Finnish scientists trucked in real forest dirt and grass and laid it over the gravel at four daycare yards. They let the kids dig around in it for a month. The blood tests came back with changes the researchers hadn’t expected to see so fast or so clear.
The study ran at ten daycares in two Finnish cities with 75 kids aged three to five. Four of the yards got the forest treatment: about a tennis court worth of soil and grass laid over the gravel, plus planters and peat blocks the kids could dig and climb on. Three others stuck with their normal gravel yards. The last three were daycares where the kids were already visiting real forests every day.
After one month, the variety of bacteria living on the kids’ skin shot up, and the kind that helps train the skin’s immune defenses jumped the most. Their gut bacteria started to look like the gut bacteria of the forest-visiting kids. Their blood showed more of the immune cells whose job is to keep the body from freaking out at harmless stuff like pollen and peanuts, and overall inflammation dropped. The kids on the plain gravel yards showed none of this.
Childhood asthma in the US doubled between 1980 and 1995. Food allergies in kids jumped 50 percent between 1997 and 2011, then jumped another 50 percent between 2007 and 2021. And peanut allergies in one-year-olds tripled between 2001 and 2017.
The Finnish researchers think one of the reasons is simple: kids today don’t get dirty enough. 37 percent of American preschoolers now spend an hour or less outside on a normal weekday. Their immune systems are getting trained in environments stripped of the bacteria humans have always lived around.
Aki Sinkkonen, who led the study, put it in plain words: “It would be best if children could play in puddles and everyone could dig organic soil.” The Finnish government is now helping pay for daycares across the country to make the same changes.
Leaving a toxic workplace is a weird feeling… like you’re relieved you’ve finally left, but also annoyed that a perfectly good job has been unnecessarily ruined by a few people creating a horrible work culture.
Working parent confession: I've done most of these minimizing strategies for years now. For me, it's older children active in sports/activities and with disabilities (ADHD, Autism). Working lunches are a favority strategy.
https://t.co/DL8O9YxuUQ
"Our results reveal that whenever handwriting movements are included as a learning strategy, more of the brain gets stimulated, resulting in the formation of more complex neural network connectivity...typewriting do[es] not activate...networks the same way that handwriting does."
🚨🚨 Just in: Babson has been named the No. 2 college in America by The Wall Street Journal.
Read more at the link below:
https://t.co/1P6Sds1yng
#babsoncollege#babsonalumni
Academics across the country are talking about how students struggle with reading: Many have weak vocabulary, are unable to analyze complex texts, or understand different points of view.
Here's what they're seeing — and what may need to change. https://t.co/4dBUGsRs2x
@DanMulroyjr because the U.S. math curriculum was developed in the 1950s when we were trying to win the space race, and hasn't been substantively updated since. As a result, we train all our children to be rocket scientist rather than give them the math they need for life skills.