A daycare experiment in Finland is showing just how important nature is to children's health, from mud to fungi and moss.
The Guardian reported that 43 daycares across the country have been awarded grants to rewild their yards and increase children's exposure to the microscopic biodiversity within them. And a novel experiment assessed how such changes to playgrounds can affect the microbial composition of children's skin, saliva, and feces by comparing kids at "rewilded" daycares with those attending more traditional centers that are generally covered with asphalt, gravel, sand, and plastic mats.
One year into the study, the researchers found that children playing in the nature kindergartens had fewer disease-causing bacteria on their skin and stronger immune defenses. Their gut microbiota showed reduced levels of Clostridium bacteria, which are associated with inflammatory bowel disease, colitis, and infections such as sepsis and botulism.
Another companion study found that after just two weeks, children's immune system regulation could be enriched by playing in sand enriched with garden soil.
"The results suggest that with such relatively easy nature-based solutions, we can prevent the imbalance of children's immune defenses," Aki Sinkkonen — a senior scientist for the Natural Resources Institute Finland, which helped lead the research — said in a news release following the sandbox study.
These results corroborate previous research linking early exposure to green spaces with more favorable immune and gut health, according to the Guardian.
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Other studies have discovered various health benefits from simply spending time in nature. One paper, for instance, discovered that spending just 10 minutes in the outdoors can help adults with mental illness. Another study found that children who lived in neighborhoods with more green spaces were at reduced risk for mental disorders later in life.
According to the Guardian, visitors from Norway, Iceland, and Denmark have come to Finland to see how they can replicate the country's green daycare model.
"More people are saying they want to make these daycares in their towns," Marja Roslund, a scientist at the Natural Resources Institute Finland, told the news site.
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