Lab School
In Bloom in Delaware
Promising Practices in Nature-based Early Childhood Education
Saturday, April 2, 2022
9:00am – 4:00pm
Audion at STAR Tower, University of Delaware in Newark, Delaware
Registration for the Delaware conference will open in mid-January. The conference includes the keynotes, two workshop sessions and lunch.
Questions? Contact Peg Smeltz, msmeltz@antioch.edu.
Morning Keynote
Connecting Children to Nature: Teachers as Catalysts
Ellen Doris
Faculty, Education Dept. Antioch University New England, Keene, New Hampshire
Children construct their own knowledge of the world and how it works as they forge relationships with their surroundings and communities. Try as we might, adults can’t make the connections for them! What is the teacher’s role in this discovery process? A close look at the evolution of place-based investigations carried out by young children will illuminate how teachers can support children’s experience and deepen their understanding of the natural world, highlighting the choices teachers make as facilitators and catalysts.
Ellen Doris is a core faculty member and directs the Nature-based Early Childhood Certificate programs in the Education Department at Antioch University New England. She has been an early childhood and elementary teacher in schools, museums and outdoor education programs. Her books include Doing What Scientists Do, for teachers, and The Real Kids/Real Science Series, for children.
Morning Workshops
Art with Young Children Outdoors
Jamie Diemidio
Assistant Pre-K Teacher & Preschool/Pre-K Art Teacher, Wilmington Friends School, Wilmington DE
Outdoor art for children is meant to develop their expression, intuition, sense of adventure and independence through exploring the boundless materials we can find in our natural surroundings. We provide opportunities for children to be able to seamlessly connect between education and art. A project-based approach allows children to discover ways to build and make art materials through the seasons, and this contributes to their self-expression and confidence. Together, we will make ink pens, use handmade paper, natural ink and mud paint to delve into the natural art process. Resources and art recipes will be provided as well so you can practice with your students!
Exploring Ecological Identity: Using Nature to Define Us
Rose Brusaferro
Sustainability Education, Environmental Education Consultant, Baltimore, MD
Ecological identity is a fascinating concept that can be leveraged by nature-based ECE programs to help teachers and administrators frame the importance of connecting children to nature. This concept is influenced and illustrated by the way children play outdoors. In this workshop, you will experience the ways in which children at a forest preschool in Baltimore City displayed indicators of developing ecological identities. Participants will learn how to assess child-nature relationships in the context of biophilic values through hands-on activities and collaborative group exercises.
(Re)connecting Black, Indigenous, and People of Color to Land and Nature
Atiya Wells
RN, Founder and Executive Director, Backyard Basecamp, Baltimore, MD
Ecological identity is a fascinating concept that can be leveraged by nature-based ECE programs to help teachers and administrators frame the importance of connecting children to nature. This concept is influenced and illustrated by the way children play outdoors. In this workshop, you will experience the ways in which children at a forest preschool in Baltimore City displayed indicators of developing ecological identities. Participants will learn how to assess child-nature relationships in the context of biophilic values through hands-on activities and collaborative group exercises.
Montessori Outdoors in the DC area Metro Montessori Schools
Amy Beam
Nature Educator at Beyond the Walls/Kids Love Nature, Gaithersburg, MD
Maria Montessori recognized the value of children’s time spent in nature and she ceaselessly promoted it. She endeavored to create sensorially-rich materials for the classrooms while constantly acknowledging that one could never replicate the sensorial richness of the natural world. This workshop will focus on how we apply her philosophies in the outdoor spaces that we use and how that enhances the learning that takes place indoors in the classrooms. We will be using common materials that can be gathered in most outdoor environments. Applicable for all early childhood educators, not just Montessori teachers.
Just Add Nature: Forest Days in Philadelphia K/1 Public School Classrooms
Monica Wiedel-Lubinski
Executive Director, Eastern Region Association of Forest and Nature Schools (ERAFANS), Baltimore, MD
Susan Chlebowski and Brianne Good
ERAFANS Forest Days Facilitators at Lingelbach Elementary School in Philadelphia, PA
Nature is a critical component of all educational journeys, including those of students in urban public schools. By working closely with public school teachers and administrators, it is possible to craft a weekly outdoor learning program that works with the nuanced needs of each specific school community. Join us as we dig into what we have learned this year about working with students and staff, curricular connections, speaking the language of public education, and much more.
Raising Readers and Writers Outdoors? No Problem!
Anne Stires
Affiliate Faculty, Antioch University, Keene, NH Educational Consultant and Founder, Juniper Hill School, Alna, ME
Early literacy exposure happens in a multitude of ways in early childhood programs. Children develop speaking and listening literacy with puppetry, storytelling, mud kitchen play and performances. We cultivate writing literacy with nature journals and daily personal journals. We support reading literacy by having a library that can be out in nature, reading aloud twice a day, sending book bags home each week with predictable/interest books for students to read to their families, establishing reading partners in other classes, and making stories about adventures which children can then read aloud to others. Learn from one school’s experience with providing rich literacy experiences and establishing a program that occurs both outdoors and in warming spaces. Somewhat geared to teachers of 4-6 year old children.
Afternoon Keynote
Concrete and Katydids: Exploring Nature Just Off the City Sidewalk
Rose Brusaferro
Ph.D Sustainability Education, Environmental Education Consultant, Baltimore, Maryland
Given the high concentration of people living in cities across the U.S., it is worthwhile to discuss the nuances of connecting children and their families to nature in urban environments. In Baltimore City especially, nature-based early childhood programs involve strategic partnerships with parks to establish safe outdoor spaces where children can play and grow. Urban ecology offers unique outdoor experiences that show children the dynamics of human-nature relationships, such as when tree roots push up through asphalt or heavy rainfall leads to flooding. Rose will share the recurring themes from her case study of Wild Haven Forest Preschool in west Baltimore that informed the way she developed the Fox and Heron Early Childhood Outdoor Education program for BLISS Meadows on the east side of town.
Rose Brusaferro, Ph.D. has worked as an environmental education practitioner and research scientist in the Baltimore area for ten years. With roles ranging from nature birthday party leader to Director, she specializes in formally observing and documenting children’s nature play in order to show how their time outdoors influences their relationship to nature. She now offers environmental education consultation services to nonprofits and government entities, including teacher training, program and curriculum development, and lectures. She teaches mentored courses for Prescott College and serves as a peer reviewer for the Journal of Sustainability Education.
Afternoon Workshops
Letting Go and Letting Kids Be Free
Katie Pollock and Monica Shire
Teachers, University of Delaware Lab School, Newark, DE
Have you ever stepped back and marveled at what young children come up with as they play in the woods? Their ideas, creativity, conversations, and joy fill the air in a way that is unparalleled to a traditional indoor school setting. Nature-based education encourages deep learning by embracing children’s desire to discover with and in nature. Children meaningfully experience connections to the natural world and to themselves when given the time and space. Participants will be led through a process to breathe new life into their own teaching practices allowing them to “Learn to Let Go.” Being challenged to experience risk themselves, participants will gain perspectives that they can then take into their programs to stimulate change.
Exploring Nature-based Science Practices and Engineering Processes
Jennifer Gallo-Fox
Associate Professor, University of Delaware, Department of Human Development & Family Sciences, Newark, DE
Young children are natural scientists who ask questions and seek to understand the world around them. However, knowing how to support their scientific development can sometimes be hard. Together we will examine science and engineering processes and design, wonder, explore, and document our natural environment. By doing this we experience ways we might follow children’s curiosity to foster interdisciplinary, developmentally appropriate learning about the world. Opportunities to discuss how to design emergent, child-centered curriculum and examine children’s work samples will occur.
Exploring Nature and Birds with Toddlers
Debbie Torbert and Polly Lung
Teachers, University of Delaware Lab School, Newark, DE
What can toddlers learn by splashing in puddles? In rolling down hills? Watching the movement of clouds and tall trees while lying on their backs? Noticing the birds that come to our classroom window feeders? Adventures in nature provide opportunities for toddlers to learn how to observe nature up close, wonder, question, imagine, create, and build their knowledge of nature. We will explore what spiritual development in young children looks like and why that awareness is important when developing the whole child.
Pop-Up Style!
Monica Morrell
Director/Teacher, St. Paul’s Nature Preschool, Camden, DE
In this hands-on session you will experience a small-scale Pop-Up Adventure Playground! Large or small, Pop-Ups help support childdirected play. With the help of the UK charity Pop-Up Adventure Play, I held my own Pop-Ups in 2019. With these events I showcased play in the community and promoted the opening of my play and nature preschool program. In this workshop “loose parts” materials will be provided for participants to discover, imagine, and create. This experience will provide you with the confidence and resources necessary to implement a Mini Pop-Up right away in your program or community.
Mind Full or Mindful: Exploring Benefits, Practices and Possibilities for Children and Teachers when Nature and Mindfulness are United
Kristen Chandler and Laura Morris
Teachers, University of Delaware Lab School, Newark, DE
Most would agree teaching, at this time, is challenging, complicated and stressful. What if it was possible to alleviate some of these challenges without needing to move to a tropical island or spend a lot of money? In this interactive workshop, participants will investigate the concept of mindfulness and explore how engaging with nature in a mindful way serves as a powerful tool for reducing stress, reactivity and anxiety and for increasing focus and self-control. Participants will experience practices that can be easily incorporated into any program and can be used to bring about greater calmness and self-awareness for children and teachers.
The American Shad: A Story across Time–Connecting People, Place, and Environmental Practices
Kesha Braunskill
Urban & Community Forestry State Coordinator
Amy Shepherd
Director of DEI, St. Anne’s Episcopal School
Kerry Wilson
Program Manager, Philadelphia Regional Institute for STEM Educators, Philadelphia, PA
Meaningful watershed educational experiences (MWEE) provide rich opportunities for cross-curricular understanding and study. MWEEs offer hands-on immersive experiences that lead to increased citizenship engagement, problem solving, and critical thinking. We will learn about the history of the American shad (Alosa sapidissima), Indigenous people, and shad bush through a MWEE. Discussion will include historical and contemporary Indigenous connection, human impacts on the environment and restoration of the shad migration to the Brandywine River in Delaware and
Pennsylvania. You will hear diverse perspectives of Afro-Indigenous people, DEI, and the scientific community. Activities will include a picture book presentation and discussion, STEM activity, and cultural connection with fish tanning. Please be prepared to get dirty and wet. This workshop can be scaled to suit the needs of learning for multiple grade levels.