My Personal Development as a Nature Interpreter
This course has not only helped me develop my skills and understanding of nature interpretation but also pushed me to really reflect upon this development through its entirety. I think my personal ethic as I develop as a nature interpreter is surrounding inclusive interpretation, specifically concerning our youngest generations. My ethic believes specifically in inclusive nature education for all, as this goes hand in hand with nature interpretation. I believe this is for a large part due to the experiences I have had working with children in an educational and outdoor environment, and the way this course has made me revaluate these experiences and what I should pursue going forward. This course has actually pushed me to really think about these experiences I have had and allowed me to delve even deeper into what I learned from them and what they now allow me to bring to the table.
Photo of Children Participating in Nature Interpretation (source: Barber, 2019)
I have always thought that children are an extremely important part of protecting our environment as they are curious, willing and excited to learn and then also share their new knowledge with their friends, family and more. This idea was further solidified through the readings and units in this course, most well put by Beck et al. “Our most important audiences might be our smallest and youngest ones. These groups are the future stewards of our natural resources and cultural heritage. They are our hope for the future. At this young age is their most impressionable as they form beliefs attitudes and emotional responses to their environments that may last a lifetime. (Beck et al. 2019, p. 144). I’ve seen such stark differences in the youngest population and those that have opportunities to truly be immersed in nature and experience nature interpretation regularly and those who do not. In my final years of high school and up until the summer of 2019, I ran a camp at an indoor trampoline park. Generally, the children that were sent to this camp were relatively privileged and their families were well off; to put this in perspective the camp was easily a couple of hundred dollars more a week than anything else offered in the area. As part of the daily schedule, I took the campers outside almost every single day, whether to the park, for a walk or to play games in a large field; unfortunately no matter what was done it was a constant battle and more often than not the kids would sit on their devices and refuse to participate. If I tried to get them interested in nature through scavenger hunts, or learning activities many of the kids did not want to participate – when issues were brought up to parents it was simply stated that they came to the camp to jump on trampolines – they could go for a hike, to the zoo or to a nature centre with their families or to a camp at one of those places if they wanted to.
Photos I took while working at the Trampoline Camp
In contrast, working at an Outdoor Education Centre with the Toronto District School Board, the students showed up so excited to learn and be outside. The visiting schools were usually from extremely urbanized and relatively low-income families in the city and had usually never experienced anything of the sort before. However, I also noted that many of the children I have had the opportunity to work with are afraid of nature; well put by Beck et al (2018, p. 54) “urban children who grow up terrified of real and imagined things out in the unknown woods could someday destroy those unfamiliar haunts of perceived danger”. Looking at the gaps in opportunities children in today’s society have really saddens me – on one end of the spectrum you have those who take nature for granted and then you have those who are often scared or afraid of it due to never being able to truly experience it. I therefore believe that it is so important for children to have the opportunities to experience nature whenever possible and it is my responsibility to try and foster this in them; as we need to have a younger generation with a true appreciation for nature to truly protect our planet and all it has to offer.
A bunch of photos I took while working at the Outdoor Education Centre
Finally, I believe education and interpretation of nature also go hand in hand and I have a responsibility to play in this. For me the approaches to nature interpretation that I find suit me best is to try and understand the audience that I am speaking to, find ways to engage them specifically and then also integrate my own personal experiences. Furthermore, I think it is very important to target nature interpretation not only to specific groups, but also to individuals within said group. People have all different learning styles; personally, I am more of a hands-on learner, however I know there are so many out there who are visual or auditory learners as well. Therefore, I believe I have a responsibility if I choose to act as a nature interpreter to try and include aspects of all of these as well as many others to accommodate whatever needs of the group of individuals, I have in front of me. In terms of my own experiences in nature I feel that small stories or anecdotes of my own are important to translating my insights and ethics to a larger audience. They make the audience feel like they know a bit more about you, and show more of your personality, they make the experience unique and memorable. This helps me as I find that I speak more naturally and sound more passionate about the subject when I do this. To finish off, I honestly believe this course has allowed me to realize that educating the public and society on nature and the environment is something I am truly passionate about, and even if it is not something I do as a full time job in the future it is definitely something I want to pursue.
References
Barber, G. (2019, September 25). Fun Outdoor Learning Activities for Young Children with Special Educational Needs. Retrieved from https://www.thestablecompany.com/blog/fun-outdoor-learning-activities-for-young-children-with-special-educational-needs
Beck, L., Cable, T.T., & Knudson, D.M. (2018). Interpreting Cultural and Natural Heritage for a Better World. Urbana, IL: Sagamore Publishing. ISBN/ISSN: 978-1-57167-865-2
Hi Emily!
This was an awesome read and I love how you have been able to connect what you’ve learned in this course to your lived experiences, especially regarding children and nature appreciation. You raise some great points about how our upbringings can affect our relationship with nature as children and eventually adults. This makes me reflect on my own childhood where I was often immersed in nature, whether it would be in the forest behind myself or the outdoor summer camps I frequented every year. Specifically, one fond memory of summer camp that your post reminded me of was a game called Predator & Prey, that we often played. In this game, kids were split up into herbivores, omnivores, and carnivores and we were tasked with collected food/energy clips hidden around the forest while avoiding (or hunting) other predators (or prey) to collect their life chips. This is just a brief overview of the game (as there are many more layers to it) but more information on how it works can be found here. While use kids thought we were just playing a version of tag, what we didn’t realize was how the ecology of food webs were being taught to us through the form of outdoor play. Not only did this educate us about these dynamics but it made us enthusiastic and willing to learn because, in contrast to being lectured, the game play element was more engaging. I think memories like this, that have stuck with me for over a decade after the fact, just goes to show how right you are when you say that children are at an impressionable and important age for molding their concepts of nature, that could end up lasting a lifetime.



























