nature (study) - a peek into what it looks like for us

I cannot remember a time when I have felt a disconnection from nature. My parents are "outdoors" people. In fact, they met in a church backpacking group, were among the earliest members of REI Co-op, summited a couple of California's major peaks, and even went backpacking (with diapers and a birthing manual) when a couple weeks shy of delivering my older brother.  (I was explicitly told "do not do that!" when I was pregnant.) As kids, there wasn't a ton of money, but a strong sense of adventure and I saw a lot of the U.S. from campsite to campsite. Today, still, my parents are hikers, bikers, birders, travelers, and continue to share their love of the outdoors with us and with my children. My kids' knowledge of birds comes from my parents sharing their love of birds. The kids, in turn, share it with me.

My brother and I inherited (absorbed?) this love for the outdoors in different ways. My brother, S, is definitely a careful, but more extreme adventurer than I am, having spent over a decade researching in Antarctica and having completed quite a few 'hard core' through-hikes and peak summits. M is also a lover of the outdoors. Both brother and husband were Boy Scouts (different troops) and M's troop spent weeks every summer adventuring wildly, with little adult supervision and direction, in Desolation Wilderness. M's love of the outdoors is playful and exuberant and he knows far more about survival, equipment, and fires than I do. (Incidentally, S and M met working at REI (they had the knowledge and liked the discounts), became fast friends, and that is how I met M, my husband!)

I have taken it all in in a gentler way. My degree is in biology, but I have a strong interest in plants and environmental science. When I grow up (i.e., I am no longer homeschool parenting), one of my considerations is to deepen my nature knowledge and/or pursue becoming a naturalist. (I could do this through higher education or even participating in some of the classes Jon Young founded here or here.) There is something about nature that soothes my highly sensitive soul, brings me peace and order when anxiety kicks in, and leaves me feeling like there is hope for the future and a connection to the past. While I am a hiker, swimmer, and paddler, too, I also like to slow down and pay attention to what is around me in nature.

And all of these experiences have filtered down to our kids. Our shared stories become part of their story, their history, and their experience.

I have shared quite a few posts about our nature study because it has been one of our greatest intentional successes this year. Because of who I am and who M is and our shared love of the outdoors, our kids have grown up camping, hiking, and loving nature. In fact, as I sit here and write about nature, our kids are in a day camp that has one of them herb foraging and crafting and the other exploring forest crafts. They are loving it. 

I want to share a little more in this post because I have been reading a book called How to Raise a Wild Child by Scott D. Sampson. I had never heard of this book before, but the hosts of one of my favorite podcasts, Homeschool Unrefined, are reading it and podcasting about it, book club style, during the summer. Since the topic is right up my ally, I borrowed the book from the library to join in. 

I am in the middle of chapter 3 and, it turns out, the author is speaking right to me. It could be, in part, because at least part of this book was written when he lived in the part of California in which I live, but so much of what he says resonates and validates my family's approach with nature, which, as a homeschooling mamma, isn't a feeling I experience or allow myself often enough. He talks about cultivating a love of and connection to nature in our children from an early age by providing consistent time in nature and an engaged adult (a mentor) with whom to share those experiences. He discusses the importance of a sense of place and taking the time to observe, ask questions, and being attentive to how the children in front of you learn best. Stories, hands-on activities, individually, in groups? Much of what he has covered, so far, is applicable beyond just the consideration of nature study and the cultivation of interest in nature. Those questions and approaches resonate deeply with my Waldorf roots and apply to other aspects of homeschooling and learning in general.

While I don't want to turn this post into a review of that individual book, I do think it (and likely others, such as Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv) offer powerful food for thought on how humanity is and is not interacting with nature and how the idea of nature has changed in recent generations. 

Other guides that have supported our family's experiences with nature are general guidebooks for where we live. (Some of ours are in a photo below. Some have been gifts, but many have been purchased used in local book sales.) Guides that have greatly shaped my mentoring of nature with my own kids and as a 4-H leader are Exploring Nature With Children by Lynn Seddon and Nature Journaling Curriculum (for use with children) by John Muir Laws. (An updated version of this is coming soon and as a beta tester, I am excited for it! He is local to me, so the kids and I have even gone to some of his free workshops, but he has lots of free videos.) And stories. Stories of all sorts, set in nature or featuring nature, have inspired curiosity, whether they are fables, The Burgess Bird Book, James Herriot stories, stories about pioneering naturalists like Girls Who Looked Under Rocks, and so many, many more.

A quick mention here about gear and food; Having shoes, jackets, hats, and pants that fit well and repel water well makes outside time in wet weather more bearable. The same holds true for warm gear in cold weather as well as proper sun protection in hot, sunny weather. One piece of gear that our kids have, which I don't know if I would have invested in, are CamelBak backpacks. When our kids were 2 and 5, my parents bought them each the smallest size available. To this day, they still wear the packs and for many hikes, those packs were the deal-maker. They loved having their own packs and so from a very early age, they have carried their own water and their own snacks. Now, older, they often have a sitting pad, first aid kit, sunblock, and Swiss Army knife in their packs as well. When they were young, they loved the control and we loved not having to carry so much weight. And snacks...with kids, especially if you have kids who are highly sensitive, everything goes better with food. Pick portable, filling snacks that appeal to your kids and pack extras!

From the time the kids were very little, they have brought nature home with them. We have a nature table that changes with the seasons. Usually, it becomes full and we clean it all up and start over, with a few favorites that stay for awhile. We talk about what we collect here and the phrase "leave only footprints and take home only pictures." We try and find appropriate balance between leaving nature in its own ecosystem and wanting and needing a little bit of it in ours.

Closer to home, interaction with natures has meant bird watching from the deck, growing a garden, taking walks around the neighborhood and seeing what is in bloom and when, raising chickens, and watching the phases of the moon change with each passing day.

M made 'pocket' flower presses for the kids. They were a hit!

One of our greatest homeschool successes this year has been a dedicated nature study day each week. Each week, depending on what is going on, we enjoy nature in our own back yard (like the week we participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count), at a nearby lake (seasonally, so we can see the changes from season to season), we take a little field trip, or, most commonly, head to our favorite nearby park. (By park, I don't mean playground. We are blessed, for as urban as it is where we live, the area has a tremendous number of large regional and state parks.) Annually, we spend time up at the lake, off-grid with the environment as our playground. For our weekly nature time, we often have something to focus on (buds, bugs, trees, weather, etc.), but always need free play, too. I always try to capture it in some way in my nature journal (some pages of mine shown here) and the kids often do, as well. Looking back on the year's worth of journal pages has brought a sense of awe and accomplishment.

Camping, hiking, observing, foraging, identifying, growing, and protecting are all ways in which we are connecting with the natural world around us. How do you connect with nature?