Learning is in Bloom: Cultivating Outdoor Explorations

Books

Learning Is in Bloom

Cultivating Outdoor Explorations

Ruth Wilson, PhD

Copyright ©2016 Ruth Wilson

Published by Gryphon House, Inc.

P. O. Box 10, Lewisville, NC 27023

800.638.0928; 877.638.7576 (fax)

Visit us on the web at www.gryphonhouse.com.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or technical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher. Printed in the United States. Every effort has been made to locate copyright and permission information.

Cover photograph courtesy of Shutterstock ©2015.

Connecting through Math and Let’s Find Shapes by Dr. Gwendolyn Johnson are used with permission.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Wilson, Ruth A., 1943-

Title: Learning is in bloom : cultivating outdoor explorations / by Ruth

Wilson.

Description: Lewisville, NC : Gryphon House, Inc., [2016] | Includes

bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2015036476 | ISBN 9780876593745

Subjects: LCSH: Nature study. | Outdoor education. | Early childhood

education.

Classification: LCC LB1139.5.S35 W549 2016 | DDC 372.21--dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015036476

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Disclaimer

Gryphon House, Inc., cannot be held responsible for damage, mishap, or injury incurred during the use of or because of activities in this book. Appropriate and reasonable caution and adult supervision of children involved in activities and corresponding to the age and capability of each child involved are recommended at all times. Do not leave children unattended at any time. Observe safety and caution at all times.

To all the soul-making aspects of nature

Preface

This book is about connecting young children with nature, and it provides the what, why, and how of doing so. Readers will find the forty hands-on activities effective in engaging young children in investigating nature, both indoors and outdoors, on the school grounds and on excursions around the neighborhood. While fostering a love of nature is a major goal, the activities also promote all areas of early childhood education and development.

Young children need frequent positive experiences with nature for their holistic development and for becoming environmentally literate individuals. Connecting young children with nature should focus more on fostering a sense of wonder than on teaching facts, more about promoting desired dispositions than on meeting academic benchmarks or achieving standards-based competencies. Yet, the academic areas are not ignored. This book addresses science, math, literacy, and the arts through activities as varied as experimenting with seeds in sand, making a name plate using natural materials, and comparing the size of leaves using informal measurement strategies. This book also offers suggestions on how to include children with special needs and how to deal with children’s fears. The guidelines provided help teachers see how to connect children with nature in both developmentally and environmentally appropriate ways. The activities promote empathy, caring, scientific and philosophical inquiry, self-motivation, and independence. Additional topics addressed include nature play, natural play spaces, nature as an integrating context, ecological identity, and environmental literacy.

Acknowledgments

Many people have contributed directly and indirectly to the development of this book. There’s no way to list them all, but I would like to recognize the colleagues with whom I’ve shared ideas, the friends and family who cheered me on, the students with whom I’ve worked, and the young children who remind me daily of what it means to live with wonder. To all of you, I am grateful.

I would also like to thank several individuals who contributed directly to this book. Gwendolyn Johnson, math educator at the University of North Texas, developed all the math activities for this book and contributed a discussion on how nature can be used as a resource in promoting mathematical thinking in young children.

Susan Talbott Guiteras, a supervisory wildlife biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, contributed sections of her ecological autobiography.

For these impressive contributions, I am truly grateful. Your tangible contributions and your ongoing support make this book so much more than I could have developed on my own.

Introduction

My childhood was filled with many rich nature-related experiences. I explored streams, woods, and fields on the farm where we lived. I picked tomatoes, planted peas, and fed the chickens. I made corncob dolls and wooden boats. By the time I became a parent and an educator, not many children were spending their time actively engaged with nature. I found this troublesome.

I taught at Bowling Green State University in Ohio in the 1990s. This was before the terms biophilia, nature deficit disorder, and the nature principle were a part of our mainstream vocabulary and before many people were concerned about the denaturing of childhood. I worked with the department of special education, where my primary focus was on preparing teachers to work with young children with special needs.

The integration of young children with special needs into regular education settings was gaining momentum at the time. While the fields of early childhood education and special education were once considered incompatible because of differing philosophies and strategies, new thinking called for an integration of these two disciplines. This new thinking was based on the understanding that a young child with special needs was a young child first and that the disability was just another aspect of the individuality of the child.

This understanding led me to other insights about young children and what they need to thrive. I knew that nature had nurtured me during my childhood years and had motivated me to explore and experiment. I was concerned that, without close connections with nature, children would be missing out on something important to their development and well-being. I decided to make connecting young children with nature an integral part of my professional work.

I worked with the university’s environmental studies program to write a grant proposal focusing on nature and young children. I then went about finding ways to integrate early childhood education and environmental education. The concept was difficult for some to grasp. I was frequently asked what I thought early childhood environmental education should teach young children. Some assumed the focus would be on recycling, as sorting materials was something young children could do. Others thought I might try to teach scientific concepts such as the sun being a source of energy and the rainforest as an example of biodiversity. To my delight, I received funding for the project, which launched me onto a whole new path as an educator and writer.

Today, the movement to connect young children with nature continues to grow. We now have some excellent resources and guidelines to help us explain the what and the why of early childhood environmental education. Guidelines, however, aren’t enough. We also need the how—and that’s what this book is all about. Connecting children with nature includes environmental education, but it’s more comprehensive than that. Working to connect children with nature includes the emotional aspects of ecological identity. Open-ended exploration and wondering connect children with nature through positive hands-on experiences.

For young children, nature isn’t a topic or subject—it’s the world in which they live, learn, and play. It’s the milieu or environment in which they can become whole. Becoming whole includes developing an ecological identity that has emotional, spiritual, and aesthetic components. Children’s emerging ecological identity allows them to see themselves as a part of the natural world, not separate from it. They also grow in appreciation of nature, not only as a resource to meet our basic survival needs, but also as a wellspring of beauty and wonder that enriches our lives in countless ways.

Young children are curious, inquisitive, imaginative, and eager to learn. Nature is their world, their natural habitat, a place where they can grow in holistic and authentic ways. It is my hope that the ideas and suggestions offered in this book will provide the inspiration and guidance you need to embark on the privilege of immersing children in the wonders of the natural world. The benefits of doing so are far reaching. By strengthening connections between children and nature, you will be fostering their development; promoting love, respect, and appreciation of the natural world; and contributing to the development of a more sustainable and peaceful society.

1

Connecting Children with the Rhythm of Nature

Nature and Children

If we made a list of what children need during their early childhood years, we would certainly include such things as food, shelter, water, and air. We know that young children also need love, security, a sense of belonging, and the freedom to explore. What’s sometimes overlooked is children’s need for direct contact with nature.

The benefits of connecting children with nature are evident in every area of child development. Nature helps children grow intellectually, emotionally, socially, spiritually, and physically. A review of the professional literature by Andrea Taylor and Frances Kuo indicates that children who spend time in nature are more creative, less stressed, better able to concentrate, physically more active, and interact more positively with others. This same review indicates that time in nature also reduces symptoms of attention deficit disorder, improves problem-solving and observational skills, and fosters a sense of wonder. Additionally, time in nature promotes conservation attitudes and a child’s developing ecological identity—the way we see ourselves in relation to the natural world. This is important because how we view our relationship with nature makes a difference in how we act, what we value, and even in our sense of well-being. Most of us know that nature fosters inspiration, enchantment, and a sense of wonder because we’ve experienced it. While hard to measure, these benefits add to the holistic development of children and their experience of being alive.

When we think of rhythm, we often think of music—primarily in terms of tempo, flow, or pattern—but other aspects of life have rhythm as well. There’s a rhythm to our day, to the way we walk and talk, eat and sleep, and even to how our bodies function without much conscious thought. Nature also has a rhythm. We see and feel this in the ebb and flow of tides, the migration of birds and butterflies, seasonal cycles, and the way dawn comes after night. There’s a rhythm in the way plants sprout from seeds, gradually mature, and eventually produce more seeds. There’s also a rhythm in the way all living things come into this world, grow, and then eventually die. Everything in nature is connected in some way. Helping children become more aware of nature’s rhythms and connections will foster their sense of wonder and deepen their interest in the natural world.

In her book The Sense of Wonder, Rachel Carson, a highly-respected author and scientist, describes a child’s world as fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. A part of our job in working with young children is to recognize and honor their unique experience of the world. If you watch children as they play and explore, you’ll see that they have a rhythm of their own. Children can experience the world as fresh and new and beautiful because their focus is on the here and now—the present moment with all its wonders and possibilities. Adults, on the other hand, tend to get caught up in the pressures of time and the need to get things done. We also have a tendency to take the wonders of nature for granted and to spend very little time just contemplating the expansiveness of the sky or the unfolding of a flower.

Rachel Carson wrote about