When Melina Mauceri was 5, she started going to an Audubon Society camp in Auburn. "I loved meeting new people," said Melina, now 13, "and I also loved learning new things, about the animals and the woods and the different kinds of trees."

Many educators and environmentalists worry that Melina is the exception rather than the norm nowadays. Children are spending much less time outdoors than ever before, they say. Experts warn that trend can lead to physical and psychological problems, such as childhood obesity, diabetes and attention deficit disorder, and societal problems, like less appreciation for the environment.

Tuesday, Melina will speak at a statewide forum designed to address these risks and how to solve them.

Melina is certainly qualified to talk about the relationship between kids and the environment. She has returned to the Audubon camp every summer, most recently as a counselor's assistant. When she goes home after camp ends, she still plays outside, exploring the woods behind her house in Derry and skiing in the winter.

Organizers of the forum, called "Leave No Child Inside," say there are new challenges to fostering kids' interest in the outdoors. Many parents work longer hours, and many children have activities that keep them busy until dinnertime. Video games, the internet and television, along with exaggerated parental worries about child abduction and insect-borne diseases, they said, have become obstacles to exploring nature.

"You can't blame a parent for watching a child playing an Xbox and eating Cheetos, because at least they can see what they are doing," said Martin LeBlanc, the national youth education director for the

Sierra Club. "It is easy to put in what I like to call the adolescent pacifier, and plug in the video games."

The Sierra Club says its research has found that students' science and math test scores increased dramatically when children were taken outdoors. But standardized testing has placed new burdens on teachers, organizers said, leading to drastic cuts in science-based field trips and even recess.

Marilyn Wyzga, who is organizing the forum for the Department of Fish and Game, works to help teachers include outdoor education in the new science frameworks the state recently adopted. She said that teachers are excited to learn how to fit science skills like data collection, site inventory and mapping back into their curricula.

But she is concerned, she said, that perennial school destinations like the Squam Lake Natural Science Center and the Mount Kearsage Indian Museum have had schools cancel field trips, out of fear of insect-borne diseases like Eastern equine encephalitis and West Nile virus.

Diseases like this are over-hyped by the media, said Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods, who will address the forum. He directs the Children and Nature Network (cnaturenet.org), which aims to reconnect kids and the natural environment.

Parents are also scared of child abduction, Louv said, even though the risk has decreased slightly over the years. He said that today's parents, some of whom never played outside themselves as children, are afraid of the outdoors. In his book, he encourages parents to explore with their children and discover their own sense of wonder.

Part of the problem, he said, was that Americans have less unstructured time than previous generations. National park attendance has dropped 20 percent in the last 20 years, according to the Sierra Club.

But Louv and LeBlanc, who is also vice president of the Children and Nature Network, said that the outdoors is much closer than many believe.

"We're not talking about every kid going and climbing Mount Washington," said LeBlanc, who grew up in Dover. "This is about taking your dog for a walk. This is about getting to know your local stream."

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