history. If it wasn't for her love of orienteering that had gotten our family involved, I'm pretty sure that my interest in orienteering would had faded with time, instead our interest in regular scouting faded and orienteering took its place. So I can say that it was the love my daughter has for the sport and our love for her and her brother that got us well into orienteering and now we love it as well.

I hardly ever played in the woods as a kid. I was a city kid, though a few blocks from the Mississippi River; I remember going down there with friends/siblings to play, without our parents' permission or knowledge, but I think we just took the trail down to the shore & back. I went to summer camp a few times but it was not outdoor-oriented, and my Girl Scout career flamed out before any outdoor activities took place. My parents were decidedly not outdoors people, and we never camped.
It wasn't until I was in college that I camped, and grad school before I started hanging out in the woods to orienteer. My first few years of orienteering I really looked at the races as me against nature. My views are much different now.
Our son is having a very different childhood than I did. I'm determined to let him have more freedom than most American kids do, but societal pressure is difficult to overcome.

Oh, I did Girl Scouts as well (still registered in fact) with lots of camping (both with the troop and summer resident camp). When I was old enough I worked at camp all summer as a stable assistant & riding instructor. Earning the orienteering badge really is what got me into the sport, but I'm one of the rare few out there whose first introduction to the sport was in middle school gym class. That's what led me to work on the badge and the rest is history... hahaha.

I think it's great that Minnesotan's are listening to As It Happens.

Spent a couple years and several summers at god-parents' farm. Spent lots of time roaming farm with Pal, a collie.

Later often biked 2 miles by self or with friends to explore woods and Bitter Bend Creek just outside of town.

Good hikes and overnights with Boy Scouts. Our patrol was very good at orienteering - of course, accurate bearings and pace count. Worked 6 summers at camps as Ecology Director and then Aquatics Director.

Lots of summer vacations with mom and dad in house-trailer - saw lots of State Park and Forest Service campgrounds, including Algonquin Park in Canada twice. Dad spent a lot of his youth hunting and fishing.

We were lucky to pass on much of this spirit to Zan :) - Happy B-Day!

I grew up in suburban Vancouver. We did not have any woods to play in; but we did lots of exploring by bicycle. But times were far more innocent then. I always had an interest in exploring and maps; used to go car camping, hiking then backpacking with my Dad, and was interested in maps from an early age. I was introduced to O by a high school teacher and thought it was so neat that there was a sport based on map reading. In Whitehorse I am happy that my daughter has the opportunity to explore her surroundings - urban as well as woods -- in a relatively innocent fashion. Our house borders on forest, with a small creek, marsh and trails. Last summer she was out quite late on a Friday night, and it was starting to get dark but I was not worried. She was not hanging out downtown or at the mall -- she and a bunch of the neighborhood kids were down at the creek looking for frogs.

I grew up just north of NYC. As HVO'ers know, despite the population density, there are actually plenty of woods available. I'm not sure what age I was when I was allowed to start hiking to the top of Flag Hill, but I know it was in elementary school. It was a trek of a bit over a mile each way, half urban, half in the woods. Every kid in the neighborhood did it on a regular basis. I find it interesting that when I share such stories, many parents now say, "Yes, but that was a different time." Damn straight! Crime was a real problem back then and NYC had the highest rate in the country. It's so much SAFER now that the fear would be comical if it wasn't so sad.

...a mother who let her ten-year old walk a mile.... and had the police pay her a visit as a result...

I'm glad I don't have kids, and have to raise them in today's PC world. I can still remember the thrill of walking by myself, in the dark, through the woods, to my friend's house back in the 1940's. Not to allow kids to develop the self-reliance, confidence and skill to find their way in the big world out there is IMHO.....child abuse!

ebuckley's post reminds me of us going for a training run in Harriman - parked at Silver Mine Lake; and there was a group of teenage kids from NYC there for a day's outting. Some of them were blown away by the 'wilderness' as apparently for most of them it was the first time they had been so far (!) from the city and into woods. Whereas here I was having come across the continent numerous times to explore the place. (Don't think I have been back since WOC but Harriman/West Point are still one of my favourite areas.)

I'm glad I don't have kids, and have to raise them in today's PC world.

It's not as bad as all that really. We've been leaving Yaya unattended at Wineries while we do a tasting since she was 3 (she's been going since she was 2 weeks and knows what she is and isn't allowed to get into). Just yesterday, she wandered around the cave at Cave Winery (which is a fairly big cave, but with clearly marked boundaries) for nearly an hour while we enjoyed a bottle with her Aunt and future Uncle. I routinely leave her at the start/finish area for races after a brief introduction to one of the volunteers in case she needs something while I'm racing, but she's never bugged them. I usually come back to find that she's hooked up with another kid. The most ambitious (and wildly successful) leave was sticking her in a tent next to the hash house last fall while I did a nighttime 12-hour in Kansas City. She was awake when I left, but she's put herself to bed in the tent plenty of times. I finished the race to find her still fast asleep. I'm sure some feel we are being too loose with her, but nobody's ever felt the need to express that opinion to me.

In a small (5 acre) isolated forest adjacent (at the time) to my house, I developed and maintained a trail network around age 11-12. I rode my bike (this is long before mountain biking) as well as walked/ran though there. It was also a through-the-woods not-so-short cut to a friend's house.

When a new house was built next door, access to the woods was cut off. That neighbor then bought the whole area, bulldozed a new driveway through it and also used it as his personal landfill. Thankfully, he moved several years ago, but sold his house and the woods to different people.

In recent years, the owner of the woods attempted to subdivide and develop it, but failed. In the end it was sold to the town as permanent -- though relatively inaccessible -- open space.

My grandfather was a walker and I practically lived in the woods as a kid. As soon as my kids were old enough to walk trails without being carried, they went along with me. On Matt's first trip the bottom of his backpack was at his knees. Our Grandson is 3 and he is starting to recognize important landmarks as we pass them. Yes, we teach our children by example, so they are likely to develop similar interests.

We didn't have any woods near my house growing up, I hated (and still hate) camping, and was never athletic as a kid (due to undiagnosed asthma). So it's quite ironic that I love orienteering today. When I find myself deep in the woods with no one else around, I get a feeling of satisfaction that I've come this far. I'm envious of those who have been doing this stuff since childhood, but proud that I didn't grow up to be a couch potato.

From age 0-6 I didn't live near the woods, but my parents had friends who did.

From age 6-11 I lived 150m from the nearest woods that I could play in.

From age 11-12 I lived 400m from the woods.

From age 12-17 I lived 10m from the woods. Our house was on the map.

One important thing to note is that Norway has laws stating that anyone can travel on uncultivated private land as long as you don't:
* Damage anything, including nature.
* Disturb private residences.
* Camp closer than 150m to a residence, or for more than two days. (The latter clause does not apply above the tree line.)

If the ground is frozen or covered by snow, you can also travel on cultivated land.

In Norway you are also allowed to bathe and swim in any body of water as long as you are "reasonably far away" from private residences. The way this law is typically interpreted, it's virtually impossible to declare a beach private.

These laws make it much easier to access nature.

All countries need the right of access laws that Norway and Sweden have. In the US people seem to like to buy up huge tracts of land, put up barbed wire fences and "no trespassing signs" and leave the land unused and unusable.

Out of curiosity, why the exception for camping above the tree line?

As for myself, I seem to recall playing in the woods whenever I had the chance, but I've lived in cities all my life (until now) so the opportunity never came often. I was also extremely unathletic until age 13 when I started running, but even then it was largely because I preferred strolls in the woods over cramped basketball courts.