by editor | Nov 5, 2025 | Environmental Literacy
A linguistic “ecosystem”: Word study methods for outdoor education
by Sam Rubin
samrubin19@gmail.com
Once the students had settled on the benches of the Pond Shelter on IslandWood’s campus, I unfolded my large butcher paper with the word “macroinvertebrate” written in large letters.
“What does that say, macrinovirbatalalalate?”
“Microscope?”
“Macaroni and cheese!”
A chorus of giggles emerged as students wondered if we were going to study macaroni and cheese. I gave them space to explore this idea, excited about their joy as we began to engage in word study.
~~~
In my experience teaching in elementary school settings, a significant barrier in science sensemaking and understanding is the perception and reality of complicated scientific language. A student might see the word “macroinvertebrate” and receive an explanation of what it means, but the length and perceived complexity of the word blocks recall and connection to other words. Thus, a student might not see themselves as a scientist because they feel they lack the understanding and language to form that identity. While scientific words are lengthy and morphologically intricate, this structure makes them ripe for linguistic study.
I have always loved words, a love that was solidified as I began my studies of linguistics in college. After graduation, I found a job teaching kindergarten at an elementary school in the San Francisco Bay Area. To my pleasant surprise, the literacy curriculum at this school was grounded in linguistics, with kindergarteners learning words such as “grapheme” and “phoneme,” and engaging in a daily, interdisciplinary practice of morphological and etymological inquiry. This instructional method is deemed “Structured Word Investigation,” or SWI, based in research on effective morphological instruction (Bowers and Kirby, 2010). When I began my graduate studies teaching intersectional environmental education at IslandWood, I noticed myself engaging in SWI practices for sensemaking in this new context. I wondered if the same word study practices I employed in the classroom could be applied to outdoor, field-based science education.
SWI blurs the boundaries between science and literacy in novel ways. The scientific approach of noticing, wondering, and analyzing word data in literacy instruction challenges the notion of science as a discrete and exclusive endeavor, while using literacy practices in science construct deeper understanding. Additionally, the study of words creates space for multilingual learners to share their expertise. Perhaps a Spanish-speaking student knows a Spanish word with a Latin base that illuminates the meaning of a challenging morpheme, or two Lushootseed words for different more-than-humans illustrate a connection that clarifies a Western science conception.
In this article, I will share two SWI word studies I reasoned through with a wonderful group of students. Since every word study is different, I choose to share these as two vignettes rather than a context-lacking list of tips. I do hope that outdoor educators can use this article as both motivation and a toolbox, so techniques and curricular questions are inevitably included in these vignettes. At the end of this article are various resources to help you get started!
Day 1: “ecosystem”
When I meet a new group of students, I often ask them,“What is an ecosystem?” I usually do this by taking students to some of the different ecosystems IslandWood has on its campus, examining biotic and abiotic factors, and perhaps asking students to find similarities between themselves and the ecosystems they explored, to build a stronger connection to land. In planning for my week of word study, I looked up the etymology of <ecosystem> on etymonline.com (a SWI teacher’s favorite resource), finding that the base <stem> in <ecosystem> comes from the Greek word histanai, meaning “cause to stand.” From previous word studies, I know that the prefix <sy-> is an reduced form of the prefix <syn-> (sometimes appearing as <syl-> and <sym->), meaning “with, together.” To scaffold this word study for my students, I wrote the word sum “eco + sy + stem” on a large piece of butcher paper, folded it, and placed it in my backpack.
At the end our first field day, after some free explore time in a forest ecosystem, the time felt right for a word investigation. Sitting on the ground, logs, and stumps, students examined the butcher paper and awaited instruction.
My first question, as in any good scientific investigation, was, “What do you notice?”
Students shared that they knew about the prefix “eco-“, defining it as “environment.” Another student said a <system> is when “things work together.” A visibly excited student exclaimed, “So an <ecosystem> is when the environment works together!”
I was already thrilled about the direction of this word study, and wanted to go further. I asked students what they wondered about the word, and a student asked if it was connected to “STEM.” We talked about what the acronym stood for, and even though it wasn’t necessarily connected in meaning to the base “stem”, I still wrote it down, because it was a part of student sensemaking. Another student wondered if it was connected to the stem of a flower. I asked students what a flower stem does.
“Brings water and nutrients to the flower!”
“Protects the flower!”
“Makes it stand up!”
I couldn’t have said it better myself! The group decided that the definition of the base <stem> was “stand up,” and I wrote it down.
At this point, we had two out of three morphemes figured out, and it was time to tackle the pesky “sy-” prefix. After some think time, a particularly scientific student yelled out “photosynthesis!” Not usually the first word I see in this word study, I was more than happy to write it down and indicate further connections to science. Another student added “synthesis” to our list. The chaperone, a math teacher, asked students what it means when a shape can be split into two mirror-image parts, and like a lightbulb turning on, half the students cried “symmetrical!” Thinking about other words they learned in school, one student shared the word “synonym” and another “sympathy”. We had a good list of words going, so we moved on to thinking about commonalities between words.
“All these words mean something about being similar, or together!”
“Oh! So an ecosystem is when the environment stands up together!”
“Yeah, but maybe ‘stands up’ in this word means something like supporting or working together.”
I took this opportunity to ask my favorite question: “So, how are we an ecosystem?”
Quiet. Then, a brave voice.
“Well, we all work together, and support each other to help each other stand.”
“Yeah! And we all stand up for each other!”
What began as a vague, science-y nature word suddenly became a meaningful, connected, and motivating idea. Through every student observation, question, and synthesis, we were building a deeper understanding of both language and science, grounded in our outdoor context.
Figure 1: Recorded evidence of our investigation. I crossed out the accidental extra “s”, and made a show of adjusting my understanding after a mistake! Photo by Sam Rubin.
Day 2: “macroinvertebrate”
Once the students had settled on the benches the Pond Shelter on IslandWood’s campus, I unfolded my large butcher paper, with the word <macroinvertebrate> written in large letters. We were about to investigate various freshwater macroinvertebrates to assess the pollution level of the pond.
“What does that say, macrinovirbatalalalate?”
“Microscope?”
“Macaroni and cheese!”
A chorus of giggles emerged as students wondered if we were going to study macaroni and cheese. Sensing the challenge in a large group discussion, while also hoping for students to apply some of their knowledge from our “ecosystem” investigation, I prompted them to work with a small group and write down some ideas in their journals. I asked them to write down what they noticed, what they wondered, and perhaps hypothesize a word sum (since I hadn’t split the word into morphemes this time).
After some writing and pair-share, a student pointed out that they recognized the prefix “macro-” as the opposite of “micro->, like in “microscope”, and another student clarified that “macro-” means “big.” Another student noticed <invert>, having seen the word “inverted” before. Another student noticed the prefix “in-“, and thus we are left with the base “vert”. All these ideas (along with “macaroni and cheese”) were written on the butcher paper, so students (and I!) could track the discussion.
At this point, we are left with the base “vert”. While not a word itself, like the base “stem” in “ecosystem”, “vert” might appear in many words an elementary school student might see. We call this a bound base, since it must be bound to a prefix, suffix, or other base to make a recognizable English word.
I had done some research about “vert” using Neil Ramsden’s Word Searcher, a helpful tool for finding words with similar structures to a base of interest. It is important to remember, though, that a word may share the same structure as the base, but have a different meaning, such as “overtake”, a compound word combing “over” and “take”. It is vital to always check for both when planning a word study.
In uncovering the meaning of “vert”, I prompted the students with some ideas. Perhaps in math they learned about “vertical” axes or a shape’s “vertex”, in social studies read about religious “converts”, or in SEL class thought about whether they were more “extroverted” or “introverted”. As they uncovered these words, a student had an idea that these words had to do with “angles” or “turning.” Their idea aligned with the Latin root vertere meaning “to turn.” Suddenly, the word “vertebrate” that one student has also pointed out made more sense, as the place where someone’s body “turns.”
Now, as the group looked at the word <macroinvertebrate> they notice denotations of “large,” “not,” and “turn” within the word, along with a connection to backbones, and the larger, unfamiliar word becomes a conglomerate of small, familiar morphemes. One student hypothesized that the definition of a macroinvertebrate could be “a large creature that can’t move in a certain way because it doesn’t have a backbone,” followed by many nods of assent from their peers.
Figure 2: Recorded evidence of our “macroinvertebrate” investigation. Photo by Sam Rubin.
When we were exploring the macroinvertebrates at the pond after our word study, I experienced a much richer pool of observations around the ways these creatures were moving and turning, what protections they had, and their relative size. Our word study both gave students tools to be more active readers while also engaging their scientific minds.
—
“What were those little bugs we saw at the pond called again?” A student wondered as we were walking to their lodge, preparing for departure.
“OH! Umm, I think it started with an ‘m’, like m…a…c…r…o…” her friend responded.
“MACROINVERTEBRATES!” they yelled in unison.
I smiled, observing this too-good-to-be-true assessment of their new linguistic knowledge. Not only did they recall the name and meaning of this large word, but also were able to begin to spell it out! I knew that engaging in frequent word study in the classroom was an effective literacy tool, and now could see evidence of just two days of scientific, contextual word investigation.
I challenge educators, especially outdoor educations to really spend time with the word-related questions students ask. The only tools you really need to facilitate these are curiosity and a proclivity towards saying “yes, and…” (traits of any effective outdoor educator). It is okay to get things wrong–I often will return to a previous day’s word study clarifying a mistake I later realized I had made, which only contributes to the student’s learning and development of trusting relationships. If you have a word in mind, do some research on Etymonline, but don’t expect all the answers there! The most exciting learning occurs from engaging in scientific word study with students themselves.
Resources
- com: A master of SWI and word study, Rebecca Loveless shares more background and implementation of SWI curriculum.
- Words in the Wild: A literacy- and exploration-based outdoor education center that provides ideas of scientific, contextual word study.
- Etymonline: An “online etymological dictionary” helpful for word study research.
- Neil Ramsden’s Word Searcher: A tool for finding words that share prefixes, suffixes, and bases.
References
Bowers, P. N., & Kirby, J. R. (2010). Effects of morphological instruction on vocabulary acquisition. Reading and Writing, 23(5), 515–537. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-009-9172-z
Credits
Sam Rubin is a field instructor and graduate student at IslandWood’s Graduate Program in Education for Environment and Community in partnership with the University of Washington.
by editor | Sep 22, 2025 | Arts and Humanities, Environmental Literacy, Language Arts, Place-based Education
Staging Nature
Integrating Place-based Environmental Education, Literacy, and the Performing Arts
by Regine Randall, Rebecca Edmondson, and MaryAnne Young
“Teacher, teacher, teacher, teacher, teacher!”
Such a cry is likely to get any educator’s attention—and quickly. Yet, this repetitive call is not coming from a child but, rather, an ovenbird whose common breeding territory includes Acadia National Park in Maine. In a unique collaboration supported by a regional instructional grant, teachers Rebecca Edmondson and MaryAnne Young at Conners Emerson School in Bar Harbor, Maine—the primary gateway for Acadia—developed a musical to integrate multiple elements of the state’s Kindergarten–Grade 5 curriculum while also helping children to take notice of the very special place where they live.
Creating the musical Plant Kindness and Gather Love gave the students at Conners Emerson, as well as the communities on Mount Desert Island, an opportunity to celebrate the 2016 centennial of Acadia National Park and the bicentennial of Maine in 2020. Plant Kindness and Gather Love, however, was much more than that: it served as a much-needed model for creative teaching where learning objectives incorporate important foundational skills with efforts going well beyond screens or a brick and mortar building to raise children’s awareness of the world around them.
The seed of an idea takes root
Acadia National Park draws several million visitors from across the world every year. Yet, Edmondson and Young wondered how well students at Conners Emerson really knew what was in their own backyard? Having collaborated frequently and over time to blend language arts with music, Edmondson and Young observed that this integrated approach had a consistently positive impact on student learning and engagement. Young had a regular practice of sharing books with children in which the lyrics of a song were, in fact, the entire narrative of the story. With books in hand, the students then sought out Edmondson’s help in learning the songs. Singing the text breathed new life into traditional read-alouds. With this in mind, Edmondson realized that she and Young could adapt the same approach beyond a single book or skill (e.g. alphabet learning) to create an original story about Acadia. As noted earlier, the project coincided with celebrations of the centennial of Acadia and the bicentennial of Maine but also tapped into traditional academic subjects and literacy standards. Raising awareness of the park’s natural diversity through the musical was simply one more opportunity for Edmondson and Young to amplify what could be discovered within Acadia but also a chance to join with park associates in highlighting stewardship through family-friendly conservation practices.
Centuries ago, philosophers Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi and Friedrich Froebel argued that the best education occurred when children learned with the head, heart, and hands through play (McKenna, 2010; Tracey & Morrow 2012). Plant Kindness & Gather Love became a manifestation, quite literally, of Unfoldment Theory where teachers provided the necessary support for the children’s play (Prochner, 2021). Moreover, Edmondson and Young believed that such a musical would help children as young as kindergarten begin to see themselves as stewards of the earth because coming to love a place foments a desire to know and protect it (North American Association for Environmental Education [NAAEE], 2016). Despite the Herculean effort required to launch any school production, the excitement and pleasure embedded in this creative endeavor optimized learning for students and teachers alike while also forging a stronger and more memorable connection to the natural world. What makes the work unique is that their younger students did not need to wait until middle or high school to “envision knowledge” because this collaboration gave them the opportunity to be actors in sharing what they learned with a community that may or may not have known the same content (Langer, 2011).
From root to branch
Plant Kindness and Gather Love developed into a forty-minute musical with ten original songs written, arranged, and choreographed by Young and Edmondson with parts for fifteen characters. In the planning stage, Young and Edmondson brainstormed ideas for the musical with the Acadia National Park (ANP) Education Coordinator, Katie Petri, as well as other ANP associates. The Park Service went on to provide material support for the production in the form of Junior Ranger hats. The goal of the musical was to expand the venues through which children learned environmental content specific to Acadia and Mt. Desert Island. Instructional activities that supported the production of the musical ranged from students sketching and labeling wildflowers (where they also learned about the Fibonacci sequence) to discussing and illustrating the dramatic seasonal changes in Acadia to determining the components of stewardship and encouraging that we all act upon them. Such endeavors help introduce children, especially those in kindergarten and the primary grades, to all the park has to offer since more formal outdoor education programs (e.g., Young Birder, Schoodic Adventure) often begin a bit later, typically around age ten or fourth grade.
Interest in the musical spread throughout the school and the larger community. Locally, the art teacher helped with scenery and displays, a local greenhouse donated flowering plants and foliage, and parents constructed costumes. To help other teachers throughout the state and New England consider similar projects, Petrie organized a teacher workshop at the Schoodic Institute at Acadia National Park based on Plant Kindness and Gather Love as a follow up to performances in Bar Harbor, Maine. Additional workshops on the musical were offered at the Maine Music Educators Association Conference and the Maine Environmental Education Association Conference. Most notably, a copy of Plant Kindness and Gather Love went to Washington DC to be placed on Senator Susan Collins’ reception room table along with other children’s books by Maine authors.
Making music
The songs within the musical Plant Kindness and Gather Love moved from broad concepts to specific ideas. In “Nature Lover,” the introduction began with a simple request: step outside. Jason Mraz had expressed this same sentiment years earlier in a clever rearrangement of his smash pop hit, “I’m Yours” where, during his performance of “Outdoors” on Sesame Street, he sings about the good feeling we get when we’re no longer “trapped between the walls and underneath the ceiling” (Sesame Street, 2009). Edmondson and Young took a similar approach by using song to inspire students to explore, but Acadia was the place to where children were taking a “close look or commanding view.” Only through experiencing the sights, feelings, sounds, and wanderings in a place like Acadia can they promote the desire, as Jason Mraz also reminded us, that “all of nature deserves to be loved, loved, loved, loved, loved” In the musical, a “nature lover” may be one who goes on to identify birds in Acadia by their unique calls or one who takes the initiative necessary to lead for an environmentally literate citizenry as made manifest by Maine’s motto of “Dirigo” (“I lead” or “I direct”).
Thinking, seeing, listening, learning, dancing, singing
Plant Kindness and Gather Love integrated content to develop higher-order thinking skills in identification, comparison/contrast, mapping, synthesis, and representation. Typically, the focus on higher-order thinking characterizes learning objectives in grades six to twelve when basic academic skills are assumed to be more fully developed (Zwiers, 2004). Yet, as Johns and Lenski (2014) note, learning anything requires that we can recognize something for what it is and also know what it is not. Edmondson and Young capitalized on this principle in their musical. For instance, the tempo of the song “Beacon Bills” is allegro (brisk) and includes the calls of no less than ten birds found in the park. Children become acclimated to a “prima donna” cardinal calling “purty, purty, purty” whereas a chestnut-sided warbler is “pleased, pleased, pleased to meet cha.” What is significant here is that students come to know things not through sight or seatwork alone. They can also learn by seeing what gets left behind: tracks, nests, scents, even scat! Not actually seeing but still knowing is the essence of inferential reasoning.
Another song in Plant Kindness and Gather Love has children singing of the wildflowers in Acadia. This scene incorporates movement because the children who play daisies, violets, bachelor buttons, British soldiers, foxgloves, and Johnny jump-ups are “dancing in the breeze” along the sea. Movement can solidify content in long-term memory, and we see this technique in teaching letters through air writing as well as during exercised where children tap out sounds or clap to count syllables (Madan & Singhal, 2012). That said, imagining that the wind off the Gulf of Maine made you sway in the same way as Queen Anne’s lace can fuse children’s personal expression with their connection to nature.
Children performing as flowers may be charming as well as kinesthetic, but it did not veil the very pointed message contained in the refrain. As the “flowers” came together in a true “kindergarten,” they sang out “Don’t pick me” over and over. Children’s growing sense of the natural world develops alongside their growing sense of themselves, as well as others, in the world. By leaving flowers to bloom and go to seed, we are making a promise to those who will come upon them in the next season that they play a vital role in the park ecosystem in addition to being a pleasure we share (Harlan & Rivkin, 2008). Of course, not all plants are equal, and such a song helps elementary science teachers also discuss the concepts of invasive species such as purple loosestrife in the park.
More on reading and writing Acadia
Too often and in many schools, reading and writing activities in the primary grades are taught as discrete skills that divorce them from other content (Gabriel, 2013). With science of reading initiatives, this practice may become even more entrenched with the focus on content area reading and writing not gaining momentum until upper elementary or middle school when curriculum more often reflects scheduling constraints, staffing, or building organization rather than a pedagogical decision (Fullan et al., 2018). Yet, the musical and what children learned about Acadia easily lead to a variety of literacy activities that keep nature and content learning at the fore. For example, children who are developing phonological awareness, an important precursor to skilled reading, can participate in activities where they see pictures of different birds (such as owl, seagull, chickadee), name the bird, and then stomp out the number of syllables they hear in the name. In a word identification lesson focusing on the onset (letter or letters making the initial consonant sound, blend, or digraph) and rime (the vowel that follows and remaining letters) of one syllable words, choosing a word from one of the songs (e.g., “pick” from the refrain “Don’t Pick Me!” in “Wildflowers of Acadia”) so that children can change the first letter(s) to form other words strongly supports decoding and spelling development (tick, quick, stick, chick, etc.). Since students are likely to have been introduced to this vocabulary, the words are easier to decode for two reasons: 1) they are within the same phonetic word family, and 2) they have become part of students’ receptive and expressive language used when learning about Acadia.
Such an activity moves from word and spelling patterns to an opportunity to record salient observations based on what happens in the park. For instance, “Tuck your pants into your socks to avoid tick bites.” Another might be “With a quick dive, a loon snatches a fish.” Or, “Adding a branch here and a little stick there, beavers keep their dam in good shape.” Finally, “Trails to Jordan, Valley Cove, and Precipice cliffs often close in the spring because peregrine falcons nest there and raise their chicks.” In another spin on word learning, the use of rhyming words such as tea, ski, and tree all contain different graphemes (ea, i, and ee) that are among the letter combinations that “spell” the long /e/ sound. Not only do such activities help children learn phonics concepts and other basic skills, but they are also introducing content specific vocabulary (loon, dam), homonyms (their, there), and usage based on context (nest as a verb). Bridging the observation skills that help children notice the macro and micro details within the natural world strengthens their ability to notice patterns and differences across multiple areas.
Speaking from my own perspective as a teacher educator, I welcome instruction that moves away from over-dependence on workbooks and commercial programs. Teachers who understand the scope and sequence of language development are poised to use any text any day to capitalize on how words work (sounds, spelling, syllables) and the ways we use words to create meaning and show what we know. Writing prompts that simply ask children to record what they see (the waves rolling in at Sand Beach), feel (wind at the top of Cadillac Mountain), or hear (the collision of water and air at Thunder Hole) are always authentic in the sense that responses can change day by day, hour by hour, or minute by minute. In terms of checking understanding of key facts or concepts, students can also complete sentence stems such as:
- Hiking in the woods means….(e.g. you might get bug bites).
- Being a park ranger means…(e.g. you have to be good with the public).
- Loving nature means…(e.g. you are happiest outside).
- Going to Acadia means…(e.g. you are on an island, or you could be on the Schoodic peninsula, or you are in a National Park).
Open-ended sentence stems allow children to generate many different responses with varying level of detail. Such responses can also suggest what we need to study further or better understand. It is a low-risk activity that introduces children to multiple perspectives while also enabling the teacher to identify misconceptions or misinformation (Randall & Marangell, 2018). Further, the sentence stems serve as a launch for extended writing on a self-selected topic of interest to the student. Ultimately, though, Plant Kindness and Gather Love went beyond interdisciplinary cross-pollination: it helped teachers understand how nature and place can re-energize lessons to improve targeted skills, expand our ideas of text to include multimodal materials beyond print (artifacts, audio, digital collections, etc.), and facilitate content learning. Historically, we know what engages learners and creates success; the joy and pleasure that went into imagining, producing, and performing Plant Kindness and Gather Love are the same emotions that motivate any learner to gain important skills, understand content more deeply, achieve more, and seek out new experiences wherever they are (Dewey, 1938; Duke et al., 2021; Gardner, 1999; Rosenblatt, 1938).
Show and share how to care
The musical concluded with an ode to the beauty of the park, which is undeniable and fine as far that goes, but also, more pointedly, with a call to be active in its preservation. The different songs, choreography, and even the costuming in the musical all contributed to creating the sense of wonder that comes from living in proximity to the natural world (Wilson, 1994). The score and lyrics for “Nature Lover” in Plant Kindness and Gather Love sets the stage by encouraging discovery, and the North American Association for Environmental Education (2016) described children as naturally inquisitive because “everything” is worth exploring “with all of the senses” (p. 2). So, exploring is for everyone but, perhaps, it is children’s particular ability to notice “a fish, a beaver, or an otter…a little bird…a white-tailed deer” that can reignite our own interest in using natural places as tableaux for learning.
You, too, may live in an area that has of extraordinary natural beauty and diversity, is near a wonderful park, or, equally important, want to make wherever it is you do live more special in the eyes of children. For instance, Last Stop Market Street by Matt de la Pena and Christian Robinson is a children’s picture book of city life where Nana helps her grandson smell the rain, watch it pool on flower petals, and be a better witness to what’s beautiful in people, places, and things. With this in mind, the success of Plant Kindness and Gather Love may be just the right incentive for you and your colleagues to tell the “lively stories” – in any form, not just musicals – of the places and the inhabitants in your community (van Dooren, 2014).
References
Dewey, John. (1938). Experience and education. Macmillan.
Duke, N. K., Ward, A. E., & Pearson, P. D. (2021). The science of reading comprehension instruction. The Reading Teacher, 74(6), 663-672.
Fullan, M., Quinn, J., & McEachen, J. (2018). Deep learning: Engage the world, change the world. Corwin.
Gabriel, R. (2013). Reading’s non-negotiables: Element of effective reading instruction. Rowman & Littlefied Education.
Gardner, H. (1999). Intelligence reframed: Multiple intelligences for the twenty-first century. Basic Books.
Harlan, J. D., & Rivkin, M. S. (2008). Science experiences for the early childhood years: An integrated affective approach (9th ed.). Pearson.
Johns, J., & Lenski, S. (2014). Improving reading: Strategies, resources, and Common Core connections. Kendall-Hunt.
Langer, J. A. (2011). Envisioning knowledge: Building literacy in the academic disciplines. Teachers College.
Madan, C. R., & Singhal, A.. (2012). Using actions to enhance memory: Effects of enactment, gestures, and exercise on human memory. Frontiers in Psychology, 3(507): 1-4. http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00507
McKenna, M. K. (2010). Pestalozzi revisited: Hope and caution for modern education. Journal of Philosophy and History of Education, 60, 121-25.
North American Association for Environmental Education. (2016). Guidelines for excellence: Early childhood environmental education programs. NAAEE. https://cdn.naaee.org/sites/default/files/final_ecee_guidelines_from_chromographics_lo_res.pdf
Prochner, L. (2021). Our proud heritage. Take it outside; A history of nature-based education. NAEYC. https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/yc/fall2021/take-it-outside
Randall, R., & Marangell, J. (2018). Changing the narrative: Literacy as sustaining practice in every classroom. Association of Middle Level Education, 6(2), 10-12. https://www.amle.org/BrowsebyTopic/WhatsNew/WNDet/TabId/270/ArtMID/888/ArticleID/918/Changing-the-Narrative.aspx
Rosenblatt, L. (1938). Literature as exploration. Appleton-Century.
Sesame Street. (2009, December 18). Outdoors with Jason Mraz [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrqF7yD10Bo&ab_channel=SesameStreet
Tracey, D. H., & Morrow, L. M. (2012). Lenses on reading: An introduction to theories and models (2nd ed.). Guilford.
van Dooren, T. (2014). Flight ways. Columbia University Press.
Wilson, R. (1994). Environmental education at the early childhood level. North American Association for Environmental Education.
Zwiers, J. (2004). Developing academic thinking skills in grades 6–12: A handbook of multiple intelligence activities. International Reading Association.
Authors
Régine Randall, PhD, is a professor in Curriculum and Learning at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) in New Haven, Connecticut where she teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses in education. Her teaching and research interests allow for regional collaboration with K-12 educators on literacy instruction and assessment, student engagement, and best practices in environmental and agricultural education. With roots in Maine, Régine is an avid hiker and biker throughout New England and the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York.
Rebecca Edmondson is a composer, conductor, clinician who has taught in both public and private schools in Maine and Pennsylvania for the past forty years. Her school music program was one of 12 in the country designated as a Model Music Education Program, and her writing has appeared in the American String Teacher. In addition to winning composition competitions, Rebecca was named the 2022 Maine’s Hancock County Teacher of the Year. She continues to nurture the love of learning through music and developing children’s books. All this has prepared her to become Liam and Finn’s Grammy.
MaryAnne Young is a lifetime resident of coastal Maine. She comes from a large family tree of educators and authors. After more than 38 years as an educator MaryAnne retired from Conners Emerson School. She engages with young learners as a substitute teacher and continues to write poetry and story songs. MaryAnne is inspired by the woods, waters and wildlife that surround the place she calls home. Her most joyful lifetime achievement is being a proud Mimi to Cameron and Maya…the new generation of Nature Lovers!A
by editor | Sep 20, 2025 | Environmental Literacy
Field-based Inquiry: Developing Comprehension and Memory
Preparing teachers to introduce their students to field-based research in local or regional environments means that these teachers have an inherent need to actually be able to do the kinds of work they plan for their students to engage. Something to think about.
by Jim Martin
It’s a bright, sunshiny day on Oregon’s Salmon River, not far from where it passes by Welches, a small Oregon village. Just downstream, a school bus is disgorging a happy class, who are running down to the river’s edge. Arrived, the students traipse down the path to the river; happy, lugging gear; knapsacks hopping back and forth around their shoulders. Happy class; happy day! They are here to investigate the health of this stream in this particular place; and so, array themselves along the river’s bank; organize into five groups of four; find and arrange their gear, and start to work. Each group has chosen one of five aspects of the stream: Temperature and dissolved oxygen; turbidity; aquatic plant species; sediment grain size; and a transect from river’s edge 100 meters onto the shore to identify plant species. The odd thing about this is that this is their first field trip this year. And the teacher is standing, quiet, further up the stream bank, a slow smile on her face. What is she thinking? What does she know?
Have you ever wondered how natural areas develop and express a coherent view of a place which is as it should be?
Have you ever attempted to explore that thought; conducted an inquiry of your own into what is there, and how it works?
One more question: Have you ever stood looking over an urban or suburban area, and wondered if it actually works for your benefit?
What is Field-Based Research?
Field-based research with students is a relatively recent phenomenon which immerses the brains and bodies of teachers and students in a milieu of conceptual interactions with concrete elements of a natural area which ultimately converge to produce people who comprehend, interact with, and appreciate, the species and ecosystems they visit, or live within. How does it do this?
Good question. Try to envision how this would operate in a school classroom, without googling or searching for information to respond to that question. How many of us left our last school, college, or university, with not only a clear understanding of the species in the ecosystem we inhabit; but, the experience of sitting on a river bank, holding a temperature probe, ready to measure the temperature of the water next to the shore. Knowing why you’re doing this.
This might seem unattainable; but, a few hours in a natural area, with a well-prepared teacher, and some classroom prep in how to use most instruments; and, in the species who live there, can do it. And, using this active learning approach to education uses our brain in the way itevolved to do just that: Look about. See. Think!
This method of teaching new material involves active learning, in which students, after a brief introduction to the topic under study, engage in self-directed discussions, development of questions which need answers, active planning for activities directed by those questions, development of group roles and ways to work together effectively; and, finally, self and group assessment. When we take students, and teachers, into a natural area to engage in research into an ecosystem and its inhabitants, we open a door to this very human, and very effective way that our brain and body are organized to work together to discover, learn about, and comprehend, the components of this place: Who they are, what they do, and how they do this in cooperation with all the pieces of this particular place. Understandings that humans developed thousands of years ago; and which are slowly being re-learned by today’s humans.
Before the class’s field trip to the natural area, they spent three classes engaging as much of the field work as they could without being on that river bank in order to learn the observational skills they would need on site. On one of those days, they made their observations on a creek which flowed through the west edge of the school grounds. By their third day in the creek and lab, all of the students had introduced themselves to each of the sets of equipment, books, etc., and now will focus on one set, describe where they will be on that streambank, and how they would organize themselves and their gear to do a good job while they are on site. During all this work, as they observed in the creek and in the lab, practicing their skills, each student, and each group, discovered they were growing; working together, figuring things out, learning about their own capacities in this new world they had engaged.
Then, the Temperature and Dissolved Oxygen group gathered together the five temperature and dissolved oxygen samples they had collected on the creek behind the school the day before, each from a different part of the creek. They brought each sample, one at a time, to their lab table, unscrewed the lid of each container, carefully let the probe into the container, and recorded the data presented: Temperature, or Dissolved Oxygen. They did this for each of their five samples, then used a graph to plot their data. The data, as plotted, is shown in the figure here. Their job at this point became how to explain the shape of their curve. They had made careful descriptions of the five stations when they made their water collections in the creek on their school grounds, and noted that there was a small fallen tree near Station 3, which disturbed plants, animals, and the bottom at that site. They decided that the slow rise at Station 4 simply indicated a recovery process might be in place; and, they would measure dissolved oxygen at Station 4 when they next visited the creek.
Currently, the U.S. is way behind in slowing climate change. Today’s students need all the assistance they can find in order to understand this fact, and its consequences for them in their lives.
Field-based science inquiry has proven itself over the past few decades to generate understandings which lead people to do their part in alleviating global warming’s effects. As noted in numerous articles found in CLEARING, and performed by teachers who have worked with organizations like the Diack Ecology Education Project1 to build their skills and understandings. We need to be prepared to increase the comprehension and dedication of a much larger segment of students in school today.
We, and our Primate ancestors, learned this way of looking at our world by interacting with it. As Archie Diack2, the founder of the Diack Ecology Education Program, said, more than once, “When we get our hands dirty, we begin to learn about the environment we live in.” When we hold a temperature probe in place in a stream, read the reported temperature, and set the probe down in order to pull out a pen to record it in a notebook, we are physically engaging thoughts and actions in the “Real World”—that physical place outside our body or classroom. Those actions produce a key to unlock the place in our brain which supports critical thinking, and long-term memory; the prefrontal cortex, or PFC. It all starts when we “place our hands on . . .” . That simple act sets our critical thinking processes in motion.
When we engage our mind in critical thinking, the PFC sets up a free place for this work and its storage, and a group of neural addresses which point to relevant information on this thing you want to know about. It does this, not to tell us what to think; but, to provide access to information, to suggest steps to take in order to accomplish your thinking, and memories from your current work that you’ll want later. In effect, the PFC helps you to set up what amounts to an office in your brain, and a strategic plan to learn this place you are working and thinking within. This same phenomenon can work in classrooms also, but is rarely employed.
Now, back to action! We left the teacher, a slow smile forming, and her students, organizing their work. Let’s get back to them. They are engaged in a sampling of a teacher-organized, student-centered, project to help students to comprehend the place of natural ecosystems in our worlds, and their place within them.
Back on the stream bank, the student groups have decided just where their particular station would work best; and, have begun to discuss how to set them up. As a class, they, not their teacher, are deciding just where each group’s station would work best. We’ll follow the Water Temperature and Dissolved Oxygen team, who are setting up a 30-meter reach along the river bank, adjacent to where a set of rocks in the stream near the shore, a growth of rushes and grasses in the water, and a strand of sand beyond the beach, will provide a variety of microhabitats which might affect the temperature and dissolved oxygen in the water in the stream along their reach. Before they started this field trip, in the classroom, they researched, thought, and finally decided to relate temperature and dissolved oxygen to the health of the stream itself, and for the organisms living there. So, this decision will focus the work that they do.
They decided to form two subgroups, one to do the temperature work, the other to do the dissolved oxygen work. The make up of each subgroup was decided by each student declaring what he or she preferred to do, then accommodating where possible. Then, they went to work. During the time they made and recorded their observations, they made minor decisions among each subgroup when a small tweak needed to be made in their work. And, so, they carefully measured and mapped their sampling stations in their notebooks, naming them by their polar coordinates. (Something they dreamed up!!) They also described their sites, and detailed the reasons for placing things where they are.
All this time, the teacher was moving up and down the class’ reach, responding to questions and encouraging their good work and thinking. When time was up, students gathered their materials, and moved back to the covered area on the shore, with the tables and benches they would need when they set things down; and, prepared a preliminary report on their work, findings, and interpretations. Each of the five groups decided on their part of the report. They agreed to calibrate the report when they were back in school.
Each of the five classroom groups decided on their part of the report. They agreed to calibrate the report when they were back in school. Throughout their work, members of each group began to clarify relationships, the nature and specifics of the work, the meaning of what they were doing, and their own individual development into an effective member of their group. Students discovered that they are a powerful arrangement of people, ideas, and materials which can work together to accomplish worthwhile things. They learned that they could pull two or more pairs together as needed to build effective work groups. Plus, they learned that, when we begin to discover our own capacity while we are working, we discover that we are becoming people. This work, and events, may look or be different for each class, but together are usually equally effective.
The main reason these students were able to accomplish so much within a 4-hour field work period lies in the way their teacher organized her delivery. She has used active learning delivery techniques for three years now, and is very comfortable with them. One of the things she did was on Day One of the school year, arrange to have her students organize themselves into pairs. She did this by giving each student a Partner Calendar, a mostly blank sheet with spaces for writing “Time”, “Partner”, down the sheet until they had done ten spaces, with times beginning about 8:00 AM, until ending at 5:00 PM. Then, she asked the students to go around and introduce themselves to one another; and, while they were doing this, ask for, and fill out, a Calendar “Date”. As the class did this, she walked around and noticed who was totally involved in the activity, and who was either perplexed, or seemed bored. She talked to each of them individually, asking them how they thought this might work to organize effective work groups. This was one of the steps she used to build strong, effective groups. Students, many of whom had never met, began to know one another. This seemed to work each of the three years she had done it; and, that seemed to be true this day also.
When all the work of signing up seemed to be done, she asked the class to get together with their 2:00 Dates, and then brought these pairs out into the lab to take first steps for some work they would do. She asked each pair, a dyad, to get together with another pair to form a tetrad, a group of four. Each tetrad selected and went to a particular table. When they were at their tables, the teacher let the partners know that, in about three weeks, they would be going out to a river near the Columbia Gorge, between Washington and Oregon. Meanwhile, each week, they would spend one day in the lab, preparing to use the equipment they’d need to examine the river.
What did the teacher know? She knew from her teacher education preparation, and from two workshops she had attended three years before, that teacher lectures and assigned homework did not produce students who were involved and invested in their learnings. So, she attended a workshop focused on active learning, and a light flashed in her mind; she suddenly “got it!” Organize the teaching environment, now matter where it is, and organize what the students do so that it will raise questions in their minds. She knows now that they will heartily engage those questions; and, in doing so, will learn more than she could teach them using didactic methods. She had discovered learning as our brain is organized to do just that.
1 A program (https://www.diackecology.org/) which provides training for teachers, funds for equipment to use in natural areas, and basic funding for transportation to study sites.
2. Archie Diack, the founder of the Diack Ecology Education Program. The family of Arch W. Diack established the Diack Ecology Education Program to encourage teachers to involve students in student field-based research and ecology. The Diack program seeks to inspire a combination of experiential education and authentic science in order to spark interest in a scientific understanding of the complex ecosystems of the natural world.
Jim Martin is a retired but still very active science educator who has written a remarkable series on finding science lessons in your community for CLEARING. You can find them at www.clearingmagazine.org.Student
by editor | Sep 20, 2025 | Data Collection, Environmental Literacy, Experiential Learning, Forest Education, Inquiry, Integrating EE in the Curriculum, Learning Theory, Marine/Aquatic Education, Questioning strategies
Building a Community: The Value of a Diack Teacher Workshop
Teachers are being asked to do more than ever before. We are inundated with meetings, grading, analyzing data and curriculum development. The idea of taking kids outside to do field-based research can be daunting and filled with bureaucratic hurdles. Given all this, why should we take our precious time to implement this new type of learning?
by Tina Allahverdian
It is a warm summer day at Silver Falls State Park and a group of teachers are conducting a macroinvertebrate study on the abundance and richness of species around the swimming hole. The air is filled with sounds of laughter from children playing, parents conversing on the bank, and the gentle babble of the stream below the dam. The teachers, armed with Dnets, clipboards, and other sampling equipment, move purposefully through the water collecting aquatic species. Being a leader at this unique workshop, I am there to support the teacher’s inquiry project and also help brainstorm ways to bring this type of work back to their classrooms.
The buckets on the bank soon host a variety of species like water beetles, caddisflies, and stonefly nymphs, offering a snapshot of the rich biodiversity in the stream. We teachers sit on the bank, peering into the tubs, magnifying lenses and field guides in hand. We fill out data collection forms and discuss our findings. On this particular summer day, several young children at the park gather to see what we are doing. Their curiosity is piqued by the idea of discovering the hidden inhabitants of the aquatic ecosystem they are swimming in. The teachers and I patiently explain the project to the children and their parents. While some of the crowd goes back to swimming, two little girls stay for over an hour to help identify species. Later, while we pack up a mother stops to thank us for including her daughter in the scientific process. She shares that discovering the magic of the stream with us is her daughter’s idea of a perfect day. This moment is a testament to the power of experiential learning and the unexpected magic that can happen when we take learning into the field.
After the field work is completed, we all gather back at the lodge to create posters and present our results to the rest of the workshop participants. Based on individual interests and grade levels, teachers work in small groups to analyze their data and share their conclusions and questions. There are various topics that groups are curious about — from lichen or moss, to bird behavior and effects of a recent fire on the tree species. Teachers take on the work of scientists so they can get a feel for the experience their students will have in the future.
Teachers often want to backwards plan, knowing the end product their students will experience and learn. But this type of scientific inquiry requires us to let go of control so that students can ask authentic, meaningful questions that are not yet answered. Teachers come to learn that teaching the process of science is often more valuable than teaching the content. They are engaging in the work of true scientists and learning how to be curious, lifelong learners along the way. Being a part of inspiring projects and trips such as these is an experience that teachers, students, and even parent volunteers will remember for years to come. As an upper elementary teacher myself, I often hear about the power of our work when families come back to visit and reminisce about their time in my classroom. I know that this work will impact future generations and their enthusiasm for science learning. Not only that, we are teaching students to do, read and understand the work of a scientist so they can make informed choices in their adult lives.
Every time I help lead this workshop, I witness a transformation among the participants over the course of the three days. On the last day we give a feedback form which is always filled with so much enthusiasm for taking the learning back to the classroom and to colleagues; I often hear this is the best professional development they have experienced in a long time because it is so practical and hands-on. One of my favorite parts about the Diack field science workshops is witnessing the teacher’s excitement for learning about nature that I know will be passed on to students back in the classroom. Twice a year we meet at a beautiful location in Oregon where teachers from many different districts have the opportunity to carry out the mini-inquiry project and plan curriculum that promotes student-driven, field based science inquiry for K-12 students.
Perhaps one of the most significant outcomes of the Diack Ecology Workshop is the formation of a community of educators passionate about outdoor learning. Teachers exchange ideas, share success stories, and collaborate on developing resources for implementing field-based inquiry projects. They share ideas across grade levels to get a sense of where their students are going and have come from. This sense of community not only strengthens the impact of the program but also creates a support network for educators venturing into the world of environmental education. I always leave the workshop inspired by the creativity, collaboration, and joy from teachers. It is one of my favorite parts of the summer and I would encourage anyone who works with students to come join us and experience the magic.
Tina Allahverdian is passionate about connecting students with science in the natural world. When not teaching fifth graders, she can be found reading in a hammock, kayaking through Pacific Northwest waters, or hiking in the mountains. She currently teaches in West Linn, Oregon, and resides in SE Portland with her husband, twin boys, and their dog, Nalu.
by editor | Sep 20, 2025 | Conservation & Sustainability, Critical Thinking, Data Collection, Environmental Literacy, Experiential Learning, Inquiry, Place-based Education, Questioning strategies, Student research, Teaching Science
Instilling a culture of caring and fieldwork in a Montessori adolescent program
by Jonathan Erickson
Metro Montessori School
Portland Oregon
One thing that drives most educators is the hope that we are guiding students who will ultimately care about the work that they do and care about the world in which they do it. Remembering this should be a sort of thesis for all of the planning and action that follows. The work we do as teachers should help students develop into people who value themselves and the effort they put forth.
Through this writing I hope to answer the questions: “How do we best instill a culture of caring in the learning community?” and “How does fieldwork and ecology connect to other areas of social development?”
Teachers and Guides need to strive to create immersive social and scientific experiences for students, just as we would if we hoped for them to gain mastery a new language. We need to make space for students to dive deeply into valuable work so that they will not feel like “work” is just a four letter word, but will realize that it can feel good and serve a greater purpose.
We’ve all stumbled onto those perfect moments where we observe students in flow, where they are finding joy in their work and satisfaction in the process as much as the result. How can we make these moments more commonplace?
I am working towards a cultural shift at my own school. Saying it like this implies that the movement would be larger than one teacher and bigger than one class. After all a culture outlasts a tenure. I believe that we can intentionally plan and drive this change by designing and supporting long-term, project-based fieldwork rooted in discussions of current events and personal values.
Caring for natural resources and spaces
After completing a seminar reading about learning to see, this student was inspired to walk slow and carry a hand lens.
My students are adolescents. As such, they are beginning to view themselves as part of a larger world community, and they are getting more and more emotionally invested in what they see and hear from their peers, parents, social media, and the news. To be frank, what my students witness every day directly or indirectly is pretty frightening and truly merits mediated discussion. So we allow time in our learning community for students to debrief what the world is throwing at them. That said, as the adults in the workspace, we must impart a sense of hope for positive change, as young adults can easily fall victim to despondency and gloom.
The above paragraph could be a jumping off point for scheduling more service work, getting politically involved, becoming a “Green School”, discussing and understanding mental health issues, or countless other initiatives. Any work in the school that is inspired by hope for a better future is meaningful work, and hopefully we can make time for all of it. When it comes to the environmental crisis facing our world however, the entry point is in ecosystem experiences. Students will care for what they understand, and they will move towards understanding with ecological field study.
Practical lessons for us all
How can ecological field study find a place in an already full curriculum? That is just one of the challenges that I and others have faced while trying to include big projects and studies in our yearly work cycle.
Working in an independent Montessori adolescent program means that there is an administrative and institutional commitment to deep work. In my case it also means flexibility since, while we are accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, we aren’t beholden to state, district, or school board mandates. Dr. Montessori placed emphasis on following the innate interests and natural tendencies of children; which we’re doing when we take them outside and ask them to be curious. This is what we are doing when we allow students to take weeks or longer to study something that may not be discovered in a textbook or online.
A student discovering that moss isn’t just moss. Samples will be used to see if these mosses support different CO2 emitting organisms and which contribute most to the pH of runoff.
Onboarding
Student-driven projects of depth have always been a part of our students’ experience, so I don’t want it to seem like this piece is missing in our curriculum, but ecological field study is a new avenue, and I do not want it to seem ephemeral; I want it to run through all the work we do in a school year. Since I work as part of a team, it takes good communication and collaborative planning to pull this initative through.
We are not a large ship, but we are still a ship, and when we alter direction we need more than one person committed to the change. Because scheduling fieldwork will likely impinge on the plans of other guides and teachers, loop them into the work and get them excited about the possible application and integrations between science, math, and literacy disciplines. I think that most teachers like to get excited.
We are early in the shift, but I have arranged for co-teachers to join me in a field science professional development opportunity next summer hosted by the Diack Ecology Education Program and Jane Goodall Environmental Middle School. This 3-day workshop will give us the chance to do the work of our students; transforming our curiosity into a scientific question and collecting data and observations to possibly support our hypotheses. We don’t get to practice what we teach often enough in the classroom as we get bogged down in student management, record-keeping, and the like. It will be refreshing to feel the way our students feel when they are immersed in nature and are driven by curiosity. This workshop will also give the teaching team a chance to collaborate and find ways to make fieldwork a reality with our school’s unique situation.
How to plan
The culture of caring surrounds the individual work cycles like an atmosphere. Ensuring that the work cycle will align with the program goals, such as they were stated in the above thesis, means students will experience continuity in teaching philosophy and predictability in their work.
My teaching team plans “work cycles” not discrepant units, since they continue and flow into each other through the years. Students are already familiar with the ways that knowledge and skills find application across the work day. For example, understanding how plants rely on mycorrhiza and nutrients might inform the potting soil that they buy for the school garden. Understanding how human activity affects runoff might alter how students discuss environmental case studies in ethics.
Even with a willing culture and total buy-in from all the invested parties, time is still at a premium every day in the learning space and with its scarcity, there is a need for intentional planning. My goal with this schoolwide shift is to be able to have work flow into work in logical and obvious, though sometimes unexpected, ways. I want interrelationships between content lessons and activities to feel mutualistic in nature.
To be certain, there are countless ways that educators organize their ideas and put them into action; when I draft a learning cycle plan of this “big work,” I consider three periods or stages. The first period contains the key lessons and the important foundational content that the future work will build upon. The second period contains the independent student work and research, while the third period finds students presenting their work in some formal manner. All this is followed by professional reflection and the chance to begin again with a new cohort. Students also have the opportunity to continue inquiry work in our learning spaces for multiple years which allows them to build on and enhance their previous study.
Using tools that we have in our STEM space, students are inspired to analyze forest soil and compare with compressed soil of the trail. They will see if forest soil can host more nematodes, an organism that they are excited to have learned about.
First Period
Note to self: You know what’s best, but listen to student feedback as you enter into content lessons. If students get to be drivers of the learning, they are invested in the outcome.
This year, I wanted to begin with an extended amount of time just spent in nature, partially unstructured and casual: a sort of “site safari” to see what is and imagine what is possible. This was a time for work to call out to the student. These outings can be somewhat challenging for my school since we are located in downtown Portland, Oregon, but they are not impossible. It is worth it to take time to visit the outdoor workspace if just to remind students that these areas exist and need to be preserved.
This past fall, the entire student body came to the forest for journal work, readings, break-out groups with specialists, observations, discussions, chances to practice scientific illustration, etc.. We de-briefed the visit by creating a list of questions and curiosities. All of the students and adults ended the day getting something different, a personal mix of learning and asking. This was the jumping off point for content and skill lessons.
- Following that initial immersion into nature I offer the following key lesson because they seem the most useful for students as they become more intentional about the direction of their work:
- What is a scientific question? What is a variable?
- What can be measured?
- Biotic and abiotic factors
- Interspecific relationships
- Trophic levels and energy flow
- Levels of organization; What is life?
- Taxonomy and classification
- Evolution and speciation
I like to clarify for students early on that our goal of inquiry in nature is partially to gain understanding but mostly to build appreciation and keep or develop a sense of wonder. Set a manageable goal since to fully understand what happens in nature is beyond our human capabilities. Appreciating the complexity of local ecosystems and acknowledging the minutiae of countless unfolding stories seems achieveable and leads to the caring that is our ultimate goal with students.
The value of the activities and lessons should be clear to the learners. When purpose is veiled for too long, student motivation and thus caring can quickly be extinguished.
Breaking an ecosystem into its components asks students to reconsider what life looks like. Sometimes it looks like witch’s butter.
Second Period
After the majority of key lessons have been given and the basis of ecology built, students can follow their personal interests into individual curiosity and research. Most students will need guidance as they start this process, and some will need it throughout. As the ego-bearing adult it can be hard to release control of these personal investigations because, inevitably, students are going to ask unanswerable questions of you and choose to take you down some untrodden paths, figuratively, maybe.
A Montessori Guide (teacher) can sometimes act as a teammate in this work, sometimes they are a part of the learning environment, and most often they are an observer of the child. Making observations helps the adult be what the child needs during a sensitive period, that is, a perfect moment for learning something new.
Students enter into this second period armed with a scientific question. Many times the scientific question leads down a rabbit hole, again figurative, maybe. If we had our way, these independent inquiries would run their full course and could unfold over months or longer. In reality, we sometimes have weeks and students might have to get comfortable with indefinity. Students will understand that some data sets will be left incomplete, and the work may fall onto the backs of others down the road. This is one point of having a fieldwork culture in place, so that picking up the reins on a long-term study becomes commonplace for students. Just like humans are part of ecosystems, students are part of the study of ecosystems for a limited time and and benefit from collaboration over time and with peers.
Students enjoy the unexpected things that they find in the forest, like this rootwad and nurse log, almost as much as they enjoy doing work side-by-side with friends.
Third Period
Whether an investigation runs its course or is interupted by circumstance, there needs to be a logical end-point so that students can move on to other purposeful work. The third period is all about sharing their work with others.
These days it seems that there are more ways for students to share their work with the world than ever before. Anyone lucky enough to work in a middle school will know that sometimes adolescents want to be pretty goofy with their final product. I remember when a group produced a carbon cycle music video in the style of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing.” Ultimately however, I ask that they also present their findings more formally, some of the following modes would work for me:
- Produce a video
- Present to the neighborhood
- Publish an article
- Produce a podcast
- Create a blog
- Send results to a professional for feedback
- Organize an event with parents and families
- Go to a science fair
Adolescents gain a sense of what Dr. Montessori has termed valorization from presenting to peers and others outside the community; they gain a feeling of capability that is a vital experience for those who are becoming adults. This is a chance to see the mastery of students gained through the work with real questions solved through observing in the outdoors.
The wrap
Our time outside is part of a pedagogy of place that implies that this experiential learning will lead to both empathy and action. So a culture of fieldwork and a culture of caring go hand-in-hand. As students begin to see interdependence in nature they better understand interdependence in their community and society. They may begin to see their impact on peers more readily after observing and measuring the impact of different ecosystem members or factors. They will at least have a framework for understanding impact.
We have to come to terms with the fact that we have all signed up for work that never ends. We can hope that it gets easier by building a culture where our work and the work of our students has purpose, meaning, and value. I find comfort remembering that with all the flaws in my planning and delivery of ecology concepts, students will always grow when they are outdoors making discoveries alongside their peers and with supportive adults. To see the best results in the students that we work with, we should put them in the learning environment that nature prepares for them. As Dr. Maria Montessori states in her book From Childhood to Adolescence, “When children come into contact with nature, they reveal their strength.”
Words as true as when they were written nearly 80 years ago.
Some Good Short Seminar Readings for Students of Ecology
- “Clouds in Each Paper” from The Other Shore by Thich Nhat Hanh
- “Learning to See” from Gathering Moss by Robin Wall Kimmerer
- “Partnerships” from The Forest Unseen by David George Haskell
- “Fungi and the Anthropocene: Biodiversity discovery in an epoch of loss” by A. Pringle, E. Barronn, and J. Wares
- Selected excerpts from “Entangled Life,” by Merlin Sheldrake
Jon Erickson is a Montessori Guide and Middle School Teacher and has worked with adolescents in Alaska and Oregon for 15 years. He currently works with students in Portland and enjoys the opportunity for side-by-side learning and hands-on work. He teaches STEM and plans curriculum for classes with names like “Fisheries Management and Watershed Studies,” “Cascadia Rainforest Ecology,” “Bicycle Physics, Use, and Maintenance,” and “Makerspace/Woodshop Creations.”
by editor | Sep 18, 2025 | Adventure Learning, Conservation & Sustainability, Critical Thinking, Data Collection, Environmental Literacy, Experiential Learning, Forest Education, Inquiry, Student research, Sustainability, Teaching Science
Expeditionary Learning: Exploring Healthy Forests
By Val McKern and Greg Goodnight
What is a healthy forest? That is the question that Kettle Falls Elementary School fourth graders have been grappling with all winter. In order to examine this question, fourth grade teachers Sally James, Sydney Potestio and Judy Galli have designed an expedition with carefully scaffolded projects for their students. Through these in-depth, service-learning projects, students have been engaged in reading, writing, math, science, social studies and technology. In Kettle Falls we firmly believe that it takes a village to educate a child and we count on a cross curricular approach of teachers and many experts to make any expedition a success for our students. Our priority is creating engaging expeditions that have rigorous learning for ALL students.
Kettle Falls Elementary: an expeditionary learning school
An expedition is the format Kettle Falls Elementary uses to combine adventure and service with learning state standards. Each expedition has standards strategically embedded in fieldwork. The healthy forest expedition will combine many “I can” learning targets based on state standards, with snowshoeing, animal tracking, trail cameras and forestry. In the end, students will deliver PowerPoint presentations to the North East Washington Forestry Coalition (NEWFC) as an authentic audience for their service learning work product. The expedition will provide an exciting and adventurous outlet for student learning and assessments on rigorous state standards. As an Expeditionary Learning School, Kettle Falls Elementary believes that expeditions are the primary way of organizing curriculum.
The subject matter of a learning expedition is a compelling topic derived from content standards. Expeditions feature linked projects that require students to construct deep understandings and skill and to create products for real audiences. Learning Expeditions support critical literacy, character development, create a sense of adventure, spark curiosity and foster an ethic of service. They allow for and encourage the authentic integration of disciplines. (Expeditionary Learning Schools Core Practice Benchmarks p.8.)
This learning expedition began as all expeditions begin at Kettle Falls Elementary. The staff went through a careful study of the new Washington State standards and determined the “priority standards” at each grade level. The standards are then written as long-term learning targets. Once these standards were determined, teams researched case studies that could become the focus of the learning expeditions. The life science standards addressed focused on life cycles, animal structures and behaviors, food webs, ecosystems and human impacts as the center of the expedition.
Literacy is embedded with in the expedition. Priority learning targets are written based on the standards of reading and writing. Reading comprehension strategies and the traits of writing are the focus of these targets. A content map is designed that assigns long term learning targets to each of three expeditions through out the school year. Each expedition runs for eight to twelve weeks.
Learning targets are at the heart of our work. There is clear criteria for posting and referencing learning targets school-wide. Long- term targets, project targets, and scaffolding steps are organized so that students can track their achievement during the daily debrief. We emphasize “learning together, but assessing independently.” Anchor charts that hold the thinking of the class are posted near the targets. The anchor charts will collect information that makes the learning target clear, whether it is knowledge or meta-cognitive thinking. All students are independently assessed on all learning targets.
Kettle Falls Elementary as a 21st Century School
Expeditionary Learning Schools set an expectation for service and authentic work. Kettle Falls Elementary teachers create expeditions that foster service in authentic ways.
Benchmark 3: B. Authentic Audiences
1. Products often meet an authentic need and have an audience and purpose beyond families or the classroom teacher.
2. Some of the products are particularly motivating because in themselves they are acts of service.
(Expeditionary Learning Schools Core Practice Benchmarks p.13.)
We are a Learn and Serve Grant recipient, which has helped us focus on the service aspect of our expeditions. This grant gave teachers release time to write rigorous expeditions and make the community contacts necessary for authentic service. It also supported the expedition through fieldwork and materials for a new expedition.
We knew that this expedition was an outstanding opportunity to educate our students in sustainable education. It meets many of Jaimie P. Cloud’s EfS Frameworks:
Responsible Local/Global Citizenship — The rights, responsibilities, and actions associated with leadership and participation toward healthy and sustainable communities. Students will know and understand these rights and responsibilities and assume their roles of leadership and participation.
Healthy Commons — That upon which we all depend and for which we are all responsible. Students will be able to recognize and value the vital importance of the Commons in our lives, their communities, and the places in which they live.
Multiple Perspectives — The perspectives, life experiences, and cultures of others, as well as our own. Student will know, understand, value and draw from multiple perspectives to co-create with divers stakeholders shared and evolving visions and actions in the service of a healthy and sustainable future locally and globally.
A Sense of Place — The strong connection to the place in which one lives. Students will recognize and value the interrelation- ships between the social, ecological and architectural history of that place and contribute to its continuous health. (Cloud, p. 172-173.)
The North East Washington Forestry Coalition (NEWFC) agreed to partner with Kettle Falls Elementary School. This expedition reaches each of these components of Cloud’s framework. It is the basis of an expedition with an authentic purpose, service, purposeful fieldwork, multiple perspectives and rigorous content.
Kettle Falls Elementary Bangs monitoring project
Three KFE classes will be engaged in a hands- on learning experience that includes in-class preparation and learning and fieldwork designed to teach them about the life cycles of natural systems, sustainable resource management, and community collaboration. The project will include wildlife, tree, and plant monitoring within the Bangs Mountain Wildland Urban Interface project on the Colville National Forest, as well as presentations and instruction from school and community experts in the field and in the classroom, including members of the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition. The students will work with the Coalition to complete a final report in the form of a PowerPoint presentation, documenting their monitoring work and educational experience with photos and written reporting. The final report may be posted on the Coalition’s web site, and a final press release may be prepared for local newspapers to share the outcome of the project with the broader community. Derrick Knowles, Education Outreach, NEWFC.
NEWFC is a local organization that believes in demonstrating the full potential of restoration forestry to enhance healthy forests, public safety, and community economic vitality. Because Kettle Falls is community that relies on the timber industry to survive, we wanted to create an expedition that would have many viewpoints. We felt that NEWFC would have the multiple perspectives within the organization that would make our study to compelling to students and community members, since NEWFC is comprised of members who come from the timber industry to those in Conservation Northwest. Our students are seeing that there is not one “right” answer to their question of “What makes a healthy forest?”
Kettle Falls Elementary fourth grade expedition: the stories tracks tell
Case Study One: Indicator Species of Bangs Mountain
Our Learn and Serve Grant gave a team of six staff members the opportunity to participate in a SEA (Service, Education and Adventure) training this fall. This adventure included learning to track with Tom Murphy of Edmonds Community College and the LEAF (Learn-n-serve Environmental Anthropology Field) school. This so engaged the teachers that we were determined to give our students the same opportunity. Murphy was able to create an alterna- tive winter course that brought 12 college students to Kettle Falls for a week. During that time, the LEAF school taught the students how to recognize tracks and gaits of our local animals. The focus was on five animals: whitetail deer, turkey, snowshoe hare, lynx and coyote. These animals were chosen with help from the Forest Service because of their status as indicator species for the Bang’s Mountain area. Students spent time in the forest that week, learning to track, photograph tracks, and measure tracks. They also learned to set trail cameras along trails in order to capture photos of the elusive animals.
Students from Kettle Falls High School Wildlife class with teacher Jono Esvelt participated in each of these activities sup porting the fourth graders throughout this expedition. They also took on the task of writing “field guides” for the fourth graders to use in their work.
This project focused on the learning targets of
- I can independently sort animals by the structures and behaviors that help them survive in their environment.
- I can independently list 4 parts of an animal and describe how the parts help the animal meet its basic needs.
- I can independently generalize from multiple forms of text to learn about forest animals.
- I can independently elaborate using details and/or examples about one forest animal.
- I can edit for capitals against the class capitalization chart.
Students learned about each animal through predicting structures and behaviors by analyzing a collage of photos and You Tube videos. Predictions were recorded before reading field guides and predictions were confirmed or not. Once the recording sheets were completed, the students wrote expository papers on the survival structures and behaviors of each animal. These were combined to create PowerPoint slides that will be included in their final product, some with actual photos of the tracks or animals that were photographed at the Bangs Mountain site. The good news was that some animals were captured by the trail cams, but some remained elusive!
Case Study Two: Food Webs of Bangs Mountain
This project really focused on the interdependences within the forest ecosystem. Learning targets in this investigation focused on giving students the knowledge to be able to complete the narrative prompt:
You are a wildlife biologist researching animals on Bangs Mountain. One of your jobs is to report to the community of Kettle Falls the stories the animal tracks of an indicator species told you while doing your fieldwork. To do this you will need to describe where the tracks were found and your inferences of what the tracks are telling you about that animal’s daily life:
- I can describe the interdependences in a forest ecosystem.
- I can explain how a forest ecosystem impacts animal population.
- I can independently generalize from multiple forms of text to learn about forest ecosystems.
- I can write a narrative with a clear beginning, two events and a clear ending.
In order to make this narrative realistic students needed to understand the actual role of a wildlife biologist. Learning about careers while in engaging expeditions opens our students’ eyes to the world of possibilities. Students continued their fieldwork, checking their trail cams, snag counts (their first monitoring experience), searching for tracks and other sign of life in their plots and were prepared for snowshoeing (though there simply wasn’t enough snow for them this year). Using the reading skill of “generalizing to understand” helped student comprehend the interdependence of the forest and was built through reading, photography, experts, media, data and many simulation games. After each activity students recorded “new learning” on anchor charts that build the content schema. They also recorded their use of the skill “generalizing” on anchor charts to show their ability to be meta-cognitive about comprehending new material. Students were able to use the information gathered from the multiple sources to write their narrative.
Case Study Three: Bangs Mountain as a Changing Ecosystem
Now that the students have developed a level of knowledge about the interdependence of forests they are ready to move on to the changing ecosystem. This is when they really become experts and begin to look at the many stakeholders of the forest. Their fieldwork becomes very data based. Through skill building in P.E. they learn about pacing. Each child is responsible for pacing off 104 feet, using a compass to keep their lines straight, they determine a half acre plot for their team. They use a tape to measure their accuracy after pacing and the corners are marked on the GPS so that their plot can be found on Google Earth. Students are now collecting data on the canopy by measuring open and covered areas. They have learned to use transect lines during their monitoring. This data is part of the baseline that will be used in the study. They identified three plants in the understory and did a plant count of their plot. Their study of the animals in their plot also continued, with data from tracks and trail cam photos. The most common track and photo taken was squirrels, though they are not one of the indicator species. Students found little evidence of the lynx at their plot. Animal population changes will be one indicator of increased health of the forest over time.
During this project students learned about many changes that can happen to forests over time. The learning targets for this project are:
- I can independently describe how onepopulation may affect other plants and/or animals in the forest ecosystem.
- I can independently evaluate one population in different forests, determine which will thrive and give clear reasons.
- I can independently describe three ways that humans can improve the health of the forest ecosystem.
- I can independently assess the author’s effectiveness for a chosen audience.
- I can independently organize my writing.
This means:
- I will write an introduction, supporting details using examples, and conclusion in an expository writing.
Each day of this project focuses on a change in the forest ecosystem. Some are changes that have taken place at the Bangs Mountain Project and some are changes that could eventually happen. All students receive the same reading each day, but they read the articles for a different purpose: natural or man-made changes, population changes, or gradual or rapid changes. Each student becomes an “expert” on their article. The students then “jigsaw” their articles once they have recorded the important information. The student experts then share out in small groups, creating a real need for students to comprehend and analyze their text. Special Education and Title I students are pre-loaded with vocabulary and content before the article increasing their ability to fully participate while in class. Once the information has been analyzed students come together to complete anchor charts where they record the changes and determine if human impact was positive or negative. They also determine the author’s purpose and if the author was successful in delivering their message.
By the end of this case study they have a thorough understanding of thinning, prescription fires, recreation management, forest flu and other healthy management issues.
We believe that reading is only one vehicle to understanding new ideas. Fieldwork, media and experts are also key components to creating powerful learning tools. Experts from the timber industry, Forest Service, Conservation NorthWest, and Department of Fish and Wildlife have all volunteered to work with our students, ensuring that students are learning realworld applications of the knowledge. Each of these experts will not only share their expertise on managing forests and their per- sonal perspectives of what makes a healthy forest, but also about their careers.
The students will complete this project with a simulation from Project Learning Tree, “The 400 Acre Wood.” Students will determine the actions taken to manage a forest much like their plots on the Bangs Mountain Project. This project has a balance of Vibrant Economy, Healthy Environment, and Equitable Society, as recommended by The Sustainable Design Project Teacher Manual. (Wheeler, Bergsman, Thumlert 2008.)
The Final Presentation of “What is a Healthy Forest?”
The final project is a culmination of all of the data that the students have collected while completing this project. Data is compiled in a variety of ways. The ani- mal monitoring is a graph of the sightings caught on the trail cams, the plant monitor- ing is a graph as well, both done on Excel. The canopy is drafted on graph paper, indicating the cover and open space. There is also the map from Google Earth, indicating each plot for future reference and to gauge changes over time. This work is gathered in a Power Point to be presented to NEWFC at a future meeting.
Kettle Falls Elementary: expeditionary learning and 21st century intertwined
Our students had the opportunity to become engaged in their local forest, gathering a respect for the land, observing the interdependence and understanding the decisions made by others that use our forests. Students were able to meet rigorous learning targets and assessed independently on each target. They collaborated to create authentic projects that reach beyond their school walls.
The expedition included many different modes of learning during this project that are key to Heidi Hayes Jacobs’ Tenets for Purposeful Debate leading to Content Upgrades:
- • A personal and local perspective is developed and presented in the content area, where natural and viable.
- • The whole child’s academic, emotional, physical and mental development is thoughtfully considered in content choices.
- • The possibilities for future career and work options are developed with an eye to creative an imaginative directions.
- • The disciplines are viewed dynamically and rigorously as growing and integrat- ing in real-world practice.
- • Technology and media are used to expand possible sources of content so that active as well as static materials are included. (Jacobs p 31).
Through compelling expeditions students at KFES achieve many 21st century outcomes. Students build strong habits of work, through both performance (traits that enable students to perform to their potential) and personal relationships (traits that enable students to be good people and community members). They are motivated to learn. Students believe that they have the ability to meet their targets, have clear targets that they can self-assess their progress against, and are connected to their school through the work they do. We believe that academic achievement is increased when students are engaged in learning. Through authentic expeditions like “The Stories Tracks Tell” students build life and career skills. Real world problems increase students’ critical thinking and problem solving skills. The use of technology opens the classroom to wider world, with meaningful examples of the work our students are doing. Our students increase their understanding of 21st century themes such as environmental literacy. (Hulleman, Hartl & Ciani 2009). Through compelling expeditions our students are engaged, supported and held accountable to high standards.
References
Hulleman, C., Hartl, S., & Ciani, K. (2009). Character, Motivation, and Engagement in Expeditionary Learning Schools, Review of the Relevant Literature and Available Measurement Instruments. Nellie May Education Foundation. Expeditionary Learning Core Practice Benchmarks (2003). Garrison, NY: Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound.
Jacobs, H. H. (2010). Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Wheeler, G., Bergsman, K., and Thumlert, C. (2008). Sustainable Design Project Teacher Manual. Olympia, WA: Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction.
Greg Goodnight is superintendent at Kettle Falls School District.
Valerie McKern is principal at Kettle Falls Elementary.
SWI blurs the boundaries between science and literacy in novel ways. The scientific approach of noticing, wondering, and analyzing word data in literacy instruction challenges the notion of science as a discrete and exclusive endeavor, while using literacy practices in science construct deeper understanding. Additionally, the study of words creates space for multilingual learners to share their expertise. Perhaps a Spanish-speaking student knows a Spanish word with a Latin base that illuminates the meaning of a challenging morpheme, or two Lushootseed words for different more-than-humans illustrate a connection that clarifies a Western science conception.
