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Nature Passport app launched to get kids exploring the great outdoors

Staff WriterEastern Reporter

A NEW app has been launched designed to get children outdoors and playing in their natural surroundings.

Launched by Nature Play WA, a not-for-profit organisation established to increase the time WA kids spend in unstructured play outdoors, the app is called ‘Nature Passport’.

It looks to engage technology-obsessed kids in the kinds of outdoor activities their parents and grandparents enjoyed when they were children.

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The app encourages kids to look up at the world around them outside and engage with nature in creative ways.

It also promotes social connections and fun, outdoor family time.

Launched today by Sport and Recreation Minister Mick Murray, the app is a collaboration between Nature Play WA and leading non-for-profit environmental education centre Islandwood.

“The smart thing about the Nature Passport app is it is not trying to compete with kids’ love of technology – it is working with it to get them off the couch and into the great outdoors,” Mr Murray said.

“When many of us were kids, playing outside was normal – younger generations haven’t grown up with unstructured, outdoor play as part of their lives.

“The idea of being shuffled out of the house and told to go find some fun and adventure out in the open is not something a lot of today’s kids relate to.

“The Nature Passport app embraces how technology has changed how kids play nowadays.”

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