Giving curiosity somewhere to go


Young children are naturally curious. They don’t need constant entertainment. Instead, they need environments that invite exploration.


A woodland floor covered in leaves offers different possibilities from a grassy clearing. A fallen log encourages climbing or crawling. A puddle changes when a hand, stick or stone touches it. Natural materials can be grasped, carried, dropped and investigated.


For babies, these are simple discoveries. For toddlers, they become the beginnings of experimentation.


What happens if I drop this? Can I reach that? What happens when the stick goes into the puddle?


These questions form the foundations of problem- solving, critical thinking and scientific enquiry.


Confidence through challenge Outdoor environments naturally provide opportunities for challenge at the right level. For a baby, that might mean reaching towards a leaf or turning towards a new sound. For a newly mobile child, it could be crawling across uneven ground or finding a way around an obstacle. Our role isn’t to remove every difficulty. Instead, we stay close, ensure children are safe and offer reassurance while allowing them time to persevere. Each achievement, however small, helps children discover: I can do this.


These early successes become the foundations of confidence, resilience and self-belief.


Follow the child, not the plan


Working with very young children outdoors requires us to slow down.


A planned activity might take five minutes, but a baby may spend fifteen minutes absorbed by the movement of sunlight through leaves. When we follow children’s interests rather than rushing them on, we create opportunities for sustained attention, curiosity and deeper learning.


For adults, this means asking simple questions: • What has captured this child’s attention? • What are they trying to do? • What happens if I give them more time? • How can I support their fascination?


About Vikki


Vikki Silverwood is the Owner of Børn of the Forest CIC, an outdoor forest school and nature connection initiative in Harrogate. She is also the creator of Kinature, an app designed to help adults understand what children are learning through nature and how best to support it. Kinature launches on 6 October 2026.


Find out more at bornoftheforest.co.uk


Sometimes that support means offering a new object to explore. Sometimes it means simply staying close and sharing the moment.


Our role is to create the conditions


Perhaps the biggest shift we can make is to stop asking, “What activity can I do with the children?” Instead, we can focus on creating environments where children can explore at their own pace, become absorbed in what interests them and experience manageable challenge.


For babies and young children, outdoor play isn’t preparation for future learning.


It is learning. It is connection. It is curiosity.


It is discovering that the world is interesting, that their ideas matter and that they are capable of making things happen. And when these experiences happen in nature, something else grows too: a sense of belonging to the living world around them. Perhaps that is one of the greatest gifts we can give children from the very beginning.


Shop Little Learners products and more at ypo.co.uk/earlyyears


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