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Oysters are Our Friends

By W. George Scarlett, Image via Internet Archive Book Images Oysters lying side by side,Keeping back the ocean’s tide.Slurping food from water’s yuckThen spitting back where yuck gets stuck.Cleaning up the estuarySo fish might live and children swimAs shores keep their shorelines trim,And wonder comes to tarry.

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Salt Marsh Periwinkle Poem

By W. George Scarlett, Illustration by Angelina Lewis Salt marsh periwinkle safe when tide is out.But tide’s now rolling in with blue crabs all about.Up goes periwinkle climbing smooth cordgrass.Now those hungry blue crabs will have to swim on past.

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Make Your Own Periwinkle Snail Habitat

By Leah Harrigan, image via Carolina Wildscapes (Adobe Stock) Children can see and feel the magic of ecosystems by creating a “Periwinkle Snail Habitat” using common household materials. This hands-on project will help them understand the role of snails in our environment while having some fun along the way. Materials Large glass or plastic container…

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A Journey of Life with Snails and Slugs

By Fangfang Xiao, translated by Qin Shu One morning, after a rain, teachers Yue and Qi found a small mollusk, without a shell, climbing on the osmanthus tree. They quickly drew children around and sparked a discussion. The next day, Zhou brought a book called Life Story in which everyone found the answer to the…

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When Pond Problems Call for Systems Thinking

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…

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Sorting Out Pond Stuff

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…

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Book Review: Over and Under the Pond

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…

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When Nature Seems ‘Cruel’

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…

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Deep Entanglements: Children and Fungi

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…

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Technology for Playful Learning

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.

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School Gardens in the City

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…

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Collecting for Connecting to the Natural World

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…

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The Elephant-Human Relations Aid Program: Projects and Empathy for a Neighborhood of Friends

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…

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Nature’s Toolbox: Learning with Nature at the Auchlone Nature Kindergarten

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…

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The New England Aquarium’s Internship Program for Teens: From Positive Youth Development to Becoming an Ocean Steward

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…

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