In my role as an outdoor educator, I view myself as an elder-one who shares trust and a sense of wonder with the children. When a hummingbird flies nearby or a dead rat is found, the children come running, shouting, “Teacher Heather!” They know I will share in their sense of wonder, and answer their questions honestly, and provide tidbits of information for those who show interest, helping them gain knowledge and a source of comparison for future experiences. Eleven of those years have been solely outdoors. During my 16 years of teaching young children, my background in biology has served me well as I progressed from the indoors, to a garden, and finally to a forest school. On a windy day, children at the forest school where I taught for three years felt and experienced what wind meant: ruffled hair, lightweight items blowing away, and cold hands when it’s wet. It took me quite a long time to learn that nature itself is the curriculum. Taylor’s teacher research study and her questioning of her own fears about children’s choices are valuable starting points for discussions about issues of safety, children’s independence and freedom, choice, and licensure requirements that occur as results of working in a forest school. As a result of her own self-study of her fears, Taylor had a better understanding of and confidence in children’s abilities to make wise choices. She also explains how her daily data gathering (e.g., photos, videos, daily notes) provided her with information that she shaped for the children’s families and her coworkers. She reflects on her struggles with and solutions for gathering data in an outdoor setting. Taylor finds support in a five-step cycle of inquiry that guided her in observing and documenting the children’s interests, explorations, and learning. She raises questions like “Could I step back and allow the children to discover and choose their own interests?” and “Why do I regularly experience a sense of fear as my students do something new or out of character for themselves?” She uses this story to simultaneously explore her questions about children’s choices, her fears of children’s freedom, and the children’s excitement about fishing, building their own fire for a barbeque, and cooking their lunch over the fire. Thoughts on the Article | Amanda Brancombe, Voices Executive EditorĪs an outdoor educator and “nature elder,” Heather Taylor tells a story, “Trout,” that stretched her personal views of what it means to allow children to have the freedom to make their own choices as they study nature.
0 kommentar(er)
