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Blog 10
Describe your personal ethic as you develop as a nature interpreter. What beliefs do you bring? What responsibilities do you have? What approaches are most suitable for you as an individual?
Hey! For our final blog post, we were asked to write about our personal ethic as we develop as nature interpreters.
I’m currently in my final year of university, and I’m beginning to look for jobs. And for the first time in my life, I’m looking for career jobs, instead of part-time of summer positions. So needless to say I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about what jobs I ideally want, what jobs I’m willing to do, and what jobs I’m not willing to do. Our course readings for this week mentioned a fear of a desk job being a potential motivating factor for pursuing a career related to environmental interpretation. That one did admittedly resonate with me a bit. My last job was more or less of a desk job, where I worked as a research assistant in a lab. And even though, on paper, it was closer to what I want to do as a career, I didn’t enjoy it very much. I missed working in the service industry, I missed the high-energy, social atmosphere, I missed getting to work with my hands and see the results right in front of me. Spending most of my working hours not only indoors, but in a dim lab staring at a laptop just made me irritable. So I’d love to find a job in the sciences that’s more hands-on and active, but I’ve realized I’d happily move away from research if I can’t find a job in that field that lets me move around.
Every week or so I get an email from the university describing job opportunities. It hasn’t been very useful in finding jobs, but it sure has been useful in helping me figure out exactly what place/companies/fields I am not willing to work for. There’s always plenty of decently paying opportunities working for mega-corporations like PepsiCo, and the like, as well as their countless subsidiaries. I know now that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I worked for a place like that. I would much rather go just about anywhere else, including back to the service industry. I might have a less prestigious career, but I care about having a job that I enjoy doing and that I see as important. During my last job, it was difficult to get up and go to the lab in the morning when I couldn’t really see the effects and importance of the research that was being done. I know that whatever I end up doing, it needs to be relatively active, and even better if I get to spend time outdoors as part of it. As long as I’m still able to spend my free time outside, that much is negotiable.
I wanted to go into more details about my beliefs/motivations/self-assigned responsibilities. First, the rather apparent role of nature in mental health and our current culture around it. Not that I have enough space to go into all of my thoughts on that, but I’d like to include a few of them here. One, on mental health being treated like an individual problem, when it really should be recognized as a systemic one. Even if people admit that it’s systemic, the “solutions” and treatments that are currently popular tend to be highly individual. Take mood-regulating medication, go to eternal therapy, isolate yourself from others in the name of self-improvement. In general, mental health has been both commercialized and capitalized upon. Like I mentioned, I don’t have the adequate space to go through my thoughts on the systemic causes of mental lack-of-wellness. But as I’m sure many of us are aware, spending time outside and spending time with other people (or even both at the same time!) have been shown time and time again to be beneficial to human well-being. Honestly, I don’t think we need more research in that area. We already know, and as much as I like numbers, more statistics aren’t going to save us.
So for me personally, all that means that I don’t want to have a job that drags down the health of other people, or my own. I would love to have a job that helps remove some of the barriers that have been put up between nature and people, which I don’t think should belong in different categories in the first place. But an important caveat for me is that I don’t want my career to be a constant fight. I’m quite tired of war analogies. There’s less of a point in destroying something if there’s nothing better to work towards. I don’t want to dedicate my life to fighting climate change, because I’ll make myself miserable and make everyone around me a little less happy. That’s not to say I don’t care, but I do think that a bunch of sad and lonely people aren’t going to bring about much positive change. Like the video with David Suzuki and Richard Louv mentioned (I think it was Richard Louv who mentioned it), it’s hard to make change if people don’t have any sort of positive idea of a future to look forwards to.
So to summarize as neatly as I can: If I end up doing something related to nature interpretation, I want it to get people excited and help people feel more connected to the world around them.
Picture: One of the Arboretum gardens after a snowstorm
On the same note as working towards something rather than solely working against, I have a book recommendation for anyone looking for a sci-fi story with a positive outlook: Monk and Robot by Becky Chambers (and its sequel)
Thanks for reading!
I resonate with a lot of what you wrote for this final blog post. It can be a struggle to find a career that fulfills financial needs alongside more intrinsic needs. And while a lot of your writing focused on what isn't working for you at the moment just know it's still good progress towards finding that ideal future.
I'm hopeful that with each passing year that environmental thinking becomes more mainstream we'll have access to a lot of jobs that fill that need of being out in nature and being active instead of being crammed behind a desk. I, like you, hope to be out in the field, working with others in order to help deepen their understanding of nature as well as my own.
Small actions, big outcomes! Environment as a frequent classroom topic!
Describe your personal ethic as you develop as a nature interpreter. What beliefs do you bring? What responsibilities do you have? What approaches are most suitable for you as an individual?
This is my final blog post and you likely do not know who I am, but if you are interested, I invite you to delve into Madeline Fantin’s interpretive ethics, values, and ideas for the future.
To start, what beliefs do I bring? I am a wildlife biology and conservation student; therefore, the vast majority of my courses have looked through a scientific lens (western science that is). Perhaps the reason I chose my program is due to possibly my most core belief, that individuals have the power and influence necessary to make a real difference. This is why I became a vegetarian even though my entirely Italian family thinks I’m bonkers, I think one person cutting their carbon emissions is a worthwhile effort. Are billionaires flying their private jets around for unsatisfactory reasons and investing in all kinds of large corporations who dump pollution directly into our environment? Yes of course, and don’t get me wrong, I think part of the fight towards a healthy planet is holding the extremely wealthy accountable. Perhaps they are hoping we will put all the blame on ourselves so that we ignore their insurmountable consumption. However, we are consumers too and where possible, we can choose where to put our money and how to live our lives to a certain extent. I believe that however small, the average citizen’s fight against climate change is valuable and necessary. In conversations I have had with the people in my life, I have learned that many people become unmotivated by the “all or nothing” mindset. For example, I frequently hear people say that they “could never go without meat all the time.” So don’t! Have meatless Mondays! Have meatless weekends! Go pescatarian! Go meatless biweekly! There are unlimited combinations of schedules that could provide a more reasonable expectation. The effort doesn’t need to be “perfect” to be worth something. This can be applied to many environmental actions. In most places in Ontario, it wouldn’t be reasonable to ask people to use public transport or bike as a main form of transportation. Most cities don’t have great public transport, and most people live a long, long bike ride away from their place of work. However just because you cannot bike to work doesn’t mean you can’t ever trade the car for your bike. Maybe there’s a friend you often visit just on the other side of the neighborhood, and maybe you usually drive to them, but when the weather is ideal and if you are able, the bike could work! Many “imperfect” actions are better than no action at all I promise!!!! There is no shame in not being the perfect environmentalist all the time, it is near impossible in the society we have created.
I also believe that there is something to be gained from spending time in nature, for anyone. Whether that is a chance to gather thoughts, get some exercise, some vitamin D, you name it. I don’t think it needs to be picturesque either. Sometimes connecting with nature looks like sitting on the curb outside your east campus townhouse because the sun has reappeared after some days of gloom. Sometimes you will have the energy to head to the arboretum, but when you don’t, taking a sunny break on the curb is better than skipping the outdoors all together. Again, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing.
I believe it is never too late to get started! Everyone, no matter the age or circumstance, should feel like they have a place in the world of nature interpretation and the outdoors. Having not grown up in an outdoor adventure family doesn’t mean you can’t have any outdoor adventures! On that point, outdoor adventures are whatever you make them. They need not be a costly trip to the other side of the continent. Someone with the right mindset could gain more from an hour by the local creek, than someone with the wrong mindset on their trip to Mount Kilimanjaro.
What responsibilities do I have? Well, there are the obvious ones such as to deliver the program I have advertised, inform guests about risk, manage and prevent dangers, present accurate information, check my bias and privilege, to be fun and engaging, and for guests to leave feeling like they have benefitted in some way. Other more specific responsibilities I believe depend on the approach…
So what approaches are the most suitable for me? Well, it is my goal to get into teaching in high school classrooms. This is not the type of environment we have spent the last few months discussing, but nonetheless I think there is a ton of relevant overlap. Nature interpretation could take place in the classroom, or the school yard. There may also be opportunity for class trips where students could be exposed to new ways of learning or new environments.
When relevant to the content, I would aim to stimulate interest and conversation about the environment and environmental issues happening around the world, as they relate to us in Canada and otherwise. I probably plan on living in Canada, and therefore will need to create programs suitable for all 4 seasons. This could mean the same topic modified with each passing season, different topics in each season, or a combination. I am excited to take advantage of the variance each season brings. I think many topics in the high school curriculum could benefit from an environmental lense, and I would look to make connections throughout where possible.
I would look to encourage active learning and participation through mediums the students may be interested in, just like we talked about all the different mediums of nature interpretation. If I’m teaching grade 9 or 10 science, then this class is still required of them, and many may only be there by necessity. They might not want to be there or have particular interest in the content, which is ok, and I would need to navigate how to still make sure they get what they are meant to, even if they never develop excitement about it.
To revisit responsibilities, as a teacher I must provide a classroom environment conducive to learning, where everyone feels comfortable, valued, and that students look forward to attending each day.
For my final blog post outro (☹), I will say that climate doomism is very contagious and easy to get wrapped up in. I think one of the most important things we can do as nature interpreters is spark hope for change. You never know who is looking to you when they are feeling discouraged about the state of the world, and how you can provide them motivation to keep fighting the good fight!
I really enjoyed your overall message in this final post. I totally agree with what you're saying about how widespread climate doomerism has become and also love your view about how every little decision can help the world function in a slightly better way. Nothing we as humans do will be perfect and it's silly to assume that solutions to climate change will be any different. As small as any individual change may be it's still a change in the right direction and if enough of those happen then we will start to see some real effects.
One example I like to use to illustrate that is, same as you, I've become a vegetarian on ethical and environmental grounds. Does that mean that I haven't touched a single piece of meat since I made the decision? Nope, but I've gone from eating meat daily to having it a few times a month at most and honestly it feels like a good change to have made. It's let me explore some fun vegetarian recipes and even my roommates have been convinced to try them out because of how well they turn out. I think this illustrates a point that even our small contributions can end up having some ripple effects beyond what we originally imagine which is nice to think about:)
I also envision myself working on a more local scale, although not through education directly, and honestly I do believe that we will be able to have a much more profound effect than we could ever imagine. Take for example even if only a fraction of your future students take up some form of environmental work - at the end of your career that could be hundreds of individuals out there working away at making the world more environmentally conscious.
Week 10 Blog Post and a quick farewell:)
Describe your personal ethic as you develop as a nature interpreter. What beliefs do you bring? What responsibilities do you have? What approaches are most suitable for you as an individual?
I can’t believe it’s already time for the final blog post of the semester, it feels like it wasn’t that long ago that I was getting situated and writing my first one! This week’s prompt definitely led to a lot of thinking and ruminating in order to come up with a concise way of summing up ethics, beliefs and responsibilities. I think the best way to work through this will be to take it one point at a time as they are referenced in the prompt.
For starters - personal ethics. Throughout this course I’ve learned a lot about what it means to be a nature interpreter and what effects I might be able to have on the world as a result of it. Being able to interpret the vast complexities of nature through music, technology, art and a multitude of other ways are all going to be important and bring new challenges that will butt up against my ethics.
I think a good place to start is that nature has an innate value to it that is worth preserving. This likely isn’t unique among environmental scientists and nature interpreters but that’s for a good reason. As a whole, nature is fascinating, vast and incredibly complex and while my knowledge about it will never be complete I do know that I want to preserve it so that future generations can be as inspired as I am by it.
Ethically I think it is also important to teach, or interpret, for my audience in a responsible way. This includes things like doing proper, well cited research in order to be able to convey a truthful outlook of nature. I think many of us know the struggle of writing a paper, relying on one or two sources that are supportive of your point only to later find an array of more recent papers that disprove your thesis. While instances like this can be frustrating it is still important to use the most current and accurate information in order to be truthful, sowing disinformation will only lead to more issues down the line.
Finally on the ethics point, which is maybe a bit muddier than my other points, is that nature and human development will not always be able to cleanly coincide with each other. I think we all know this at some level but what I’m trying to get at with this point is that sometimes we will have to sacrifice what is good for humanity in order to preserve nature and sometimes we will have to sacrifice nature in order to preserve humanity, it’s a delicate balancing act of keeping these two important aspects in a place where they can both prosper. If this point isn’t clear yet, let me give a short example. If we want to move to renewable energy there are still some hurdles with storage and consistency that solar, wind and hydro haven’t yet solved (although we’re getting there!). Perhaps using nuclear energy to fill in these gaps in the meantime could be the lesser evil even if it means creating some large mines, dealing with radioactive waste etc. since it would drastically cut carbon emissions until we can use renewables as our sole source of energy.
So to sum up my ethos I would put it as three main points:
Nature has innate value
Interpret truthfully and responsibly
Nature and humanity will not both always be able to benefit from every decision
As for my beliefs; learning from nature is also innately valuable to me. If I can learn from nature in order to preserve it better then that’s perfect. It is my hope that one day we can have someone interested enough in each and every tiny interaction that exists in nature so that we can piece together how it works as a whole. I believe that being able to understand nature at every level is important - all the way from the biochemical level up to the broadest look at ecosystem health and function. With the variety of information we could gain by understanding these levels of nature I believe we could find a way for humanity to live much more harmoniously on Earth compared to how we live now. I believe it will be the job of interpreters like us to drive climate policy to a sustainable level.
This leads nicely to some of my responsibilities as a nature interpreter. While I as an individual may not be able to influence as much as I’d like I still believe I have a place in helping the world function in a more environmentally friendly way. That could be something as small as teaching other individuals about why nature is important to preserve or, if I can manage it, maybe help larger organizations or governments make smart, effective decisions about preserving our environments. Personally, I think I would be more effective at the lower levels of this scale. I mentioned in other blogs doing things like rewilding degraded habitats or doing small guided nature walks as a way to get people to care about environmental issues. I think I work better at this scale since I’m able to see tangible effects from the work I’m doing. Working at higher levels, like determining climate policy, is tough because while you may be able to look at data like average global temperatures it’s so much less tangible than being able to see plant growth in an area that didn’t have any before.
Well, I think that about wraps up my thoughts for this final blog post. It was an interesting semester of reading fellow classmates’ blog posts every week and learning from them. I’ve mentioned it in past posts but I believe the future of environmentalism is looking optimistic because of the way you all treat issues and want the world to improve. I hope that in the years to come I get to see all sorts of advancements and improvements because of interpreters like you all:)
Blog post 8 - The most amazing thing I know about nature.
When asked to think about what sets humans apart from the rest of the animal kingdom, what springs to mind? Is it the ability to love, or to create art? Or maybe it's the ability to dream? When it comes to the latter, we humans aren’t as singular as we’d perhaps like to believe. You can tell a person is dreaming when they enter a sleep phase called Rapid Eye Movement (REM). As the name suggests, this phase is characterized by rapid movement of the eyes. But what about insects: most don’t have moveable eyes, so does that mean they can’t dream? Until recently we didn’t really know, but one study took a closer look at sleeping jumping spiders and changed all of that [1].
Jumping spiders are unique among the arthropods in that they have moveable retinal tubes (aka. eyes) [1]. In baby spiderlings these eye tubes can easily be seen through the temporarily-translucent exoskeleton [1]. It's this translucence that allowed a team of Harvard researchers to track the way the spiders’ eyes moved during sleep [1]. Notably, they observed spiders twitching and curling their legs during periods of increased eye movement [1]. In vertebrates these twitching movements are directly associated with REM sleep - it's like when you accidentally kick your partner because you’re dreaming about tripping on the sidewalk, but for spiders. To the delight of bug enthusiasts everywhere, the results suggest that these spiders do in fact have little spider dreams.
This finding has fascinating implications for the way we study sleep in all animals, regardless of their place in the tree of life. Since the last common ancestor between humans and spiders was a relative of the modern sea squirt (pictured below), we’re now left to wonder whether it had dreams. In that case, it would mean that almost everything that came after it dreamt as well. An alternative explanation is that dreaming could have just evolved separately in two distinct lineages… ones with completely different brains. Vertebrates (like us) and invertebrates (like spiders) evolved parallel to each other in many ways, and the evolution of the brain is one of them [2]. There’s so much diversity in invertebrate brains; that even one species can dream in a way similar to us is incredible [2].
Either explanation of the origins of dreaming has major implications that ripple outwards and leave us with questions about nearly every animal species on earth. If jumping spiders dream, do other species of spiders dream too? What about other bugs? And what are they dreaming about? I’ve often had that question about my cat when I’ve spotted her snoozing on my couch, but now I find myself musing about it whenever I see a snail in the grass, or a spider hanging out in its web. When you stop to really consider how these animals experience the world, you find yourself arriving at the realization that we’re not so different from them after all.
© Nick Hobgood / Creative Commons (Original)
References
Rößler, D. C., Kim, K., De Agrò, M., Jordan, A., Galizia, C. G., & Shamble, P. S. (2022). Regularly occurring bouts of retinal movements suggest an REM sleep–like state in jumping spiders. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 119(33), e2204754119. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2204754119
Zullo, L., & Hochner, B. (2011). A new perspective on the organization of an invertebrate brain. Communicative & Integrative Biology, 4(1), 26–29. https://doi.org/10.4161/cib.4.1.13804
Wow, I think you absolutely nailed the prompt for this week. Your topic and ideas bring to mind so many great questions. I would have never even thought to ask the question “do spiders dream?” but thanks to this post it’s going to be one of those questions that floats around in my head for a long time. The relatively simple way of finding an answer in REM sleep is equally as fascinating. Jumping spiders really are such a great candidate to learn about REM sleep in other animals since like you said they have that translucent exoskeleton when they’re young, Because of this little biological quirk we don’t need to make an MRI machine for spiders and see if we can induce REM sleep, instead we can simply look at their eyes and notice other behaviours that coincide with it.
It may be a relatively small discovery but you’re not wrong in saying that it could have massive implications. It really goes to show how similar we are as humans to the rest of the animal world, even if we may be tucked inside for much of our time we can still find remnants like this to connect us with nature.
Week 9 Blog Post
Interpret (through this blog) the most amazing thing you know about nature – get us excited. This is your blog – your audience isn’t out in the field with you so bring the field to your armchair reader.
Oh boy, what a prompt this week! It’s hard to narrow down just one incredible thing about nature to share since there’s so many amazing things that I could talk about but for the sake of the blog I want to focus on the ways in which species have changed and adapted over time to their environments. I know it doesn’t exactly have a strong pull in to read more but just stick with me and I’m sure your mind will be blown by the end of this topic.
The sheer scale and variety of ways that organisms have adapted to their environments blows my mind every single day. Some of these adaptations are physical - think camouflage or horns to help an individual survive. Some adaptations might also be behaviours - like how beavers learn to create dams in order to make suitable environments to live in. Some adaptations even change the very chemistry and physiology of organisms, changing ways in which glands within their bodies are used to give them an edge over the competition.
Image credit: https://www.nps.gov/articles/buildabeaverdam.htm#:~:text=Why%20do%20beavers%20build%20dams,%2C%20coyotes%2C%20or%20mountain%20lions.
Let’s start with the example of beavers since this is one that blows my mind on a regular basis. Imagine you’re a small, semi aquatic rodent swimming around and living your life. One day you decide “I’ve had enough of this lake, time to find somewhere new to live!” Without a second thought you could travel many miles in search of a new habitat. Once you arrive, well, there’s plenty of work to be done! With no communication you get to work and start chewing down trees, placing mud to stop gaps in the dam and continue this until you’ve altered a stream and turned it into a lake! This level of work is simply incredible, and beaver dams can be MASSIVE. The largest beaver dam that I could find a record for was 850 metres long. Almost an entire kilometre of beaver dam. To put that into perspective, the CN tower is about 550 metres tall, so one and a half CN towers laying down in order to create this dam. Here’s an image taken from a satellite that puts into perspective the size of the dam.
Image credit: https://www.mountainviewtoday.ca/hot-summer-guide/the-worlds-largest-beaver-dam-is-in-alberta-you-can-literally-see-it-from-space-7090170#:~:text=The%20beaver%20dam%20in%20Wood,largest%20beaver%20dam%20ever%20recorded.
Now, I’ve talked a lot about beavers here, (can you blame me?), but I also wanted to talk about some more incredible adaptations creatures have made in order to survive. As I mentioned, camouflage is one of them, but I’m sure most of us have seen a well hidden animal take off in front of us, or seen pictures of how well stick bugs can hide. What’s even more fascinating for me is things like octopus that can actively change their skin as needed. The way their entire bodies look to cloak themselves in the exact colour they need is endlessly amazing to me and hopefully this gif can bring some of that fascination to you as well. I could talk endlessly about these kinds of topics but it seems I’ve reached my word limit so hopefully this was enough to get you excited for some of the things that excite me.
Image credit: https://totheark.tumblr.com/post/645844076361662464/octopus-changes-color-and-texture
Blog Post 7
Where is music in nature? Where is nature in music?
As a follow-up (focus on the above two before you tackle this one), what song takes you immediately back to a natural landscape? What is the context? Share it with us – I would imagine many of these ideas may have similar underpinnings of a campfire, roadtrip, backpacking journey, etc.!
Hello everyone! I love this blog prompt for week seven, it's a combination of two of my favourite passions: music and nature!
I have always had a deep love for both music and the natural world, and their complementary relationship has always provided me with endless inspiration. The soothing sound of running water, the whispers of the wind, and the melodies produced by nature's animals are all closely connected. On the other hand, the magical beauty of nature is frequently reflected in the creations of the musical world. Because music has such an amazing ability to convey the essence of nature, the link between nature and music is a source of inspiration for both musicians and artists. One song in particular that easily transports me to a place is "I Follow Rivers". I have a special place in my heart for this song since I can identify with its melodies on an emotional level. When I was younger, I would always replay this song, either on a hike with my friends or on a road trip with my family. Surprisingly, while I'm outside, I frequently prefer to listen to nature's noises rather than music. The way birds start their morning chorus, with their chirps, and the leaves gently swaying and rustling in the breeze. I really believe Mother Nature herself is conducting a captivating symphony for us through these natural sounds. And this symphony has the incredible ability to create a peaceful ambiance. These natural sounds hold a unique power that can transport individuals into a different realm in the world around with an intensity that's truly transformative. Music, in all its forms, has a way of capturing the spirit of nature. Music artists often seem to draw inspiration from the very spirit of nature when creating their works. Whether it's in the subtle background melody or the overall composition, there's a sense of familiarity, like echoes of the sounds we hear when we're outdoors. I'll sum up by saying that I can never describe the deep ways that music and the environment enhance my life. Both domains take me to a state of amazement, inspiration, and are also both domains that have shaped me as a person. Listening to music and embracing the soothing sounds of nature is vital to me because it offers a mental escape and a heartfelt connection to the world's beauty, providing solace and inspiration in the midst of life.
I have attached a link to the song I mentioned that I would always replay when hiking or when on a road trip! Let me know what song you enjoy listening to when going for a walk or just while being outside.
Hey there! I loved your blog post this week, some bits of it really hit a chord with me! (pun fully intended). Towards the end of your post when you mentioned not being able to fully describe the ways that music and nature shape your life, it really resonated with me. Throughout my life I've had a pretty academic upbringing and so the nature side of it I can describe on a scientific level but I really lack the proper vocabulary to convey how music, and to some extent nature, makes me feel on a more emotional or personal level.
I also totally agreed with your point about preferring to use music not while out in nature but more so to remind yourself of nature. Going out for a bike or hike and getting to listen to all the sounds surrounding you is a special feeling and I would never want to drown that out with music, even if it’s really special music. Where that kind of special music really comes into play is times like today where I would love to go out and explore but school and work leave me inside all day long. On days like this I can use music as a kind of substitute instead and get some of the feelings of being out surrounded by nature.
Week 7 Blog Post
Where is music in nature? Where is nature in music?
As a follow-up (focus on the above two before you tackle this one), what song takes you immediately back to a natural landscape? What is the context? Share it with us – I would imagine many of these ideas may have similar underpinnings of a campfire, roadtrip, backpacking journey, etc.!
This week’s blog prompt is about music which is not something I’d regularly associate all that much with nature. Music is one of those very human constructs the majority of the time, listening to music of someone singing while someone else plays man-made instruments usually connects me more with other people rather than nature. That isn’t to say no music has a connection with nature, quite the opposite in fact! There are still songs that take me right into a nature loving mood whenever I listen to them.
To answer the second part of this prompt first, I think nature can be found all throughout music. Songs with a heavy emphasis on acoustic sounds and more gentle lyricism are the ones that most commonly come to mind. Taking out the heavy electronic sounds of electric guitars and synthesisers can really make all the difference as those are instruments you would never really expect to hear out in nature. Acoustic guitars and other softer instruments can easily bring to mind the sound of someone strumming away around a campfire. Even if you’ve never experienced this situation firsthand you’ve almost certainly seen it on TV or in movies at some point, or at the very least noticed that these shows set outside civilization tend to have amore acoustic theme when they appear.
For the other part of this prompt, about where music is found in nature, well the obvious answer that probably jumped into everyone's mind was birdsongs! Whether it’s waking up to the soft chirping of finches or hearing a chickadee tweeting their tune throughout the day it’s almost impossible to not hear birds singing if you keep an ear out for them, even in more urbanised areas. It is sad to hear many fewer birds here in Guelph compared to back home outside of Owen Sound but areas like Preservation Park or the Arboretum are great refuges for these sounds to still exist! The trees do a great job of keeping out the sounds of cars and other traffic while the birds take centre stage with their songs.
Beyond bird songs there’s so many more musical things to find out in nature. Frogs singing at night during the summer seasons are one of my personal favourites to listen to but other things like the gentle trickle of a creek combined with the other background noises of a forest take on a music-like quality for me. They may not have rhythms and beats but they achieve the same effect of relaxing me or at the very least taking my mind off things for a bit. This is another reason why I love going for walks when I’m too stressed, the sights and sounds of nature work together so well to make a familiar, yet comforting and unique setting.
To wrap things up with some music I wanted to share one song in particular that has always been associated with nature for me and that song is Far Away by José González. It basically hits all the points I mentioned about it being all acoustic sounds and the lyrics just speak of being, well, far away which is something I like about being in nature, being disconnected from the world for a bit.
Week 6: Things are boring - stories matter
Prompt: “There is no peculiar merit in ancient things, but there is merit in integrity, and integrity entails the keeping together of the parts of any whole, and if these parts are scattered throughout time, then the maintenance of integrity entails a knowledge, a memory, of ancient things. …. To think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it.” - Edward Hyams, Chapter 7, The Gifts of Interpretation) - Unpack this quote.
Hyams' is suggesting that integrity and storytelling is not only a key to good interpretation but the goal of interpretation - we need to bring all the pieces of a place or event together to authentically give them meaning.
“Ancient things” can be compared to plants or features of an environment; on their own they are just a fact, but by connecting facts and ideas we can tell stories with emotional impacts. By connecting pieces of nature and history together for our audiences we are moving our work away from just sharing information to interpretation. Our readings in Interpreting Cultural and Natural Heritage describe good interpretive writing as needing to connect to:
the life of the reader
a tangible thing (ei a artifact or place)
create an emotional connection between the reader and the thing
guide the reader towards a change in thinking or action.
(Beck, Cable, and Knudson, 2018, 304)
I think Hyams’ quote really speaks to the WHY of interpretation; yes, learning history is fun, we like stories, we like fun facts and we like visiting new places. Having interpreters involved in parks and tourism takes the fun and makes it meaningful and long lasting in the minds of the audience.
A great example of how an interpreter can take a thing and make it special and meaningful comes from when I visited Prince Edward Island. I was on a tour with my highschool band and a history interpreter told us stories about the sidewalk tiles going up from the harbor. Sidewalk tiles are objectively boring. Here’s how good interpretation made sidewalks amazing and symbolic of East Coast culture:
The tiles were meant to cover the sidewalk of the whole main road from the harbor to city hall. But the hard tiles were shipped in blocks of stone to be cut once they arrived on the island. Unfortunately cutting hard granite wasn’t possible on an island that on ever has soft sandstones. Instead the city council decided to just bury the blocks of granite and only have a stone path for the first block leading up from the harbor! Our guide went on to comment on how reflective this is of East Coaster’s mentality; they prioritized welcoming guests as they arrive from their ships above all else (and they don't see the point of stressing over a complicated solution when there is a simple option).
Sidewalks are boring until you connect them to a broader story and that story to the cultures and values of people.
Unfortunately I have to take this conversation in a sad direction to address the second key idea in Hyams’ quote where he claims that “to think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it”. You’ve heard the old adage about history repeating itself. If we forget the lessons we have learned we risk repeating them; interpretation can teach us things so that we don’t have to experience suffering first hand to learn from it. Earlier in this course we learned about the Tragedy on the Timiskaming in 1978 when a group of students on a canoe trip ended up falling into freezing water at the cost of many young lives. James Raffan shares the story through a song "The Last Place" A song about the 1978 Temiskaming Tragedy - YouTube performed to students of his own who will go on to be interpreters and guides. The song not only makes the story memorable and emotional, sharing the story serves as a reminder to the students that they should think twice before making decisions in the wild - nature has little mercy and accidents tend to pile up. Essentially, Raffan is sharing history in the hope that his students can avoid repeating it - saving them from having to make a fatal mistake themselves. By learning history in memorable ways that connect to our own experiences we not only take information but lessons.
Overall I think Hyams’ quote speaks to the connections interpreters need to prioritize: attaching a thing to its story and the story to a message.
Hey! I think you did a super good job of unpacking the quote this week ( I wish I would’ve read this to help understand the quote myself before going off to write my own post!). The thing you mention a few times about tying stories to mundane things is really the essence of Hymas’ quote and somewhat the direction I took my own blog this week too.
Without some deeper understanding of something, be it a tile in Prince Edward Island or a train in a station, then they simply exist as things. We as interpreters have the power, and arguably the responsibility, to connect things for people, to give them context and to give merit to them. One thing I find to be perfect proof of this is the fact that some of the earliest writings of humans are all stories. Stories were used as examples, warnings or instructions for ancient peoples to be able to navigate the world. Even before writing existed, stories were a way of remembering and recalling information through oral tradition and we still see this in the modern day, especially in certain groups like the First Nations. Stories inherently give meaning and make things interesting for us more than simply accruing facts and regurgitating them.
I think it’s our job as interpreters to continue these traditions in a way in the modern day, to warn people and help people navigate the modern world with stories.
Week 6 Blog Post
There is no peculiar merit in ancient things, but there is merit in integrity, and integrity entails the keeping together of the parts of any whole, and if these parts are scattered throughout time, then the maintenance of integrity entails a knowledge, a memory, of ancient things. …. To think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it.
(Edward Hyams, Chapter 7, The Gifts of Interpretation)
Hey everyone, the prompt this week definitely left me a bit confused compared to some of our previous weeks’ but I think after staring at and rereading it enough I’ve got enough of an understanding to unpack it.
The beginning of this quote made the most sense to me right off the bat, the fact that ancient things don’t have any inherent meaning is something I’ve thought about before. Just going and seeing something ancient, let’s say the Colosseum of Rome for example, doesn’t have any weight to it unless you understand the significance and context of the structure. Without these things it’s nothing more than a building and we still have plenty of those around today so what’s the big deal? Once you understand that the Colosseum is a structure that’s been in continual use for two thousand years by a variety of civilizations it starts to have some weight as to why it’s important. Then looking even further and understanding the sheer amount of work and will it would have taken to build such a structure gives some insight into the people that would have built it, they had the resources, opportunity and motive to build something so colossal (pun intended)!
This line of thinking helped me understand what Hyams meant with the next part of his quote, “there is merit in integrity, and integrity entails the keeping together of the parts of any whole, and if these parts are scattered throughout time, then the maintenance of integrity entails a knowledge, a memory, of ancient things”. Basically what I believe he is saying is that understanding ancient things is what gives them form, what brings them from just a “thing” into something more meaningful. I think many people inherently understand this too without realizing it. One example may be the fact that when humans discover ancient ruins we don’t (usually) dig them up, take the fancy looking things and forget about it. We infer, we theorize, we try to find meaning as to why people would have built in that location, why they bothered to build the things they did and why they didn’t build something else. Without these kinds of questions the value of the site is lost.
Another example that might be more familiar to us in this course might be old growth forests. Sure they’re old and have massive trees in them but there’s more than that. These biomes can tell us how long these environments have existed, they give us a window into the past and show us how we as humans can affect the world by showing us the contrast of relatively undisturbed environments which seem to be becoming more and more rare in the modern age. The information we gain by observing and maintaining the integrity of these sites can be invaluable in our attempts to preserve the Earth. If we take these things for granted, or as Hyams’ quote puts it, “To think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it.” then we lose what’s truly valuable about these sights. We see this in the modern day, logging of old growth forests provides immediate material benefits but in the long run will leave us with less to look back on, less to be able to understand and learn from. Hopefully we, as a species, can continue to use this interpretation through history to make better decisions about what we do with our world.
Nature Interpretation and the Climate Crisis
Blog 5: No prompt this week – free write on what you are thinking about!
Since there is no designated blog prompt this week, I would like to take the time to discuss a topic that is always on my mind. Climate change is a pressing issue that ALL of humanity is facing. The textbook phrases this in laments terms, “It is everybody’s problem.” Thus, I would like to open a discussion about it and how nature interpretation can play a role in slowing it down.
As a student studying marine and freshwater biology. As a traveller. As an interpreter. As a human. I feel a personal level of responsibility to protect our environment. The guilt that comes with this is crushing. My phone is flooded with news and updates from around the world. Global warming is now undeniable with the atmosphere and ocean temperatures reaching new highs. Ocean acidification is causing coral bleaching. Boat traffic is adding harmful anthropogenic noise to aquatic ecosystems. I am very aware of the amount of garbage my student house creates. I take the bus which lowers my carbon footprint but then when I travel, it is often by plane. It is easy to see how education can lead to despair and a feeling of hopelessness, but these conversations can also help resolve the climate crisis.
The textbook explains that nature interpretation can help foster meaningful and impactful discussions about the climate crisis. By creating and fostering meaningful experiences in nature, interpretation helps strengthen human connection to earth. The textbook explains how interpreters hold the skills required to move people from complacency to compassion. I believe there is a large disconnect between humans and their environment. This gap makes it difficult for them to see the urgency and importance of taking action against climate change. Interpreters can also help educate the population, open solution orientated conversation and even give voice to different groups. The NNOCCI (National Network for Ocean and Climate Change) is an organization that trains interpreters to strategically educate the public on complex scientific issues related to the climate crisis. The textbook illustrates how they focus on the use of a neutral tone to foster solution orientated discussions. This organization also highlights the importance of supporting community level solutions. One way of encouraging these solutions is by using “we rather than me” in discussions.
While the NNOCCI targets visitors through education, large companies should not be neglected as they are a leading cause of the climate crisis. Overfishing, bottom trawling, plastic production, carbon emissions are all a major product of large corporate businesses. As extensions of earth, we need to hold these companies accountable for their actions. It seems a daunting task and it will not be comfortable, but it needs to be done. We as a species must act because if we don’t, we will face extinction.
To conclude this blog post I’d like to leave you with a quote made by Barbara Ward in 1972 where she states, “We have forgotten how to be good guests, how to walk lightly on the earth as other creatures do.”
Hey there! I saw your post and totally agree with some of the sentiments you’re feeling. As students in school learning about climate change and how vital the environment is to our well being it can be very disheartening to see individuals, companies and governments throwing the idea of climate change by the wayside. I always love hearing about groups that try to educate people about the seriousness of the issue (like you said, it is everyone’s problem) but I wonder if it will be enough. There seems to be much more upsetting news nowadays about the environment than positive so here’s hoping we as interpreters can help open people’s eyes to how serious of an issue it is.
That quote from Barbara Ward sums it up perfectly. Nowadays we know exactly what we’re doing to the environment and the outcomes it will have yet most companies and governments can’t look past the immediate future to actually do something. What’s most stunning to me is that the quote you mentioned was from 1972, we’ve known for generations yet continue to use and abuse the Earth as if it will be able to hold out with this level of consumption forever. Still though, with more and more tangible evidence of climate change every year here’s to hoping we can actually move forward and help create a more sustainable tomorrow for future generations.
Week 5 Blog Post
Since it’s a free writing week I figured it could be fun to blog about one of the projects in my other course since it’s (tangentially) related to this course as well. In my vertebrate structure and function course (ZOO 2090) we’ve been given an assignment to make a small informational piece about a species from an approved list of vertebrates. I wasn’t too keen on any of the species I started looking at until I came across the various Amphiuma species. I had never heard of these creatures before but they’re incredibly interesting! They’re a species of aquatic salamanders (I always loved finding salamanders as a kid so there’s another reason why I found these fellas so interesting) which are found along the southern states along the Gulf of Mexico.
What I immediately found most interesting about these amphibians is the general lack of information about them. There’s still plenty to find with some research and digging but compared to other species there’s seemingly little. What I have managed to find out about them has only intrigued me more, they’re physiology and behaviors are so unique! For starters, like other amphibians they begin life in a larval stage. In this stage they will have external gills and live aquatically but only for two weeks. Compare this to something more common like a leopard frog which takes from 3-6 months to complete their metamorphosis and become a full frog and you’ll see this is an especially short time for an amphibian to retain its larval characteristics. On top of that, once amphiumas become adults they lose their gills and primarily use their lungs to breathe… even though they almost exclusively live in the water for their adult lifetime, which can be upwards of 15 years. It seems like everything about these little critters is designed to make whoever is looking at them raise an eyebrow.
On top of all these strange physical features there’s also many strange behavioral traits. As mentioned before they breathe with lungs but since they live in the water they must regularly come to the surface to breathe. They can also breathe through their skin but this seems to be less common since they’re lungs can be over half the length of their body and thus they can retain air for a long time within them. Another unique feature is that the males will reproduce annually yet the females only reproduce every other year.
To relate this back to nature interpretation a bit more, I find all this super interesting but seemingly one of the reasons why there’s less knowledge of amphiumas is that they’re not endangered, don’t have an overly specific niche and are tough to find. Spending all their time living in murky waters alone lets them avoid humans but on top of that, there hasn’t been an especially pressing reason for humans to research them. As an interpreter, these are the kinds of things I’d love to share with others. People know enough about salamanders generally that if they were presented with these amphiumas they’d surely be intrigued too. I think the slightly mysterious aspect can really draw people in to want to learn more.
It seems I’ve hit my word count fairly quickly ranting about my newfound interest in these little creatures, hopefully some of you found it interesting too:)
Image source: Missouri Department of Conservation
Blog post 4 - Nature Interpretation Through Art
Incorporating art and the creation thereof into nature interpretation can open your audience to a new way of seeing and interacting with the world. Creating art forces you to step out of your everyday experience and enter a different state (Csikszentmihalyi, 2004). Art can have a powerful effect on the mind, so it's no wonder that art changes the way people interact with nature. It can be a useful tool for sparking fascination & curiosity in your audience, and thus increasing their awareness of their interactions with the natural world (Boeckel, 2015).
This, to me, is the gift of beauty: it can be a highly effective vehicle for directing attention to different themes. Art allows people to communicate how they see the world, or how they want you to see the world. What people decide to include or omit from a painting determines what kind of story it tells. Through this storytelling, art can influence the way people think about things. For example, the landscape art of the group of seven has shaped one way of thinking about Canada's national identity. The absence of people in their paintings divorces humans from the Canadian ‘wilderness’. In this way, the artists communicate white settler ideas of how humans interact with nature; as external observers rather than participants in natural processes. As nature interpreters, we can use art to communicate different ideas about our place in nature. If you’re facilitating a creative activity, art can be a way for your audience to communicate to you what holds significance for them, and that information can be used to determine the themes that you choose to focus on.
As such, It's important to keep in mind that not everyone creates art in the same way. As an amateur tattoo artist, art is a way for me to explore the natural features that bring me joy and create a permanent record of them. Looking for inspiration forces me to be more in touch with my senses, and to take notice of what I find beautiful about the natural environment around me. What’s perceived as beautiful will differ for each individual. Personally, I was drawn to the aesthetic appeal of the heart shaped flowers of the bleeding heart plant, so I chose to immortalize them on my forearm. The strength of the giant stag beetle’s impressive curved horns was so beautiful to me that I decided to tattoo one on my thigh. Drawing small details like these forces you to deepen your understanding of your subject. How do the leaves of a bleeding heart plant connect to the stem? What angle do a giant stag beetle's legs need to sit at to support its weight? And most importantly, how do all these small details come together to create a full picture? Once I’ve finished a design, I can then begin the process of transferring it onto my skin.Tattooing myself is a way for me to create a record on my body of the things in nature that I find significant. Once a tattoo is done I am gifted with a constant reminder of the beauty that I have seen in the world; something to reaffirm my place in nature and my connection to it.
Hey there, I thought you had some really great insights with your post! I had very similar thoughts with regards to the gift of beauty. Using that nearly universal feeling that everyone has to take in beautiful images is a fantastic way to open peoples minds to what nature can offer and why it’s so important to preserve. Your point about what artists choose what to include and what to omit in their art is a great point as well! I don’t think that if The Group of Seven chose to include humans in many of their paintings that they would have had nearly the same impact on the modern Canadian identity.
I think most of us in this course have probably been in a situation where we are totally tucked away from any sort of civilization, whether that be on a hike or camping trip or anything else. Being able to be totally engulfed and surrounded by nature is a privilege that we as Canadians are fortunate to have and hopefully all get to experience some day. The vast amount of wild land that exists in Canada means that it is extra important for us to treat it right and educate others about its importance.
Finally I just wanted to add that I love your personal way of adding art and nature together with your tattoos! It’s so amazing to see the things you choose to immortalize and the way you think about creating them with all the little details intact:)
Week 4 Blog Post
Who are you to interpret nature through art? How do you interpret “the gift of beauty”? (Your readings – specifically Chapter 5 of the textbook – will be helpful for this!)
As a nature interpreter, interpreting art is just as much part of the job as interpreting a scientific paper to a general audience - there are going to be people who can understand certain topics intuitively while others cannot. Being able to bridge this gap in knowledge as it relates to the environment is one of the key aspects in being a nature interpreter. While interpreting art may not involve explaining mechanisms of how the environment operates, (although it may still make a great gateway for that!) there is still plenty to gain from looking at art through a critical lens.
Art can inspire others to care about nature in a way not many other things can. Everyone here for classes in Guelph should be able to relate to the feeling of seeing the beautiful gradients of crimson to green in the leaves these past few weeks. Being surrounded by something that beautiful is a powerful feeling, what art does is allow others who might not be able to directly experience this sensation to instead get a second hand feeling of it through a painting or photographs. People are often swept away by the beauty of art and when art is related to nature it is a prime time to help those looking at it to take a deeper dive. Even explaining something relatively simple like why leaves change colours in the fall can open up someone unfamiliar with nature to just how complex, deep and important it can be.
The “gift of beauty” as mentioned in the readings this week describes it as the ability to instill that sense of wonder and curiosity that I mentioned earlier. I would interpret in nearly the exact same way as the text just with a slight change. Interpretation should get people interested in the topic which you’re interpreting, that much should be uncontentious. What really gets me is when you could take a painting, have someone be interested and taken by its beauty and then take it further and connect it to ideas that may not be visible in the image. For example, in the painting “1929 Wabajisik Drowned Lake” by Franklin Carmichael we get a scene of a lake with many trees half submerged in water but still standing. One simple question could lead to a multitude of different discussions about how these trees make for important habitats for everything from fish swimming below to insects living within to birds perching atop. Or maybe questions of how these trees even manage to stand after years of being submerged would arise, and that’s not even touching on the topic of anything else like the beautiful rolling hills in the background or the astonishingly fluffy clouds that take up the upper portion of the frame.
Art is just as important for us as interpreters as anything else, it’s another gateway to get others to care about the things we as environmental minded people already hold dear. For some a scientific paper simplified down may draw them in while others will take to art for inspiration instead.
“1929 Wabajisik Drowned Lake” by Franklin Carmichael
Week 3: Lets Talk Privilege, Empathy and Access
Google defines privilege as “a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group”. I tend to think of privilege as everything I have never thought to ask or work for but non-the-less benefited from.
Privilege also creates blind-spots in our empathy. Things we don't consider to be obstacles or concerns can cause us to make our interpretive work isolating or inaccessible to others. For example, I speak French and English and speak both very quickly. When I used to coach skating, it took reminders from my supervisor or very confused looks from my student (a newly immigrated canadian excited to play hockey) for me to realize I wasn't accounting for our language barrier at all; I also never considered how my verbal instructions might be frustrating for him to understand or make him feel unwelcome on the ice. Heck, this middle school kid had the guts and confidence to join a learn-to-skate program where he knew most of the skaters would be at least half his age. I should have been doing everything in my power to make that confidence worthwhile. I have been on the other side of this as well. In one of my first jobs in the environmental science world I was part of a team of three men and two women (myself included). Unfortunately, our office only had two sets of waders below a men's size 9 despite having multiple female biologists, and on day two of work, one of the small waders sprung a leak. No one had considered that we might need different equipment because they had never struggled to find what they needed to do their job before. These examples are both small, easily fixed problems that maybe ruined a day at most, but if incidents like these pile up or happen regularly when an individual tries to access interpretive services (or provide them), they create a sense of unwelcome and unwantedness that will prevent excellent interpreters and guests from wanting to participate.
Another important relationship between interpretation and privilege is access. It is largely due to privilege that I became interested in environmental science and interpretive work in the first place. I grew up in a house with a large back yard, I have family with a cottage, and my best friend had many acres of private forest we could explore. I lived within a kilometer of bike and walking trails that were safe enough for me to explore alone as a young woman and if I ever felt unsafe I had my large dog Rudy to take with me. We think of nature as free space that everyone should have access to but it costs money to live close to nature or find transportation to these areas. If my family had never moved from Detroit where I was born my relationship with nature and my career would look a lot different. Because I had access to natural spaces I am now a young interpreter; if most interpreters are from similar backgrounds as me (white and middle class), none of us will notice when we are excluding others because of the earlier mentioned empathy gap.
I am still learning about my privilege and how it affects my work and will be doing so for the rest of my career so I look forward to hearing your thoughts and discussing further!
Until next time,
Elle
Hey! I think you had some really great points in your post!
It's so easy to be blind to the privilege we have but once we lack some privileges they are so obvious to see. Your story about lacking suitable waders for your job is a perfect example, simply because you didn't fit the 'expected' build of others working in your field, you lacked a proper tool for your job. Just imagine if a carpenter was only given hammers without heads on them and told to get to work, we wouldn't let that happen for a moment.
I think your note about lack of access piling up is a very important point too. If things like that happen once in a blue moon then it's just a simple mistake, but once they become systematic and don't offer support for all groups involved then it becomes a permanent barrier that people need to surpass. Offering as equal footing as possible to everyone involved is super important to keeping a welcoming, accessible environment.
Week 3 Blog Post
What role does “privilege” play in nature interpretation? Please include your working definition of privilege.
Privelege is a tough subject to wrap our heads around and understand, epecially in the context of bature interpretation but with a bit of work it can be understood. When speaking on privilege I would say the best definition I could use is that privilege is a set of benefits that someone receives that others do not. These benefits could be due to gender, race, class or any other number of factors and are often hard to see without precisely looking for them. This could come in the form of unconscious bias towards hiring a certain group of people or could be much more explicit like not having wheelchair access to a building. Things like this are detrimental to those who lack the privlege of not having to worry about them.
Within nature interpretation there is plenty that is affected by privelege. For starters, just being able to be concious about nature, its needs and its importance is a very priveleged position. I was born and raised in a clean rural area and given the ability to do well in school to the point I could get accepted into university. All of these factors have aided me in getting to the point I am in today where I can learn how to communicate the knowledge I’m gaining in my courses with others. Futhermore I do not have any major disabilities which allows me to freely explore nature whenever I want, being raised in a rural area mean’t I was never far from a trail or lake, and to go even further I’m a tall man which means I rarely feel unsafe going to secluded areas where others may feel uneasy.
As it should be clear to see, my circumstances, or privelege, has given me the ability to acrue knowledge and share it with others. It’s quite easy to imagine if someone was not able to afford an education like me or didn’t have the freedom to explore nature then they simply would not have the chance to be a nature interpreter like myself. This is one of the great things about being a nature interpreter - I can give the opportunity of learning all about the environment to those who otherwise wouldn’t have the chance. Even just doing something like a nature walk with a group of people could open them up to a new world. Maybe someone could come along since they’ve always enjoyed being outdoors but never had the time to dive in depth into it, with a quick bit of exposure I could give them an insight into something that ends up being very important to them.
So to sum up - being a nature interpreter is a very privileged position due to the circumstances it takes to become one, but also as an environmental interpreter we can help break down these barriers of privilege so that others who may not have had opportunities in the past can experience all that nature has to offer. It’s most definitely an interesting position to be in and I hope not only myself but everyone in this course takes full advantage of being able to share natural insights with others.
Blog post 2
Blog Prompt:
Describe your ideal role of environmental interpreter. What might it entail? Where might it be? What skills might you need? (Keep these all-in mind as you begin to work on your assignments – tailor these to that ideal job!)
My ideal role as an environmental interpreter would be one that aligns with my personality and life style. Due to this I believe I would be very happy with a park services role, particularly, a conservation officer. I have worked at a local conservation area before, and really enjoyed it. One of the aspects that made it great was many of the people visiting were from cities, often with younger children. It was amazing to see the wonder on their faces and how excited they were when they got to experience nature. I often received many questions from both parents and younger people about various topics. These including why is something the way it is, how does something do this, and my personal story, to name a few. Sharing with them my knowledge in an environment that they are already extremely intrigued about, made it that much more impactful. Sharing my story with nature, and recommending other areas to explore more, hopefully helped them to explore their curiosity even further . I believe as a conservation officer, I would be able to further my knowledge about the environment. Specifically, on conservation of animals, habitat, and animal behaviour, all of which I am very passionate about. In addition to this, as a conservation officer, you are in a position of seniority. This gives a unique opportunity to have the attention of park goers and have your opinions valued. As a result, a great responsibility is taken on, one that I would like to take on and do my best at utilizing to educate anyone I can.
My ideal location for this job would be a park anywhere farther north. Whether that be in Ontario or another province. The previous park I worked at, although enjoyable, was very close to town and was more of a trailer park, than a natural area. I would love to work in a park that is secluded and as natural as possible. This would provide a multitude of learning opportunities and make it much easier for anyone who has questions, to form those questions. Being immersed in an area is the best and fastest way to learn. I can equate this to some courses I have had. In certain courses, we are simply given data and told to analyze it. With this approach, it is often hard as we are separate from the process and not able to pose questions ourselves. Contrary to this, in courses where I get to go into the field and collect data in the forest myself, I learn much more. I was there to physically do it and was immersed. Questions came to mind and the data made much more sense.
I will need a multitude of skills for this role as an interpreter. Skills mentioned before such as knowledge on conservation of animals, habitat, and animal behaviour. I am constantly learning about these topics and will continue to. It will make it much easier as well when working everyday in this environment to learn quicker. However, the most important skill for this job is communication. I can have all the knowledge in the world, but it is useless unless I can effectively pass it on to people I am speaking with. I would look at my role as a mentor to people wanting to learn, not someone in power or a lecturer. Due to this, being able to convey my knowledge in an effective way is crucial.
Hey there! I read through your blog post and related a lot to it! It sounds super cool to have had the chance to work in a conservation area, considering the course we’re in, it seems like a great job to help build up a skill set for future careers. I especially loved how you got the chance to help people learn about nature and all it has to offer. I think I (and maybe other people in this course could relate to this as well) tend to take for granted the knowledge we have about nature and assume most others would have a similar set of ideas, but there’s many people out there who haven’t had the chance to connect with and learn about nature like we have.
I definitely relate that some of the parks in Ontario don’t feel nearly as wild as others. Some can be buried deep in the bush while others are just off the highway and feel more like a roadside stop than a true provincial park. Here’s to hoping you can find the right combination of wilderness and civilization that suits you best! I also think you’re dead on in the skills you’ll need to develop, although it sounds like you’ve got a good start to honing them already! Being able to understand the environment on a deeper level and being able to communicate that to others are vital skills for being a nature interpreter.
