Minneapolis Star Tribune
Initiative taps into ever-growing interest to connect little ones (and their parents) to nature
Charged with excitement, several of the first-graders got on all fours and smashed through the new snow. Others several yards away draped over a bowed tree, their classmates getting low-low-lower to pass underneath. And nearby several more kids grabbed sticks and held court on their sacred ground. Their twiggy lean-to was only limited by their imaginations.
What was happening was more than kids running wild — it was kids, by design, doing nothing. Unprescribed play in nature. They were free to get snowy, free to hang on trees, free to turn their discoveries on the earth’s floor into whatever, all with the few adults present purposefully hands-off.
Anna Sharratt was one of them, dressed for the weather in a warm sweater, buff and sturdy overalls. And these kids were participants in the quest she is leading, Free Forest School, set in motion on this December morning at Dowling Elementary School in Minneapolis.
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