It’s such a common refrain that it’s hardly ever questioned: Technology is the enemy of the outdoors. If you give a kid a smartphone, the kid will stay in their room playing Minecraft all day and never go outside. Thus, common wisdom says that, if you want to teach kids to appreciate nature, the crucial first step is to eliminate screen time.
But evidence shows that this view is backwards. Young people see their online and offline lives not as opposites, but as integrated parts of a whole. If you give a kid access to both a device and nature, they won’t pick one over the other–they’ll find ways to combine the two. Pokémon Go demonstrated that smartphones could be a powerful tool to get people to go outdoors and engage with the world around him. Here are some apps and sites that are harnessing technology to help private individuals learn about nature and contribute to scientific research.
Agents of Discovery is a great launching pad to harness kids’ innate curiosity about the world around them. This app lets kids complete educational challenges keyed to places like museums, zoos and parks. Hundreds of natural areas across the US and Canada have missions that encourage kids to explore geotagged locations while learning about biodiversity and ecology. Simple tools allow educators to create new missions customized to their locations.
For the older set, a variety of apps have sprung up to help private citizens to document their observations of nature. Sites like eBird (for birds), HerpMapper (for reptiles and amphibians), and iNaturalist (for all species) allow you to upload photos of plants and animals, identify others’ observations, and build a life list of species. If you thought Pokémon was addictive, wait until you have 8 1/2 million species to spot! And it’s not just for fun: Scientists use this data to study animals’ populations and ranges. New species have even been discovered thanks to curious individuals with phones.
If you can’t make it outside, you can pitch in by identifying photos. On Tomnod, you can search satellite photos for hurricane damage or seals basking on Antarctic ice. Zooniverse hosts a wide range of projects, ranging from identifying California condors at camera trap sites to classifying distant galaxies in satellite photos. What would have been endless hours of work for a team of grad students can instead be completed by volunteers contributing a few minutes on their lunch breaks.
So don’t worry the next time your kid won’t get off your phone. Instead, direct them to some of the great apps that are using technology to help kids connect with nature. And don’t be surprised if you get hooked yourself!
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The anxiety about screens’ effects on children reminds me very much of the TV anxiety from when I was a kid. And sure, yeah, a lot of it is garbage… but we, the adults, are the ones CREATING it and SELLING it to them.
Mr. Rogers believed that TV could be a time for family bonding, and I have to agree with him. A group of my friends have a cartoon night every week where we watch cartoons together, and I consider it a fun social time! (Watching things is way less fun alone, in my opinion.)
And obviously I take great umbrage at folks who presume online friendships are intrinsically less real than offline ones.
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When we were kids, our parents were OBSESSED with how much TV we watched. Yet, somehow, no matter how much TV we watched, most of us ended up fine.
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Yeah, while I knew folks (including myself, when I was younger) who were way, WAY too deep into the fiction books they read, to an unhealthy degree.
I think there ARE questions to make about the media we create, design, and sell, especially when our desire for profits outweigh ethics and morality… but it’s not quite as simple as just ignoring the mediums we don’t like.
I do believe that Facebook is corporate evil, but it’s not because it’s technology; it’s that our world REWARDS its super creepy behavior and makes it highly lucrative.
Also Genius Cat, who belongs to my roommate, says hello.
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Hello, Genius Cat!