Celebrating Sir David Attenborough at 100: Patron, champion, inspiration

This week, our Patron Sir David Attenborough turns 100. We look back on more than three decades of his support for LtL and on a message about children and nature that has never been more important.

The 8th May is the 100th birthday of Sir David Attenborough. For us at Learning through Landscapes, it’s a moment of deep pride, affection and gratitude. Sir David has been our Patron for over 25 years, and before that a founding Trustee. His belief in what we do, and his willingness to say so publicly and repeatedly, has shaped our work in many ways.

We celebrate him today not only as a legendary broadcaster and naturalist, but as someone who has given real, sustained, practical support to the cause of connecting children with nature.

How it all began

When Learning through Landscapes published The Outdoor Classroom in 1990 and formally established as a Trust, our founders asked themselves a simple question: Who are the most important and powerful people to have alongside us? One name was at the top of the list.

Our founding Trustee Merrick Denton-Thompson, who remains a Trustee of LtL to this day, made the approach with the help of a connection at WWF:

It was with some trepidation that I asked David if he would consider becoming a Trustee of LtL, knowing then how much pressure he was under. David needed no convincing, he understood immediately the importance of what we were all trying to achieve.

Founding Director Bill Lucas remembers the lunch when Sir David said yes:

I vividly remember meeting him. David asked me why school grounds were important. For a reasonably eloquent person, I felt unusually tongue-tied. But David immediately put me at ease, telling us about his daughter Susan, who was a primary school teacher and how she loved bringing science and geography alive outside. I explained how important school grounds are to children to instil an understanding of the natural world and, within moments, David had said ‘yes’, he would become a Trustee.

‘He attended every meeting’

Sir David’s involvement with LtL was never token. Merrick Denton-Thompson recalls a Trustee who was fully present and fully committed:

Throughout his time as a Trustee he attended every meeting and was the first to offer advice and help. His excitement at linking young people to the natural world is infectious, and he empowered us all to make the Trust the success it is by transforming the lives of our children.

Bill Lucas remembers filming with Sir David during a visit to a school in Exeter:

David immediately connected with the pupils, lying on the ground with them to chat and share his enthusiasm as they gazed at the flora and fauna of their school’s habitats.

 And when Bill left LtL after seven years, Sir David was there for that too:

Imagine the thrill I had when David, the busiest of all our trustees, came to say goodbye and wish me well at my leaving do. David is simply the most influential, lovely and inspirational person on the planet that I know. He never hectors, always explains and enthuses and excites. He is the example par excellence of someone who learns (and teaches) through landscapes.

Patron and campaigner

In 2000 Sir David became LtL’s Patron. To mark the occasion, he wrote to schools across the country as part of our Wildlife Safari project, inviting teachers and children to discover the natural world right on their own doorstep:

I would like to tell you about an exciting new project which will open your children’s eyes to the wonders of wildlife that surround your school. The value to children of exploring the natural world that surrounds them cannot be overestimated.

Sir David didn’t just lend his name. Over the years, he used his voice directly in support of our campaigns. In 2013, when a shortage of school places was putting severe pressure on school grounds across England, he stood alongside LtL in calling on schools and local authorities not to sacrifice outdoor space in the rush to build:

The necessity for us to maintain contact with the natural world is essential to the human spirit, yet a gradual disconnection between children and nature is occurring. With over 50% of the human race living in an urban environment, each and every opportunity for children to experience nature is absolutely vital – they are the future custodians of our planet. Unfortunately, for many children, school grounds are one of the only spaces they have access to for this kind of engagement. If schools sacrifice their outdoor spaces, this will certainly contribute to our children’s disconnection with nature.

‘If they don’t protect it, who will?’

In 2015, Sir David made a short film with us. We are proud to share it again here, in the week of his hundredth birthday. In it, he makes the case for school grounds and children’s daily contact with nature with the quiet precision and moral clarity that has made him the most trusted voice on the natural world that the world has ever known.

His words from that film have stayed with us:

Natural spaces are essential for human development and wellbeing, and none more so than those we set aside for the use of our children.

And he closes with a question we return to again and again at LtL, because it captures our ethos so clearly:

If children don’t grow up knowing about nature and appreciating it, they will not understand it. And if they don’t understand it, then they won’t protect it. And if they don’t protect it, who will?

It’s a question that drives everything we do.

Happy 100th birthday, Sir David, from all of us.