Latest posts

By W. George Scarlett When there are pond problems, such as when fish are dying, it often takes systems thinking and high-level scientific investigation to figure out causes and what needs to be done.  That’s an unreachable goal for many children.  But with proper support, adolescents can become scientists finding cause in the combination of…

By W. George Scarlett Image ©dimedrol68 / Adobe Stock As featured elsewhere on TES (see Collecting for Connecting to the Natural World), late childhood can bring a passion for collecting and sorting stuff, including stuff from the natural world.  And so, we can put that natural affinity for collecting and sorting (classifying) to work when…

Review by Hailey Swett, book by Kate Messner with art by Christopher Silas Neal | Ponds: what lovely and lively ecosystems! What child doesn’t love exploring a pond, searching for critters big and small? In her picture book Over and Under the Pond, Kate Messner takes young readers on a journey of exploration through a…

By W. George Scarlett | Bugs sucking the blood of other bugs, hawks grabbing and tearing apart squirrels, coyotes howling after a kill – if ever someone gets sentimental about nature and speaks only of nature’s wonders, that person has missed something central about nature, namely, that nature works on a different ethic than that…

By W. George Scarlett | Waterbug, waterbug, always gliding / Never sinking, always sliding…

Written and Illustrated by Anastasia Brennan | It was a Sunday afternoon, and Tillie Turtle lay around,
At the pond with other turtles
Who hardly made a sound.
Tilly splish-splashed in the water
When a leech swam up and got her!

By Layla Sastry | The following is an exercise that can be used with younger and older children to help them connect to and know life in and around ponds.

By W. George Scarlett | To know nature can be through touching, smelling, seeing – in short, through sensing.

By Zhou Jiang and Ting Zhang | By Children in urban kindergartens lack opportunities to get close to nature. But with help from teachers, getting close to nature can still happen – as the following story illustrates. The story is about a kindergarten in the West Lake District, Hangzhou City, where poop in the…

Review by Leah Harrigan | There’s something extraordinary that happens when a child steps out into the natural world, the possibility of exploration ahead of her. With each overturned leaf and puzzling new sight, there’s a momentum that propels curiosity forward. The Hike by Alison Farrell is an outdoor adventure story that follows three curious,…

By W. George Scarlett | I have sometimes wondered how came the stars, not to mention the moon and Mars. Are they someone’s leftover Christmas tree snow? Or perhaps they are mothballs – I really don’t know.

By Amy and Dan Warren | Our son, Lio, hops in the car at the end of a cold and damp school day. Rosy-cheeked and smeared with earth and ash from fort-building and fire-making, he reaches down to take off his boots and empty them of leaves, water, and mud. His pockets carry…

By John Hornstein | My mother was happiest when foraging for mushrooms. Being an immigrant from Germany, she had difficulty adjusting to life in rural Maine. Foraging became a way for her to stay connected to her childhood. It also connected her to something more primal, the natural world. As a child tagging along on…

Review by Leah Harrigan | Deep inside the damp, dark forest, something hides behind the pine needles and twigs. But upon closer look, there’s more than just a hidden treasure to be found. There’s a whole kingdom to explore. We Are Fungi is a compelling introduction to the many functions of fungi that keep our…

By Allison Choi, illustrations by Kirsten Malsam | Anthropomorphizing to explain nature need not, indeed should not, be limited to explaining nonhuman animals. Even the elusive chemistry in evaporative cooling can become intuitively understood by children, if only we bring that chemistry alive — as Allison Choi and Kirsten Malstem’s story clearly illustrates.

Review by Leah Harrigan | There’s certainly something special about the works of Eric Carle (1929-2021), the American author and illustrator who left a legacy of more than 70 children’s books celebrated worldwide. The self-described “picture writer”, Carle gifted us his bright, iconic tissue-paper illustrations that have adorned bookshelves since the 1960s. If you’ve read…

By W. George Scarlett | In E.B. White’s classic children’s book, Charlotte’s Webb, Charlotte, the spider, becomes the kind and smart friend of Wilbur, the pig. Charlotte saves Wilbur from the usual destiny of farm pigs by weaving into her web words praising Wilbur and making him famous among the surrounding humans.  But if that were all there…

Review by Joy Chi | The following article is a collection of reviews of smartphones apps that serve to help children and adults alike to connect with nature.

By Mitchel Resnick | In recent years, a growing number of educators and psychologists have expressed concern that computers are stifling children’s learning and creativity, engaging children in mindless interaction and passive consumption. They have a point: today, many computers are used in that way. But that needn’t be the case.

Watch this short film about the journey of mountain biker and artist Brooklyn Bell, directed by Dave Meyers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adLkZNd-EOg&t=1s

By Theo Klimstra | One of the striking differences between the Netherlands and most countries is the vast number of bikes that you’ll see everywhere. In the Netherlands, everybody rides bikes, partly because they are cheap to buy and cheap to maintain for commuting (no gas required) and partly because Dutch employers team up with…

Review by Joy Chi | In previous generations, bikes were functional vehicles utilized for transportation, recreation, and sport. However, their usefulness was often overshadowed by automobiles. In Bikes For Sale written by Carter Higgins and illustrated by Zachariah Ohora, the emphasis on bike culture is evidenced through two playful characters, Maurice and Lotta. An introduction…

Watch John Denver play Garden Song on The Muppets Show! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3FkaN0HQgs

By Jane Hirschi | Years ago, I spent an afternoon with a group of eighth-grade boys digging up potatoes. They were amazed to find potatoes growing underground and surprised by their almost peppery flavor when we cooked and ate them. More recently, I witnessed a third grader who often struggled when asked to speak…

Review by Leah Harrigan | There’s a little patch of Earth in the middle of a Harlem block, right on 134th Street, where big things are happening. Once an abandoned city lot, a thriving urban farm blooms with color. This is the hub of Harlem Grown, the true story of how one school volunteer and…

Video: Banded Brothers | Series 1 Episode 1 | BBC Featured image by Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons Editors note: It’s important that we all check for ticks and remove them from our bodies.  Here’s someone getting a lot of help to do just that – remove ticks from his…

By Robin Huntley and David Sobel | Start a conversation about using the natural environment, or taking learning outside, or studying the bobolinks in the meadow, and ticks start crawling through the recesses of school administrators’ and parents’ minds. Ticks and their associated diseases are perceived as a scourge across the northeastern United States, and…

Review by Marion Reynolds | In the early 1800’s, as a teen and young woman, Mary Anning scratched about on an English shoreline, finding fossils dating back millions of years – and making sense of them. Her work contributed significantly to the development of a scientific understanding of evolution. But as a woman and…

By Jack Ridge | This is a story about collecting. Not the kind of collecting that clutters our basements and garages because we can’t let go, but the kind of collecting that stimulates life-long curiosity for the natural world. This story is about the natural objects we collect, the ones we look upon with curiosity…

By Doug Tallamy | If you live with at least some green around you, chances are you have never thought of space just outside and next to where you live as a wildlife preserve that represents the last opportunity we have for sustaining plants and animals that were once common throughout the U.S.. But that…

Review by Leah Harrigan | It’s never too early to start learning how to be an engaged citizen – just ask author Laurie Krasny Brown and illustrator Marc Brown, creators of Democracy for Dinosaurs: A Guide for Young Citizens. An introduction to civic values for young children, this book explores the important question of what…

By James Cassell | Perhaps the most impressive architects of the natural world, beavers are famous for their iconic buck teeth. Using their teeth, these furry engineers build dams to flood and sculpt their environment. In doing so, they not only provide protection and lodging for themselves, they also form stagnant ponds that provide…

By Iris Ponte | I wake up in the morning, and the first thing I do is check the outdoor temperature. As a preschool educator, I used to think 30 degrees was cold. Not anymore. Our school has opened in 17 degrees, multiple times. We have learned to layer, eat warm foods in thermoses, and…

By Ashley Lin | If you don’t know the name of the tree outside your house or apartment (or don’t know if there is a tree outside your window), you’re not alone. Most people don’t think about finding nature when they look out their window at home or at their workplace, so they don’t see…

Review by Marion Reynolds | Science journalist Sy Montgomery and photographer Nic Bishop’s latest addition to the Scientist in the Field series, The Hyena Scientist dispels myths and misunderstandings about the of true nature of the African spotted hyena, profiles the presence of women in science, and tells the story, through anecdotes and examples, of…

By Janot Mendler de Suarez and Pablo Suarez | What does humor have to do with serious stuff like climate change and environmental justice? Short answer: everything. Most people associate ‘humor’ with laughter, fun, or jokes, but when we asked legendary cartoonist Bob Mankoff what he thinks of when thinking about humor, he looked us…

By Osita Achufusi | 415,000. That’s how many African elephants are left in the wild as of 2018, according to the World Wildlife Foundation. While this may seem like a sufficient amount, it’s not. Consider that an estimated 10 million of these gentle giants roamed Africa just a mere 90 years ago and that there…

By Maria Ojala | Many young people today worry about climate change and what is happening to our planet. And those who worry cope in very different ways. Some ways lead away from positive actions and earth stewardship, while other ways forge a foundation for positive actions and earth stewardship. So how do we discover…

By W. George Scarlett |
There’s a certain irony in the fact that where we find the most diversity in life forms, in nature, we find the least diversity in human life forms – at least in the U.S.. In the U.S., go to national parks or any place where wildness is featured, and…

Images and stories by Jimmy Rouse | “In the painting, those are my two grandchildren charging up the hill. The painting is a homage to an early painting hero of mine, Chaim Souttine. He was a Russian Jew who fled to Paris as a teenager because he was beaten in his village for making graven…

By Lisa Sideris | The connection between wonder and children and childlike states is one we often take for granted. Yet wonder is also the province of scientists whose expert knowledge far exceeds that of the average layperson.

By Ashley Lin | What can we do when the world is turned upside-down? How do we help young people grapple with the uncertainty, stress, and anxiety that is a constant in life but heightened during a pandemic? How can we come out triumphant, even a bit stronger?

By Tina Grotzer | I grew up in a rural environment with woods and streams all around me. Others would say that we were poor, but I never felt impoverished. I climbed trees, explored the pond, got stuck in the mud, and jumped onto the gnarled, moss-covered roots in the middle of the creek to…

By Megan Mueller |
What is it about our relationships with pets that make them so enduring, and how do they connect us to the wider, natural world – making it more likely that we will act as earth stewards? For many, experiences with pets are experiences akin to some of the most positive and…

By W. George Scarlett | Sometimes, the need is to act in a single-minded, straightforward way, a way designed to meet a crisis head-on and without delay, a way that says “Stop talking about ‘ought’ and start acting on ‘must’ “. But to do so means setting aside characteristic adult ways of being cautious and…

By George Newman | Now that nature has entered the conversation (with storms, rising seas, wildfires, etc.), it’s obvious the times call for action to redress harms done to the natural world and to nature’s systems for sustaining life, our lives included.

By Ashley Lin | According to the International Organization for Migration, by the year 2050, up to a billion people may become climate change refugees. This is most alarming in the Pacific Island nations, where rising sea levels, warming oceans, and unsustainable fishing practices are already putting citizens in jeopardy.

Alexa Galuppo & Hannah Mascuch | The following e-books about keystone animals illustrate how we might get even very young children started on a pathway toward thinking in terms of systems – the kind of thinking central to being an earth steward.

Sarah Wagner | Imagine the best possible early childhood program – where children spend the day in a space beautifully organized to invite a variety of forms of children’s play, where the children remain engaged by a rich array of materials to play with, build with, and learn with, and where teachers engage the children…

Review by Abrina LaRose | You have to be an inspirational person to have five children’s books written about you – all five told differently but embodying the same story of a resilient African soul and hero, Wangari Maathai.

By W. George Scarlett | Let’s talk climate change. Why? It’s simple. To be an earth steward in the 21st century one must understand and do something about climate change – because climate change and its related problems constitute the single greatest threat to the health of our planet.

By Melissa Wishner | Picture a stone-grey river. The river is wide—too wide to swim across. Under its glassy surface lives a thriving community of eels, snapping turtles, fish, crabs, and other plant and animal life. You wouldn’t think a river like this would be easy to ignore.

By Bian Xia | After four visits to China, Howard Gardner wrote in To Open Minds, a seminal text comparing education in China and the United States: We might contrast the Western, more “revolutionary” view with a more “evolutionary” view espoused by the Chinese.

By W. George Scarlett | At four, the future primatologist Jane Goodall wondered how eggs come out of a hen—so she crawled into her family’s little henhouse to find out. After a while, a hen followed her in and gave her the answer. The little girl was mesmerized.

A book of information and activities regarding climate change for educators of children. This resource is free, open source and available for download at archive.org

Over a million students skipped school to protest inaction against climate change in the Fridays for Future movement started by 15-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg.

By Liz Georgakopoulos | The teen internship program at the New England Aquarium dates back to 1992 when funding first became available for summer jobs for teenagers in Boston. After a slow start of two interns in 1992 and an increase to 10 interns in 1996, the popularity and funding fell into place partially…