All you need is a bucket and spade

A guide to starting your own Little Explorers Club

In this age of more is more, something I see constantly is the pressure for parents to supply kids with an endless source of amusement. This isn’t always obvious and can often come under the guise of being for ‘sensory’ or ‘developmental’ purposes. I’ve written about my issues with this in ‘The cost of ‘Being a Good Parent’ and hold firm to my belief that often the best toys a child can have are a bucket and spade.

I have noticed a real fear in parents of their kids getting bored, and often this can lead to them trying to provide entertainment in the form of structured activities, games and toys. This can mean that kids often don’t get the chance to fully explore their natural surroundings

What we rob our children of when we give them too many things or too many options is the chance to use their imaginations. How does a child learn the joy of finding unusual shells at the beach, when they have bags of bright toys laid out before them?

I’m in no way against taking the classic bucket and spade to the beach or the sandpit. These are tools that kids can use to interact with their environment. We have some genius scoopers that have wheels that my boys love to use to move sand and scoop up shells and coral. However, overloading kids with distractions often doesn’t result in real exploration or play.

When my boys were younger, I would often take them on walks through the bush or to the beach. We explored and discovered but it got lonely at times, for me and them. To remedy this I came up with an idea and started up a group called Little Explorers Club. I had a vision to provide a space for the little ones to truly explore nature, away from the noise of adult-led activities and structure, while also getting to be with other mums and having company.

The premise was simple. Each week we would meet in the same place, a little creek in a small patch of bush surrounded by, but hidden from, suburbia. Mothers were encouraged to bring picnic blankets and thermoses of tea and coffee for them and snacks for the kids. The one rule I had was that there were not to be any toys. Parents could bring a small basket for their children to collect things in if they wished, but that was it. Each week I brought a bag full of some old enamelware, cups, plates, bowls and a few hardy trowels that the kids could share. These were kept in a bag all week so that my children didn’t have a sense of ownership over them, which can be a big thing for toddlers. These things were simply for ‘Little Explorers Club’. The children used these to dig and fill and create mud pies. These were not toys, but tools, ways that the children could interact with the space around them.

It was an absolute joy to watch these toddlers explore, create and be together in this small wild space. Some weeks they needed more involvement from us which usually looked like one or two mums helping suggest a game or starting them off by asking for a mud pie, which most toddlers cannot resist ‘baking’.

There was one part of the creek where the banks were steeper, and rocks lined the edges. This became a challenge for some of the kids, each week to try and cross, starting out with their mum’s help and then over time with some of them managing to do the crossing on their own.

Little Explorers Club was not monetized, there was no term sign-up and promise for what children would ‘receive’. I committed to being at the same place at the same time every week, sometimes 6 mothers showed up, some I knew, others I didn’t, and sometimes it was only one other mother or just the boys and I! The point of this was just to gather in a space where the children could use their wild imaginations, roam freely and be away from the chaos and overstimulation stimulation that the civilised world creates.

If you have young ones who aren’t in school full time, or even if they are and you want to create a different kind of playdate for them, then I would really encourage you to start up your own Little Explorers Club. Again, this is not something to be monetised or overthought, it’s simply a group of parents gathering for a playdate with a little more intention. Below I’ve created a list of some ideas to help you to create your own Little Explorers Club.

Steps to create your own little explorers club

• Finding the space. If you can, look locally. Take time to walk your neighborhood and explore every nature strip, park corner or vacant patch of land. The best kind of place for Little Explorers Club is an area away from play equipment, slightly tucked away and somewhere that offers a natural setting for exploration. A beach, even in winter, trees for climbing or fallen logs for balancing. Somewhere with rocks or leaves for collection and if you can find a creek or body of water that’s a bonus. If you’ve got young ones, of course the area needs to have an element of safety so they can wander on their own and explore without you having to remind them to be careful of steep drops or other dangers.

• Create a collection of tools. See what you already have lying around your house, and if you don’t have anything suitable, take a trip to your local charity store and check out the kitchen section. Look for unbreakable vessels kids can use for scooping, collecting and creating, tin and enamel can be great for this. One of the best things you can get is a trowel from your local gardening or hardware store. Look for ones that are heavy-duty enough for kids to really use, but not sharp enough to cause real damage!

• Send out an invite. I first put an invite out to people I knew with kids of similar ages. I then extended the callout to a local mum’s Facebook group. It doesn’t have to be a big thing, starting with just a few other kids is perfect. Here is the message I first sent out. Feel free to use this as a template:
  Hello wonderful mothers,
  Sonny, Sylver and I invite you to join our Little Explorers Club.
  On Thursday’s at 9am we will be meeting at Thomas Reserve in Riverslea down the bottom end towards the bush.
  Our plan is to let the kids explore and play in nature with minimum interference.
  I will be bringing a tub of enamel cups/plates/spades and such for them to use by the little creek if they choose.
  Apart from that, I ask mums to please bring no other toys apart from a basket of their choice if the kids decide to collect things. It can get tricky at this age with ‘ownership’ of toys, become distracting and cause a lot more trouble than it’s worth!
  Please bring a picnic blanket, towel (just in case), spare clothes and snacks for yourself/kids, and a thermos of tea or coffee.
  The aim of this little group is to give our kids time and space to play, work, use their imaginations, explore, and connect with themselves, each other and the natural world and to see what they come up with and where their play takes them.
  We would love to see you there x

• Set ground rules. It’s important in your message you do include ground rules, as I have done. It helps set expectations and relay your intentions clearly.

• You can do it on your own! Even if no one shows up, what a beautiful time to allocate to be with your kids in nature.

One of the joys of Little Explorers club was observing the children as they got used to their surroundings. They started to develop ongoing games, every week the same shrub was an island they tried to scramble up, they challenged themselves and each other to cross the creek and they grew familiar with their surroundings.

Each week the space changed as nature does, with the seasons, with the rainfall or sunshine, some changes were big, like a dry creek becoming tiny rapids overnight and some were barely noticeable like the yellowing on the undergrowth. These things are an amazing invitation for observation. “Was there this much water in the creek last week?” I wonder why it’s so full now?” Simple questions that can get small minds whirring. And then there is the joy that comes with seeing them consciously start to observe the world around them.

Giving your kids opportunities for these kinds of connections, with themselves, others and nature can be simple. If you’re someone who lives on a bigger property or very close to nature, this, I’m sure, is entwined into daily life. But for me when I was living in the suburbs with a small backyard, getting out to consciously connect was vital, for myself and my children. And finding a way to do it with others made it that much more fun. 

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I would love to hear about your own experiences with finding spaces to let your kids run wild or if it’s something difficult for you to do. And if you do start your version of this, I would love to hear how it goes!

Tansie