Children are natural learners and nature is a natural place to learn, so teacher Lisa Walls is combining her love of nature and education to offer the area’s first nature immersion school.
“Children, especially young children, are really good at guiding their own learning and following their own curiosity, and they learn better when they’re engaged in something that they’re genuinely interested in,” she said of her new Tall Trees Nature Programs, which will take place completely outdoors.
Each of the camps (starting for spring break and regular pre-school classes starting after Easter) will take place in one outdoor location per school year so kids will get to know the area very well and watch it change through the seasons.
“I don’t go in with a lesson plan, unlike a traditional teacher,” Walls said, adding that can be tricky for a trained teacher like her who’s used to having a detailed plan to check off.
“It might be a mushroom that they find that day, so today, we’re going to learn about mushrooms,” she gave as example. “So then my job as a teacher is to use that opportunity to engage the children, to pull them in and ask why do you think this is here? Who might eat this mushroom? Why wasn’t it here yesterday?”
“There’s all kinds of natural science lessons that are easy to find, but then you can pull in math. You can count and measure, you don’t need a ruler, you can use a stick, you can use your hand, you can use your leg, you can use four children. How big is this puddle? Maybe it’s two children wide today, maybe it’s four tomorrow.”
She pointed out there is math and language in almost everything we do, “the more you speak to children, the more they’re developing their vocabulary and putting their thoughts together.”
Walls developed the idea after first hearing of nature schools from a fellow parent. She eventually settled on the idea as the perfect way to get back into teaching after seven years as an environmental scientist, realizing how much she loves getting her own two and five-year-old children out in nature.
She said nature immersion programs started in Scandinavia in the 1950s and are now popular in many places but she’s not aware of any others in the mid-Island area.
Walls has explored existing programs and is working with the Forest and Nature Schools of Canada (www.forestschoolcanada.ca) model based in Ottawa that she said is very well developed.
She said that while some schools have their own dedicated outdoor spaces, many don’t and said the local officials she asked about using public park space were very inviting and eager to have children using and learning in public spaces.
She has a couple spots picked out but admitted it may take a bit of trial and error to settle on the best places.
“Clothing is the biggest challenge, even though we live in a really lucky place where you can be outside playing in the winter,” she said of the difference from where she grew up in northern Ontario.
“The right clothing is the most important ingredient. If you send your kid dressed in the right stuff, they’ll be happy, they’ll be warm, they’ll be dry,” she said pointing out a three-year-old may just get grumpy rather than explaining they have cold toes.
For more information, including schedules and prices, visit www.talltreesnatureprograms.ca or call Walls at 250-954-8733.
