On the trail to Now Here, Nowhere, and Now Where:
Education Philosophy
As an educator, my role is to facilitate opportunities for students to deepen their relationships within the dynamic interplay between the human and beyond human earth community. Just as the natural sciences evolve and change with new discoveries replacing previous understandings, so too do students grow through developmental stages and replace previous orientations. Evolution and learners share cyclical process of knowing and not knowing, being and becoming.
Over the years it has become clear that students walk into an educational environment laden with knowledge, experience, insights, understanding, and skills which when harnessed are able to inspire furthur learning. To ignore these is to disrespect the collaborative opportunity for multi- dimensional learning. Years ago when guiding inner city youth up Mnt. Tom in the White Mountains, eager to share about mountain ecology zone transitions corresponding with elevation changes, it became apparent that the most effective curriculum entry point was what they noticed with curiosity rather then what I wanted to point out. In this case it was the metal pipe in the trail; Now Here was something familiar to them.
As a naturalist, mentor, earth tender, and wilderness guide I am not the authority but a fellow inquirer with experience, resources, and skills to help explore questions. The authority is the natural world which when directly experienced, observed, and respected inspires curiosity, the foundation of learning. I can support the phenomena teacher by providing inclusive space, flexible time, creative mediums, and appropriate scaffolding.
When students observed the metal pipe and investigated its lichen growth, they realized it must have been there for several years as we discussed lichen’s slow grow rate. All of the sudden lichen succession became of interest as students tried to age the pipe’s placement. Once students develop a personal connection with phenomena they are ready to engage through tools such as socratic dialogue, a hand lens, field guide, article, video, discussion, book, field trip, project...
As students investigate furthur, they often find handholds in quantitative and qualitative instruments, physical labor, self designed projects, group collaboration.... This involves often leaving one’s comfort zone of previous understanding in which misconceptions are revealed and paradigms held dear may be challenged. Students now notice mountain moisture increasing in the boreal zone, and reach for terms, definitions, and pattern recognition knowing that these are only cairns on the trail.
In this trajectory of learning a student becomes temporarily Nowhere because previous orientations have changed. Students are challenged here to take responsibility for identifying how he, she, they, ze learn and are supported to integrate their new findings into their previous understandings thereby creating new orientations. All along I gently hold course & curriculum objectives as a steady yet responsive compass.
Whether in school, a mountain or farm field, paying attention to what students notice guides me to be attuned to what affects their thinking, values, and actions. The more I learn about the students I work with, the more I can support them to become aware that how they connect with their surroundings guides their individual lives and shapes their planetary citizenship. Whether with a metal pipe, a mica stone, or a balsam fir, inquiry fosters critical awareness of one’s relationship within, among, and between the natural world community.
Students inherently know that a pipe did not grow here and yet is made from elements in the periodic table. Each of us is born with intuitive connections to earth and is inherently ecologically intelligent. Our instinctual awareness if honed, nurtured, and supplemented with current discoveries can guide us each to reveal interconnected patterns in one’s sense of place within the bioregion, planet, and universe. As the world becomes a laboratory, the laboratory serves as a microcosm of the world.
As a guide from behind I attempt to broaden students’ experience and draw out understanding from beyond their current edges. In effort to do so, I employ various teaching styles, techniques, and mediums to touch on various learning styles, forms of intelligence, and baseline experiences. While I offer problems to be solved, challenges to be approached, and co- designed projects, students are encouraged to observe the natural world around them through sit spots, keep journals, engage in dialogue, participate in forums, and initiate authentic investigation while being offered foundational information. Lab reports, experiments, presentations, creative expressions, and service learning projects allow students to share and integrate with their community. When students feel their contributive power, they often then ask: “Now Where?” From this place on the trail, in the field, on the horizon students participate as global citizens with informed and informing awareness.
Over the years it has become clear that students walk into an educational environment laden with knowledge, experience, insights, understanding, and skills which when harnessed are able to inspire furthur learning. To ignore these is to disrespect the collaborative opportunity for multi- dimensional learning. Years ago when guiding inner city youth up Mnt. Tom in the White Mountains, eager to share about mountain ecology zone transitions corresponding with elevation changes, it became apparent that the most effective curriculum entry point was what they noticed with curiosity rather then what I wanted to point out. In this case it was the metal pipe in the trail; Now Here was something familiar to them.
As a naturalist, mentor, earth tender, and wilderness guide I am not the authority but a fellow inquirer with experience, resources, and skills to help explore questions. The authority is the natural world which when directly experienced, observed, and respected inspires curiosity, the foundation of learning. I can support the phenomena teacher by providing inclusive space, flexible time, creative mediums, and appropriate scaffolding.
When students observed the metal pipe and investigated its lichen growth, they realized it must have been there for several years as we discussed lichen’s slow grow rate. All of the sudden lichen succession became of interest as students tried to age the pipe’s placement. Once students develop a personal connection with phenomena they are ready to engage through tools such as socratic dialogue, a hand lens, field guide, article, video, discussion, book, field trip, project...
As students investigate furthur, they often find handholds in quantitative and qualitative instruments, physical labor, self designed projects, group collaboration.... This involves often leaving one’s comfort zone of previous understanding in which misconceptions are revealed and paradigms held dear may be challenged. Students now notice mountain moisture increasing in the boreal zone, and reach for terms, definitions, and pattern recognition knowing that these are only cairns on the trail.
In this trajectory of learning a student becomes temporarily Nowhere because previous orientations have changed. Students are challenged here to take responsibility for identifying how he, she, they, ze learn and are supported to integrate their new findings into their previous understandings thereby creating new orientations. All along I gently hold course & curriculum objectives as a steady yet responsive compass.
Whether in school, a mountain or farm field, paying attention to what students notice guides me to be attuned to what affects their thinking, values, and actions. The more I learn about the students I work with, the more I can support them to become aware that how they connect with their surroundings guides their individual lives and shapes their planetary citizenship. Whether with a metal pipe, a mica stone, or a balsam fir, inquiry fosters critical awareness of one’s relationship within, among, and between the natural world community.
Students inherently know that a pipe did not grow here and yet is made from elements in the periodic table. Each of us is born with intuitive connections to earth and is inherently ecologically intelligent. Our instinctual awareness if honed, nurtured, and supplemented with current discoveries can guide us each to reveal interconnected patterns in one’s sense of place within the bioregion, planet, and universe. As the world becomes a laboratory, the laboratory serves as a microcosm of the world.
As a guide from behind I attempt to broaden students’ experience and draw out understanding from beyond their current edges. In effort to do so, I employ various teaching styles, techniques, and mediums to touch on various learning styles, forms of intelligence, and baseline experiences. While I offer problems to be solved, challenges to be approached, and co- designed projects, students are encouraged to observe the natural world around them through sit spots, keep journals, engage in dialogue, participate in forums, and initiate authentic investigation while being offered foundational information. Lab reports, experiments, presentations, creative expressions, and service learning projects allow students to share and integrate with their community. When students feel their contributive power, they often then ask: “Now Where?” From this place on the trail, in the field, on the horizon students participate as global citizens with informed and informing awareness.
