Get outside! The David Suzuki Foundation interviewed on CBC radio, Queue, Jian Ghomeshi
Challenge your family to take the challenge to be outside for 30 days in a row for 30 minutes.
Excerpts from the CBC radio interview:
Kids spend an average of 6 minutes outside a day and 6 hours in front of electronics (computers, TV, cell phones). This is the reversal of 99% of human existence was outside, or even 100 years ago when most children were left outside to play. With the explosive growth of cities, we need to be surrounded by other species - plants and pets. Canadians spend an average of 9.5 hours sitting down.
He gives the example of taking a walk around and breathing in the greenery and reflecting on the reliance we have on plants. We would not be here if we don't have plants, even though we are now largely an 'indoor species'. The evolutionary history we have changes our physical needs to be active.
Vitamin D from sunlight and obesity are markers of this, and we work against what our bodies require.
If we only love our technologically created recent habitat, we won't take care of our environment.
Nature is our home, we are born out of it and we go back to it when we die.
Humans are disappearing from the outdoors at a rate that would have us on an endangered list!
We need clean air and clean water for our survival. We focus on economy more than our atmosphere. We forget our fundamental biological fact. Without clean water and air, we can't survive.
We are not separate from nature, we are a part of nature.
The interview quoted above with David Suzuki interviewed by Jian Ghomeshi, CBC radio Queue;
http://www.cbc.ca/video/player.html?clipid=2384012833&position=3588086&site=cbc.news.ca
'We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it" - George Eliot
Take It Outside - a good teacher reference
http://www.takeachildoutside.org/
