This is valuable work, and it follows a growing awareness, with roots to Vygotsky (1978), that children’s play in nature is not only diverse, but that it provides the mechanism for many important developmental outcomes. That said, we believe there is much to be gained by expanding our understanding of children’s engagement with the natural world beyond the scope of play. After all, there are many types of interactions, such as when a child splashes water on her face from a creek to cool down on a hot summer’s day, or retreats to a solitary spot in nature and sits under a tree to regain composure after a conflict, which do not seem well characterized in terms of a play motif.
