Camp Galil (my sleepaway camp where I went 7 summers, and am returning to work this summer) is what I immediately think of when I think of outdoor spaces as sites for learning and education. Our camp is part of a Jewish Labor Zionist Youth Movement called Habonim Dror ("The Builders-Freedom") that has roots in over a dozen countries. At camp, I was taught many ideals of social justice and activism in a very laid-back outdoorsy environment. Every day, we would have 'peulot' (activities) that our counselors planned for us, where we would sit together outside in the grass in a circle having a group discussion. It was a very different kind of classroom. There are so many things to be said about convening with nature together in this way, but I think the 'boundaries' that it gave (or did not give) were very powerful.

The traditional classroom - indoors, white walls, square, windows that you should not be staring out from - give a very particular message as to how to learn, and what to be learning about. To be thinking outside the white square box is to not be present in your learning, and to be disrespectful of your education. It artificially cuts off your mind and body from the outside world.

Last week it hit me that all these discussions about ecological education and literacy and curriculum design are missing (at least) one thing. What happened to Sex. Ed.? Health class? Family Life talks? Self-Care lessons? Sexual education, in my opinion, is one of the most important parts of growing up, learning about your place in the grand natural scheme of things, and creating awareness of choices and decisions about your own physical, social, emotional and spiritual body.

When it comes to outdoor spaces as places of learning and education, I immediately think of birds and bees. I never personally encountered this 'talk' as a child, only having heard it referenced in movies, but out of curiosity I researched a bit about the lessons that are teaching sexual reproduction through natural, outdoors creatures and their actions. The fertilization of flowers bees carrying pollen represents males' ability to "pollenate" females, and egg-laying birds represent female's fertility and eggs. Another way to represent the action is that the bee stings the bird and as a result, the bird lays the eggs from which babies hatch (Yikes! Connotations of aggression, much?). 

The Ecoliterate readings for this week were incredibly interesting and enlightening, especially when thinking in terms of outdoor spaces are used in this 360 and how they may be used in other schools. Learning about the Gwich'in people and their evolving role and way of life that is at odds with oil drilling practices in Alaska was so fascinating. James's statement was especially striking: "to protect the earth is our way of life. It makes us who we are." The authors then posed the questions: How might you integrate some of these attitudes and behaviors into your own life? How can you nurture them into your own students? We then read about the experiences of students in New Orleans who came together to rethink the schools and to provide recommendations for improving schools. While there was no outdoor classroom space persay, when the oil spill occurred, the students did gain greater awareness of the interconnectedness of oil production and use and reliance, as well as how it affected them. One final part of the reading I enjoyed was the Professor who dealt with water conflicts. "What is useful? What can we apply to the conflict-resolution world? What can we learn from mystical experiene that we can bring into a room of angry people?"

As I write this, I am sitting outside on Batten House’s back porch, looking at our “jungle” and a group of about six deer, comically crunching away at these bare-boned sticks of early spring. I heard there’s a three-legged deer who hangs out in these parts, I watch for her.

Though I feel this chapter from Delpit was extremely impactful as far as what a “warm demander” looks like and acts like, the beginning of this chapter really captivated me. Delpit talks about how important teachers are for students, but makes a distinction between teachers who teach at students from “more privileged backgrounds” vs students “who are not a part of the mainstream” (72).  This distinction is something that I’ve been thinking about a lot as a first generation college student.

For me, one of the hardest things about coming to college was the level of academic rigor that was demanded of me. Mostly it was difficult to see myself struggling in these classes (that I had never experienced in the poorly funded high school that I came from) and see students who had been in private schools all their life not struggle. There was a difference and I think Delpit point it out. Both in her story about her daughter’s experience playing softball and her reframing of Gloria Ladson-Bilings words, Delpit says that in comparison to these privileged kids who can “manage to perform well in school in spite of poor teachers”, low income and culturally diverse students “depend upon schools to teach them whatever they need to know to be successful.

Throughout most of my educational experience, going outside has been seen as a luxury, a reward or fun place to hold class but one that is rarely used, because it's thought of as distracting.  On the few occasions that I have had class outside, we were supposed to act exactly as we did inside, not engaging with the environment around us and forced to ignore all "distractions" from that environment.  We never truly engaged with the place in which we were learning, because learning was seen as only the content of the class itself, not the place in which we were having it.

--"what are some ways we might think about outdoor spaces as sites of learning/education?"--here are a few images from an "outdoor classroom" that David just told me about; I've been @ BMC for over thirty years, and had never seen this space. What-and-how might we learn here?

ECON 136:  Week 11 Tasks

Looking ahead to Week 12:  We'll have our 2nd midterm on Wednesday, April 16 in class.   April 14 will be a review session.   It will cover material we've discussed since the beginning of the semester.  I'm happy to help you as you prepare.  If my office hours don't work for you, then email me with all of the times you might be able to make work and I’m sure we can work something out.

Monday:  Endowments and Perpetual Care

Preparing for Class:

Read this brief peek at the dilemmas created by the existence of cemeteries

This Blog post is the briefest (admittedly biased and incomplete) introduction I could find to the controversy surrounding the decision to break the will of the founder of the Barnes Museum.