Exploring Nature with Your Senses: Touch

While wandering by means of nature, all of us absorb our environment utilizing our senses. We odor flowers, contact tree bark, take heed to chook calls, see particulars (like an ant path on a tree), and even style among the pure objects we come throughout (suppose berries or edible flowers). And whereas investigating nature on this method comes naturally to most youngsters, typically we dad and mom neglect to permit our youngsters the time and area they should do it. Never concern, Hike it Baby is right here! This month, we’re sharing 5 other ways to discover every of the 5 senses together with your kids! So get exterior as a household, decelerate, and discover nature together with your senses collectively!

Want to study extra about exploring nature together with your senses? Check out our different posts on utilizing your sense of listening to, style, odor, and sight!

Photo Credit: Michelle Pearl Gee

Exploring Nature by Touch

Humans inevitably discover the world by means of contact. Pretty a lot each single second of the day is full of some variation of the contact sense. Though we take nearly all of our contact sensations with no consideration and don’t suppose a lot about them, one minute exterior can really feel like this:

You contact the doorknob to let your self exterior and instantly really feel the nice and cozy air and a slight breeze in your pores and skin. You take a step exterior and your naked ft really feel the nice and cozy cement floor. You stroll towards your entrance yard and brush your arm up in opposition to a bush. You attain out to the touch some flowers proper earlier than your ft contact the cooler grass. You take a second to relish the sensation of the grass earlier than you sit down and really feel the gentle floor below your physique, and possibly a slight itchy feeling in your legs.

The sensory expertise of contact actually occurs on a regular basis, a lot so we have a tendency to dam out a lot of what we’re feeling. But, if we decelerate exterior, follow a bit of mindfulness, and take into consideration every feeling because it touches our physique, it may possibly shift any outside experiences enormously.

Here are 5 methods you possibly can decelerate and actually expertise contact in nature collectively:

1. Create a contact field. Children love guessing video games and creating this straightforward exercise is not going to solely present a pleasant household gaming expertise however may also create a chance to essentially discover nature by means of contact. All you do is collect some easy nature objects and put them inside a field. Don’t let your kids see what’s within the field and have them guess what nature merchandise it’s based mostly on contact alone. You can put one merchandise in at a time (good for youthful kids) or all of sudden to make it tougher.
2. Walk barefoot in nature. The human foot is extremely delicate and experiencing quite a lot of floor cowl feels totally different on our ft and supplies totally different sensory enter. When you deliberately take into consideration every sensation your ft are feeling, the entire expertise of strolling barefoot shifts only a bit.
3. Find totally different textures in nature. Create a easy scavenger hunt and set your youngsters unfastened to search out quite a lot of textures exterior. You may also simply have the concepts in your head and have the children seek for one by one when you meander your favourite path. Some examples of easy-to-find nature textures are tough, clean, chilly, heat, moist, dry, arduous, gentle, and so forth.
4. Hug a tree. Literally. Not solely will it really feel very nice to do it, however additionally, you will be capable of really feel totally different sensations. Are you capable of wrap your fingers all the way in which round? Is the bark tough or clean?
5. Count the pores and skin sensations. Sit down for 1 to five minutes relying on the ages of your kids and their means to focus and depend what number of sensations you possibly can really feel in your pores and skin. The wind in your pores and skin, the heat of the solar, the sensation of the bottom below your physique, the fly that landed in your leg, and a lot extra. It is difficult to deal with solely the sensation of contact, however it’s wonderful what number of various things our pores and skin can really feel in only one minute.

How are you touching nature this week?

ABOUT HIKE IT BABY

Hike it Baby is a 501(c)(3) non-profit group devoted to creating alternatives and eradicating obstacles to entry so households with infants and younger kids can take their first steps exterior. With greater than 300 communities throughout North America, they firmly imagine all households have the fitting to attach with nature, profit from spending time outdoor, and be impressed to a lifelong love of nature. To study extra, go to HikeitBaby.com, Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, and Instagram.  To assist their mission and additional their programming aimed toward supporting households, donate right here.