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Turn to wilderness for your child's sake!

Swapna Mohanty | Updated on: 13 January 2018, 17:39 IST

If your young one is not able to concentrate and focus in the class and there are regular remarks in his/her  school diary then don't worry, this recent study published in the journal, Frontiers in Psychology, will help you!

The study says that when a child takes up  lessons in wilderness, his/her  attention level would receive a boost which will help it to  learn  better. And so does an adult.

When an adult comes in contact with parks, tress and fresh air his/her  experience enhances  physical activity, reduces mental stress and helps to feel motivated.

If you have an issue like, your kid has a habit of peeping out of the window pane and looking at the mountain range and garden adjacent to the school building, then don't worry this is a good sign!

Yes, you heard it right, this is a good sign,  a view of greenery through a classroom window can have positive effects on the child's attention span, the researchers have found.

The study showed that post an outdoor lesson, students were significantly more attentive and engaged with their schoolwork and were not overexcited.

Moreover, the number of times the teacher had to redirect a student's attention to their work was roughly halved immediately after an outdoor lesson.

"Our teachers were able to teach uninterrupted for almost twice as long at a time after the outdoor lesson and we saw the nature effect with our skeptical teacher as well," said Ming Kuo, a scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the US.

This study hypothesis was tested with third graders (9-10 years old) in a school over a 10-week-period.

To prove this hypothesis an experienced teacher held one lesson a week outdoors and a similar lesson in her regular classroom, and another, more skeptical teacher did the same. Their outdoor "classroom" was a grassy spot just outside the school, in view of a wooded area. And the results were positive in both the cases!

              

First published: 13 January 2018, 17:39 IST