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Welcome to April! What a wonderful time of the year. What can we be doing with children outside? How can we help them reconnect with nature, with the earth? As always we look to what is happening outside, both the unexpected and startling, and  the regularly, re-occurring  events in the natural world, as our cue(s) to what is important, interesting, delightful, and worthy of our attention and care, what is meaningful to explore, learn about and understand.

April is the month where everything changes and we just need to spend more time outside, we want to spend more time outside, to have every opportunity to experience and revel in the transformations that spring brings. The earth is softening, the plants and trees are blossoming, and the animals are breeding, giving, birth, basking in the sun, crawling through the grass, climbing the trees, flying through the air and swimming in the water. We want to help children tap into these wild, powerful energies from without and find their own wild, unconditioned ardor, enthusiasm and vitality from within.

April is also the time to start gardening. Gardening is a key dimension of the education for sustainability movement (see an upcoming children in culture segment:education for sustainability). Gardening (and foraging) is fun, filled with delight, beauty, tenderness, toughness, deliciousness, laughter and silent wonder. Through gardening children develop an ethos of care for the earth and the plants that sustain life on earth. We learn how to appreciate and be grateful for Mother Earth, and how to to tend skillfully and wisely to the plants under our care so that are our gardens can grow.

There is so much going on outside right now that my morning and afternoon meetings need to be shorter.  We usually end our meeting meditation with a dedication of merit that goes something like: “may all beings be safe/may all beings be happy/ may all beings be healthy/ may all beings find their true nature/ and may all beings be free,” which the children have changed to “may all children be free to go outside!”

Mary Holland describes April as a month of “transformation.”

“In New England, April experiences a greater degree of transformation than any other month of the year. An explosion of sights and sounds takes place from beneath the forest floor to the top of the forest canopy. In 30 days the the hillsides can change from snowy white to a mosaic of greenery with the arrival of newly-emerged leaves. Birds and amphibians are suddenly everywhere, breaking the silence of the past winter months with their mating calls. Many trees take advantage of the leafless canopies by flowering when the wind can easily disperse their pollen. Spring wildflowers, responding to the temporarily warm and sunny forest floor, burst into bloom and carpet the ground. The earliest insects emerge and visit these flowers for sustenance, and there is a fury of hidden activity as the breeding and birthing of all forms of life take place.”

How do we take advantage of this season of transformation? Here are some “pro tips” for teachers, schools and families who want to embrace playing outside, outdoor education, and a nature based curriculum and focus.

1. Find all the places to play outside near your home and school. This means vacant lots, pocket parks, public playgrounds/lawns/ and places, land trust areas, city, state and federal parks, and land reserves. Then find your favorite places and go to them regularly. My school borders a park that we use regularly. Find the places outdoors that really “sing” to you ( I love being “down by the riverside”). None of the other preschools or the three other public schools in the area use the park with any regularity except for an annual field day or cross country running practice.
2. While going to the park or the woods with a specific project and activity in mind is great, the basic orienting activity, especially with young children, should be  “guided free play.” On a trip last week children collected and played with clay, drew and built little nature collages in the dirt, built a fort, played “pooh sticks” off the bridge, built pretend fishing rods and tools with strings and sticks, climbed fallen trees, threw stones in the water and looked for insects. Lead by example and share with your children things you like to do outside. Pay attention to what your children become really interested in and build on these “emergent interests.”
3. Support individuals, groups and your whole class (family) develop particular favorite activities and interests. It’s common knowledge that people learn a second language best as young kids but the same is true for different skills and areas of expertise.  As a kid I fell in love with reptiles and amphibians and have been an amateur herpetologist ever since. My uncle taught me how to fish and I have become a lifelong angler.  And I have always been encouraged to wonder, wander, walk and explore in the woods, so hiking and camping come naturally to me.
4. Do not under any circumstance refer to outdoor time as “recess.” Both children and adults develop a false sense of outdoor time as a kind of artificial, run wild, act crazy, freedom from the confinement of the traditional classroom and the well kept home. Teachers check out ( and check their phones) and kids run around aimlessly and knock into each other. Outdoor time is fun, it’s something we get to do, it provides endless opportunities for new adventures, new learning, and you never quite know what is going to happen.
5. Do what you can to spruce up, develop and grow the outdoor spaces you have available to you as a school or family. There is always something you can do.  Don’t wait for the big grant, a change of administration, new teachers, your ship to come in, or any total makeover. If all you have is black top get some chalk, jump ropes, and learn some nature themed activity games.  Gather loose parts ( boxes, tires, gutters, balls, etc.). Do traditional reading, writing and art activities outside. Set up a birdfeeder and make observations. Develop a weather station and give a daily weather report. Take community walks. Get some planters and do some gardening. As soon as the earth thawed I worked with the kids to rake our sandbox and we dug it up so we had some mountains, valleys, wells, moats and rivers.  Take baby steps, collaborate with others,  and gradually develop a culture that embraces the fundamental, central significance of outdoor education.
6. Approach the natural world with a “beginner’s mind.” You don’t have to be an expert on everything. Whenever I fall into the trap of thinking that my job as a teacher is teach the kids the names of all the plants, trees and animals, I pull back and try to dive back into the actual encounter with the natural world with the children, catch the kids’ questions, take a “let’s find out” attitude, and focus on having memorable educative experiences together. By always putting yourself back into the learner’s position you can continue to grow and mature as a teacher.

If one of the reasons why we go into the woods is to find the wild child within, we also go to nature as the great provider, mother earth, that we need to attend to, take care of, revere and respect. There is nothing that gets children closer to the earth, the elements, the plants that sustain animal life, and the fundamental circles of life than gardening. Gardening also requires a deft hand at guiding and organizing children, showing them the way, making sensible rules and letting them do things for themselves, getting their hands dirty, making mistakes, and having fun. Sharon Lovejoy shares her wisdom and love of gardening with children in her book Roots, Shoots, Buckets and Boots: Activities To Do in the Garden. Here are some highlights from the preface of that book.

“My life’s work is deeply rooted in the soil of two sunny California gardens. The first, the garden of my childhood,  is where I shared the world of nature with my grandmother. She knew the surest way to destroy the enthusiasm of a young gardener was to dictate a steady regimen of rules and routines.Instead we greeted each day as an adventure and learned to look for and expect miracle. The second, Hearts Ease, my community garden of the last decade is a small, thriving plot of ground  that attracts thousands of gardeners each year. Both gardens….nurture the same underlying theme: All knowledge  is rooted in wonder, and what better place to cultivate wonder than in our own gardens.” 

“When my son Noah was born, I started  viewing the world of the garden through his thoughtful , cinnamon-brown eyes. He saw, sniffed and herd things that had been lost to me somewhere between my childhood and growing up….We both learned  that the only rule  we could count on in our daily garden experiences was that there are no rules;the only thing we could predict  about Mother Nature is that she is unpredictable. So every adventurous and unpredictable  day in the garden  was exciting and crowded with a kaleidoscope of sensory pleasures and the forgotten childhood miracles we found in unexpected places.” (my italics)

“I knew from experience  the frustration of visiting perfect gardens of grandiose proportions and design. I wanted a garde composed of lots of ideas  that could easily translate  to small garden spaces , balconies, window boxes, or cramped suburban yards. I wanted do-able, earth friendly habitats that would inspire visitors to try it for themselves at home, wherever they might live. What I wanted most was a garden where grown-ups would include their children, because gardening together is one way to back in touch  with the earth and one another” (my italics)

“This book is my invitation  to you to celebrate the earth  with a child, to take the time to garden together,and to take journeys in your own backyard. Remember always that your child’s knowledge will spring from the roots you planted deeply in the fertile  soil of wonder.” (my italics)

Here are some tips that I have learned from gardening with kids:

1. Make sure you pick plants that kids will get a kick out of ( See Lovejoy’s Top Twenty Plants for Kids in the Resources Section)
2. Start small: if you start to big, everyone will get discouraged and you will end up neglecting your plants
3. Gardening requires patience, from seed to fruition, so make sure to supplement and contextualize the actual gardening with stories, songs, cooking, art projects, science experiments and connections with plants in different ecosystems
4. Let children enjoy the sensuousness of gardening: digging in the dirt, playing with and in water, frolicking in the sun, smelling everything, tasting garden produce, feeling the breeze on their faces and bodies

Here are some more tips from the excellent  Native American Gardening: Stories , Projects and Recipes for Families by Michael Caduto  and Joseph Bruchac.

1. Take one step at a time, explain things clearly, and the experience will take care of itself
2. Allow each child to participate in all aspects of gardening,watch for what each child prefers doing, and let each child do what they most enjoy whenever possible
3. Let children take charge of different parts of the garden to instill responsibility
4. Intersperse garden tasks with plenty of playtime; have fun
5. Allow for lots of beginner mistakes and just try to learn from them
6. Help children see the garden as learning laboratory with lots of opportunity to experiment
7. Use only natural fertilizers and pest control
8. Teach the children  that a garden is an attempt to create  a temporary natural community or ecosystem. Use the garden  as a way of teaching  about natural cycles, such as the water, nutrient, life, gas, lunar cycles and the cycles of night and day, the seasons, and the years
9. Promote the idea that there is no one right way to garden, that everyone can find their own approach
10. Share in the sense of wonder, learning and adventure with the children

Bruchac and Caduto’s immensely practical book on gardening with children also offers a profound ethical and spiritual framework for gardening garnered from traditional Native North American communities. “A garden, in Native North America, is not just a place to grow food. Taking care of a garden is one of the most important ways that people become part of of the great Circles of Life.  Every time we plant a seed, add compost to the soil, water a seedling, pull a weed, talk or sing gently  to the plants or say “thank you” for the blooming flowers, we are giving a gift. In turn we receive  knowledge, peace of mind, food for our bodies, a growing spirit of giving and a sense of having a full life.”

Children who play outside and work in a garden discover a profound sense of freedom and power and they develop an expansive ethic of gratitude and care. It is our responsibility as elders, teachers, parents, and leaders to give children sustained opportunities, every day, to play outside. It is also our responsibility to usher children into the great circles of life such as where our food comes from and where our garbage goes, so that we can begin to create healthy, happy sustainable communities for all children and for all people. The threads that we follow with the children, that we weave into the fabric of our everyday lives, are curiosity, care and wonder, as we explore, learn and grow together.

See you outside!