June Edition - Learning in the Great Outdoors

The Japanese Garden at Maymont was in full bloom last weekend. While my son and I have been spending a lot of time outdoors--walking, observing, and exploring--I've not been writing much about it. However, lots of others folks are sharing their ideas about learning out of doors. This can only mean one thing. The June edition of Learning in the Great Outdoors is here!

Worldly Travels

Last year at this time I was finishing up a trip through China, Tibet and Taiwan. This year, I'm but an armchair traveler. You can join me by reading all about this amazing trip to Nagarhole National Park (Rajiv Gandhi National Park), Karnataka.

At A Keeper's Jackpot, take a hike through the Adirondack mountains and learn about Rock Piles, Cairns, and Ducks.

At 10,000 Birds, Charlie shares the results of two days birding in Cape Town, South Africa. All I can say is, WOW!

What's Blooming? In and Out of the Garden

The magnolia outside my office is beginning to flower. Over at Exploring the World's Trees, Dan shares some photos and information about the Southern Magnolia.

Lots of folks are thinking about their gardens these days. Laura at Laura Williams' Musings shares her thoughts on Plantin' Season Around the 'Ol Homestead.

The folks at the Parenting Squad share A Child's Vegetable Garden: Cultivating Fun, Learning and Responsibility.

Jennifer at A Passion for Nature teaches us a thing or two about the mustard plant.

Barb at the Handbook of Nature Study has a series of Green Hour Challenges. The latest challenge (#16) is on Growing Sunflowers.

Arts, Crafts, Cooking and Experiments

Have you ever wanted to make something beautiful from the things you find in your yard or garden? At Po Moyemu--In My Opinion, Sylvia describes the gourd basket she made with her daughter.

At Mama Joules, Julie shares some ideas for thinking scientifically about blowing bubbles.

Stephanie at Stop the Ride! teaches us about immature pokeweed and a shares recipe for bacon and eggs made with poke weed.

Birds, Bugs and Other Critters

Jennifer at A Passion for Nature takes us along while she helps out with some bird banding.

At Birds and Things, Tony shares thoughts on the joys of birdwatching.

John at A D.C. Birding Blog has a thoughtful review of The Young Birder's Guide by Bill Thompson.

Roberta at Weekend Science Fun shares lots of great ideas for a Critter Crawl.

Granny J. at Walking Prescott spent some time in the bayou and shares her view of Swamp Things.

Beyond the Fields We Know gives us a glimpse of a wild turkey nest with eggs.

Have the cicada colonies where you live emerged from the ground? I haven't seen or heard them here in Virginia, but Stephanie has seen them in West Virginia. Check out Every Seventeen Years for some photos and cicada info.

Outdoor Explorations

Over at the Handbook of Nature Study, Barb considers the difference between nature journals and notebooks.

What could be more fun than exploring the woods with your teacher on the last days of school? Not much! Terrell at Alone on a Limb lets us join in the explorations he shared with four very lucky students.

Dawn at By Sun and Candlelight shares the results of the May Nature Study.

That's all for this month's edition. I hope you have found some new sites to follow and enjoyed this collection. The July issue of Learning in the Great Outdoors will be hosted by Terrell at Alone on a Limb. I hope to see you all there!

**UPDATED** - Okay, it's not necessarily outdoor education, but in reading the Times this morning, I came across an article that all teachers and lovers of science should/must read. It's called Put a Little Science in Your Life. It was written by Brian Greene, a professor of physics at Columbia.

Exploring the Natural World - Part 3

In this third and final post in my series on exploring the natural world, I thought it would be helpful to point you to some of my best resources for outdoor education. Some of these are designed specifically for teachers, while others are actually written for kids. These are the books I turn to over and over again for great ideas for exploring nature.

First, a general plug for environmental education programs. I am a facilitator for Project WILD, Project Learning Tree (PLT), Population Connection. and Wonders of Wetlands. All of these groups publish comprehensive curriculum materials that provide background information and useful activities, many of them outdoor. If you can get to a workshop and receive these materials, by all means do.

In addition to these resources, the following books help to round out my collection of resources for teachers.

• I have two well-worn copies of the original books published by Joseph Cornell, Sharing Nature with Children and Sharing the Joy of Nature. You can find the 20th anniversary edition of Sharing Nature with Children, and Sharing Nature with Children II at Dawn Publications. These are filled with a variety of games and activities that will help young and old get more in touch with the world around them.

• Nature with Children of All Ages by Edith Sisson - This publication from the Massachusetts Audubon Society is chock full of ideas for exploring the natural world. I particularly like the thematic organization, where topics such as tree, plants, seeds, invertebrates, birds, etc. can be found.

• Hands-on Nature: Information and Activities for Exploring the Environment with Children edited by Jenepher Lingelbach - I have the "old" version of this publication, but it still serves me well. Produced by the Vermont Institute of Natural Science, this guide is divided into chapters on adaptations, habitats, cycles and designs of nature.

• The National Gardening Association Guide to Kids' Gardening by Lynn Ocone with Eve Pranis - Gardening is a terrific way to get kids outside and looking closely at the life cycle of plants. This guide was my gardening "bible" for a long time.
  

• The Kids' Nature Book: 365 Indoor/Outdoor Activities and Experiences by Susan Milord - Structured in calendar format, this book provides an activity for every day of the year.

• The National Wildlife Federation has published a series called Ranger Rick's NatureScope. Covering a range of subjects, such as weather, geology, trees, endangered species, etc., these guides provide extensive background information and activities.

There are many books written for kids that I use not only to guide my selection of activities, but as wonderful resources for grabbing their attention and focusing them on what they may find/see outdoors.

• Nature Detective: How to Solve Outdoor Mysteries by Eileen Docekal - Set up in a mystery format, this book includes information on animal tracks, animal houses, pond creatures, bird songs, animal scents, seeds, fungi, weather, and nocturnal creatures. Each chapter presents a "case" for children to solve.
  

• Keeping a Nature Journal: Discover a Whole New Way of Seeing the World Around You by Clare Walker Leslie - This wonderful book offers simple techniques to motivate readers of all ages to go outside, observe the natural world, and sketch and write about what they see.
  

• Field Trips: Bug Hunting, Animal Tracking, Bird Watching, Shore Walking by Jim Arnosky - This book, written in field-journal format, provides helpful hints for taking successful outdoor field trips with kids.

• My First Green Book by Angela Wilkes - This practical, oversized volume provides hands-on activities that demonstrate the importance of pitching in to protect our planet. Similar in format to the Eyewitness series, the book is filled with large-scale, color photos that effectively illustrate such experiments as those that show how clean the air is, how acid rain affects plants, how various objects biodegrade at different rates (if at all) and why rain forests are so crucial to the Earth. Other projects include creating a wildlife garden in a flower box, planting a tree and organizing a "green campaign" with one's friends.
  

• My First Nature Book by Angela Wilkes - Also an oversized volume in the format of the Eyewitness series, this book provides an introduction to nature through a variety of simple indoor and outdoor activities including collecting seeds, feeding birds, watching a butterfly grow and more.

• Woods Walk: Peepers, Porcupines & Exploding Puffballs! What You'll See, Hear & Smell When Exploring the Woods by Henry Warren Art and Michael W. Robbins - Organized by season and filled with fun and interesting facts, this book explores what you will find in the forests of North America.

• Nature in the Neighborhood by Gordon Morrison - Each double-page spread in this book reveals the diversity and abundance of life that can be found in your own backyard.
  

Please let me know if you have any favorite resources for getting kids outdoors and teaching about our wonderful world. I would love to hear about them.

**If you missed the earlier entries, please do read Part 1 and Part 2.

Exploring the Natural World - Part 2

When I began teaching, I found myself in a school that was located adjacent to a cemetery that occupied 249 acres of prime green space in the city of Buffalo. With more than 200 species of trees, it was an amazing arboretum. Numerous birdhouses placed throughout the cemetery made it a year-round haven for more than 240 kinds of birds. Founded in 1849, Forest Lawn Cemetery is a veritable garden, with rolling hills, roads that curve and intertwine with the landscape, spring-fed lakes, a creek, and a wide array of sculptures that reflect the natural setting.

While the school itself had a field, it was the cemetery that started me on the path to using the outdoors as a classroom worthy of our attention. Some of the activities my students and I engaged in can be done in any outdoor setting. So, building on the activities described in Part 1, here are some more ideas for getting kids outside and learning in the natural world.

The Year of the Tree - Select a tree (preferably deciduous) that you would like to observe through the course of a year. Every two weeks (or any time period that makes sense to you) give children the opportunity to make a detailed observation of the tree, with the goal of creating a book at the end of the year. The first page of the book should include a description of the location of the tree, with information on why that particular tree was chosen. On this first observation, children should do the following:

• Make a rubbing of the bark (to serve as the cover of the book)
• Select one leaf for pressing
• Make a detailed sketch of the tree
• Look for and record signs of life in the tree, such as nests, holes, etc.
• Use a large string to find the circumference of the tree
  
• Estimate the height of the tree
• Measure the child's shadow and the tree's shadow at the same time of day. Calculate the tree's height by using the following ratio: child's height/child's shadow = tree's height/tree's shadow. (You can learn more about measuring tree height at this site on Mapping the Louisiana Territory.)

On every visit to the tree, children should make a sketch and record information about how it looks, smells, and feels at the time. Encourage observation of the tree both up close and from a distance. Spend at least five minutes sitting at the base of the tree just watching for signs of life. At the end of the year of observation, all sketches and notes should be assembled into a book about the tree. (If you are interested in using a "ready-made" form, the Science Spot has pages for an Adopt-a-Tree activity.)

• Sky Tree: Seeing Science Through Art by Thomas Locker - In this book, Locker depicts the same tree throughout the seasons. This is a terrific book for helping children to notice even the smallest changes that occur through time.

• One Small Place in a Tree by Barbara Brenner - When a bear uses a tree as a scratching post, it sets off a chain of events that leads to a large hole that becomes home to a variety of forest animals. This is a great book for looking at many of the species of animal that can call a tree home.

Focused Observation - When I first begin to take kids outside, we do two activities designed to help them become better observers. In the first, I assign partner and give each pair a hula-hoop. The pair finds a spot in the yard, field or forest they would like to focus on. The hoop is laid on the ground, where it provides the boundaries for the observational field. How much can you find in this "small" circle? PLENTY! The first job should be to simply sit and look at all that is inside the hoop. Kids should sketch what they see in their journals. How many kinds of grass or vegetation are in the hoop? Knowing the names here isn't important, but rather recognizing that things look different. Encourage kids to get down on their knees and use their hands or a stick to part the vegetation and see what is beneath. A hand lens will help here. I often set timer this activity and then ask for groups to share what they have found. I also give groups the opportunity to repeat with a second plot so that they can see how different these small areas can be.

The second activity focuses on our ability to hear what is happening around us. Before we start, we sit together in the grass and I read The Other Way to Listen by Byrd Baylor. Then, each child finds a spot to lean against a tree. We all close our eyes and spend several minutes just listening. When the timer goes off, the children open their journals and record what they heard. We repeat one more time, and after children have made their journal entries, we share what we heard.

• For many good books about using your senses for observation, read this entry entitled Books That Fill the Senses.

Bug Hunting - Sometimes searching for small forms of life is easier and more interesting than looking for other animals. First, a bit about the word bug. In this case, we are looking for insects, spiders (arachnids), centipedes and millipedes. These are members of the phylum arthropod (we have left out crustaceans), the largest phylum of animals, containing more than 80% of known animal species. It may not be particularly scientific, but the word bug works for kids. I love to take kids on a bug hunt, both inside and outside the classroom. Inside? Yes, we share the indoors with lots of these little creatures. What kinds of bugs live in your house or classroom? If you don't see the bugs, can you see signs that they were there? Once your bug hunt moves outside, there are many places to look for bugs. In the air, trees, dirt, fallen logs, fence posts, bushes, etc. In the early morning hours you can even take a web hunt to see if the spider webs you find are different in location and appearance. You can take bug boxes along on your hunt, but I prefer to leave animals where I find them and just look. However, I do hold ladybugs, caterpillars and spiders so nervous kids can get a closer look. If you do this at home with your kids, consider hunting in the early morning hours and at dusk. You should see a marked difference in the bugs you observe.

• Field Trips: Bug Hunting, Animal Tracking, Bird Watching, Shore Walking by Jim Arnosky - This book, written in field-journal format, provides helpful hints for taking successful outdoor field trips with kids. A visit to the coloring pages at Jim Arnosky's web site provides reproducibles for 100 animals every child should know. There are many "bugs" on this list, and these pages can be incorporated into field trip journals.

That's all for now. In the next entry in this series I will share some terrific teacher resources that provide ideas for sharing nature with children.

**Continue on and read Part 3!

Exploring the Natural World - Part 1

A few days ago I wrote a post about the need to get kids outdoors so that they can spend time exploring the natural world. I was an outdoor kid, so this comes naturally for me. I always took my kids (students) outside for study, and today I take my preservice teachers and the practicing teachers I work with out to consider all the ways the outdoors can enhance and expand their teaching. Even with structured guidance, I still have students who are reluctant about this approach because they aren't sure how to begin or what exactly to do once they go outside.

In an effort to encourage more teachers and parents to get outside with their kids, I would like to share some of my favorite outdoor explorations with connections to books and indoor extensions. For most of these activities you need nothing more than a clipboard, pencil, hand lens (or magnifying glass), jumbo crayon, some paper and a container for your "finds." I have a collection of old plastic cups (kids drink size) from restaurants (Friday's, Olive Garden, etc.) that work really well for scooping up dirt and insects. You may even want to keep a few small baggies in your pocket for the non-living things you find on the ground. If you have a digital camera, consider capturing some photos to use for additional projects and/or discussion.

I Spy Shapes - Looking for shapes outdoors can be a fun activity. When you begin your walk outside, start by noticing the shapes of the buildings, the materials in the walkway, the objects on the playground, outdoor furniture and more. When you move away from the built environment, the challenge is in finding these shapes in the natural world. What shapes are the stones you find? The leaves? Sticks? What do flower petals look like up close? How about at a distance? Have you ever stood far enough away from a tree to really look at its overall shape? Is it round, oval, pyramidal or something else? Get up close to the tree. What does the bark look like? Can you recognize any shapes in the pattern? Do you see any animals? Can you recognize any shapes in their forms? (Does a bird beak really resemble a triangle?) While searching for shapes, encourage kids to sketch what they see. They can even trace objects they find on the ground. After spending some time just looking, play a game of I Spy. Say, "I spy a circle." See how quickly the children can find the object you have in mind. How many other things can they find with the same shape? Finally, consider using all these experiences to have kids write and illustrate their own "Natural Shapes" book.

• Icky Bug Shapes is a great book for looking at shapes in nature. Read this after exploring shapes outside.
• For some great background information on trees, their shapes and identification, take a look at this Tree Diversity Activity from the National Arbor Day Foundation.
  

Looking at Logs - What happens when a tree dies? Even though the tree may be dead, it lives on in the food and shelter it provides for other organisms. One of my favorite outdoor activities is exploring fallen trees. Take your kids to a wooded area and find yourself a tree that is decomposing. Spend some time looking for signs of life in this "dead" plant. How does it look? Smell? Feel? Carefully roll the log back and look closely at what is underneath. Scoop up a small sample of material and pour it out onto a white piece of paper on your clipboard. What do you see? Peel back a section of bark and examine the wood below. Do you see evidence of living things? Is anything growing on or inside the log? What role is the log playing in the forest?

• Wendy Pfeffer has written a terrific book called A Log's Life. In it she explores what happens to an oak tree that crashes to the ground in a storm. This is a wonderful look at the life cycle of the tree and a really neat introduction to decomposers.
• Robin Brickman contributes fascinating artwork to A Log's Life in the form of collages of 3-dimensional molded paper forms. You can view samples at her web site. Using paper, scissors and glue, children can try to create some similar pieces of their own.
  

What Happens to Our Trash? - Kids often ask why we recycle, but we do little in the way of concrete activities to show them why it is important. Find an old shoe box and pick a place in your yard where you can "plant" the box in the ground. Fill the box with soil. Pick a few items to bury in the soil. Take photos or draw sketches of the items before they are placed in the soil. I usually use some apple peelings or rinds from melons, newspaper, an aluminum foil ball, and a small plastic bottle. Make sure the items are covered with soil and then place the top on the box. The lid does not need to be covered with dirt. (This just makes it easy to find the box and its contents again.) Ask children to predict what will happen to these items. Once a week, check on the items in the box, and the box itself, and see what kind of changes have taken place. I would recommend using a stick or similar item to stir the soil each week when examining the contents. You can keep a journal of these weekly observations.

• There is a terrific book in the Let's-Read-and-Find-Out Science series called Where Does the Garbage Go? In it, a group of school kids look at where garbage comes from and then looks at what happens in landfills, incinerators and recycling centers.
• Gail Gibbons has written a great book called Recycle: A Handbook for Kids. It looks at the content of landfills and how we can recycle to reduce the need for landfills.
• Composting is a wonderful way to create rich soil for your garden while reducing the amount of trash you produce. You can view the slide show Composting for Kids to learn how to get started. A quick how-to guide on Composting with Kids provides the recipe for composting.
  

Sock Walk - Provide children with a pair of old white athletic socks (adult size). Go to an outdoor area (a yard, field, park or forest) where you can take a short walk. Once you get to the desired location, help the children to put the socks on OVER their shoes. Take a short walk through the area. Remove the socks and examine the material that is stuck to them. Don't forget a hands lens! Once you are done, you may want to scrape off the dirt and "stuck" material to plant in some soil. You may be surprised by what happens. I like to do this in the late spring and again in early fall in the same location.

• Generally, the socks will accumulate all manner of seeds. This is a good time to talk about how seeds are dispersed. For kids who want to know more, the Ken Robbins book Seeds is a marvelous photographic examination of different seeds and their methods of dispersal. Kids can learn even more about seeds in the ink and watercolor illustrations and poetic text of A Seed is Sleepy.
  

That's all for now. Look for the next installment where I will share suggestions for keeping a nature journal, bug hunting, and more.

**Continue on and read Part 2!