Outdoor Education Commons^™

Enganging Families In Outdoor Education, Jim Mchardy

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Over twenty years ago we started the Neighbourhood Family program where we go into high risk neighborhoods and offer groups of families the opportunity to go away to the Kinark Outdoor Centre based on their capacity to come together and get organized. This has been our indepth exposure and training with regards to parent and family engagement.

Most recently, we have initiated a 'No Child Left Inside' project where we facilitate short duration nature programs at high needs schools and family nature days in the green spaces adjacent to low income housing projects. Why are we doing this you may …

Book Reviews, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section reviewed several books, including:

Navigating Environmental Attitudes, written by Thomas A. Heberlein

Environmental Education (Critical Concepts in the Environment), edited by Justin Dillon and Alan Reid

Letters to a Young Scientist, written by Edward O. Wilson

Resources, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains a listing of teaching resources of all types for those who work in the field of outdoor education at the time of publication. Some highlighted items include: "Trip Ideas and How-to Advice" and "C&NN's Nature Clubs for Families Tool Kit."

Contents, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

The Coalition for Education in the Outdoors is a non-profit network of outdoor and environmental education centers, nature centers, conservation and recreation organizations, outdoor education and experiential education associations, institutions of higher learning, public and private schools, fish and wildlife agencies, and businesses that share a mission to support and further outdoor education and its goals.

Grand Ideas! 21 Great Ways Grandparents And Grandfriends Can Connect Kids To Nature, Richard Louv

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

What's a grandparent to do?

Marti Erickson makes a practice of keeping two collapsible chairs in her car trunk. If she's having a particularly stressful day, she drives to the closest patch of nature, sits on one of those chairs, and is soothed. She always carries two chairs in the trunk of her car. "My oldest grandchild likes nature breaks, too, and joins me when we're out together."

Last year, for an article in the AARP Bulletin, I quoted Marti about the potential benefits of nature experience, including stress reduction, better health, and family bonding.

College Corner, Jennica Skoug, Anna Miller And Kendra Liddicoat

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Wisconsin was the first state to require its teachers to receive "adequate instruction in the conservation of natural resources"' establishing—as early as 1935—a clear ambition to continue this mindset through conservation education. Conservation education has grown into Environmental Education (EE) and Education for Sustainability (EfS), and today, Wisconsin serves as a metaphorical magnet for students and organizations looking to further these fields. In particular, the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (UWSP) College of Natural Resources is home to a variety of outdoor education majors and minors that can be difficult to find at other universities, but whose popularity continues to thrive. …

In The News, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains multiple brief news items related to conservation, environment, and outdoor education. Some titles include: "Celebration of the Military Child Outdoors" and "Ancient Tree Clones To Be Planted In Effort To Restore Forests, Fight Climate Change."

Interview With Melinda Hughes-Wert, Executive Director, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Taproot: This issue of Taproot is focused on the role of volunteers (especially parents and grandparents) in helping connect children to nature. Your mission statement indicates Nature Abounds was created, in part, to "encourage volunteerism." Please describe how Nature Abounds encourages volunteerism.

We believe everyone has something to contribute towards the betterment of the planet regardless of age, race, gender, etc...Everyone needs to take care of their share. By working together, we can solve world problems through citizen action. Likewise, we believe that if we take care of the planet, the planet will take care of us. For example, if …

Students Afield And Stream, Charles Yaple

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

How can a retired U.S. Postal Service worker connect high school students to the outdoors and get them involved with home community environmental awareness and improvement projects? Recent research findings suggest fewer of today's teenagers value the natural environment as strongly as young people did twenty years ago. It appears athletics, music, dance, theatrics, video games and I pods dominate after school time for most students. "No problem," said grandfather Doug Thornton. Find a few students with at least a spark of interest in the outdoors, start an after school Sportsman's Club and see if the sparks can be fanned …

Contents, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

The Coalition for Education in the Outdoors is a non-profit network of outdoor and environmental education centers, nature centers, conservation and recreation organizations, outdoor education and experiential education associations, institutions of higher learning, public and private schools, fish and wildlife agencies, and businesses that share a mission to support and further outdoor education and its goals.

Exploring The Bronx's Post-Industrial Concrete Plant Park, Nathan Kensinger

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Concrete Plant Park, which opened in 2009, is part of New York City's new series of parks that creatively engage their industrial past. Although overshadowed by its more famous siblings— The High Line and Brooklyn Bridge Park—^this seven-acre space is the city's answer to Seattle's seminal Gas Works Park. Both parks prominently feature structures from their industrial history, and both seek to bring the public to a polluted, neglected post-industrial waterfront.

Interview With Jesse Silverstein, Raena Blumenthal

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

In this section, Raena Blumenthal interviews Jesse Silverstein, the Executive Director of the Colorado Brownfields Foundation, about the issue of brownfields and their potential redevelopment.

Generating Learning By Generating Wind Power, Katina Sayers-Walker

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This paper is a first-hand account that details the project and activities that led to the building of the Tully Central Schools' windmill. Beginning in the fall 2008 and continuing through the spring 2011, students and teachers at the Tully High School in Tully, New York worked collaboratively with community members to build a windmill on school grounds. Using traditional and not-so traditional methods of teaching and instruction, students were engaged in "hands-on" and "minds-on" learning activities. Community members were called upon for additional expertise in the area of electrical engineering. This project was an initiative funded by State University …

Book Reviews, Charles Yaple

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section reviewed the following books:

Teaching 2030: What We Must Do For Our Students and Our Public Schools-Now and in the Future, written by Barnett Berry and the Teacher Solutions 2030 Team and reviewed by Charles H. Yaple.

Up: A Mother and Daughter's Peakbagging Adventure, written by Patricia Herr-Ellis and reviewed by Julie M. Bako.

Professional Opportunity, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section highlighted the "Refining Leadership in Out of School Time 2013 Boost Conference" at the Palm Springs Convention Center in Palm Springs and discusses the many ways this conference could benefit those working in outdoor, environmental, or conservation education.

Resources, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains a listing of teaching resources of all types for those who work in outdoor education at the time of publication. The items in this issue include the activities "Mapping Our Human Footprint" and "Introduction to Population."

College Corner, Maggie Lubanko And Ben Mirkin

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Since the Emergence of Outward Bound and NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School), programs have been popping up all over the country spanning from high school outing clubs and high ropes courses to university orientation trips and college degrees (Raiola & O'Keefe, 1999). When an individual is looking to become a qualified instructor in the field of outdoor education, however, there are few programs that offer the combination of high level outdoor training, therapeutic training options, and academic rigor similar to the offerings at the University of New Hampshire.

From The Editor, Charles Yaple

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

It may seem strange to celebrate the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors 25* anniversary by publishing an issue of Taproot dedicated to the subject of urban expansion and brownfields. However, in 1987, the Coalition founders (see 25* anniversary, pages 2-3) recognized that the future need and demand for implementing the benefits of outdoor education would increasingly come from urbanized locales. They, thus, focused the Coalition's mission toward promoting high quality research and encouraging collaboration amongst the best outdoor education scholars to address the needs of a nation becoming less and less rural. Indeed, a nation where many communities would …

Rapid Urban Expansion Threatens Biodiversity, Yale University

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

A brief window of opportunity exists to shape the development of cities globally before a boom in infrastructure construction transforms urban land cover, according to a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Researchers at Yale, Texas A&M and Boston University predict that by 2030 urban areas will expand by more than 463,000 square miles, or 1.2 million square kilometers. That is equal to 20,000 American football fields becoming urban every day for the first three decades of this century.

In The News, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains multiple brief news items related to conservation environmental or outdoor education.

Ceo 25th Anniversary, Charles Yaple

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

With this issue of its biannual Taproot journal of outdoor education, the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors (CEO) begins celebrating twenty-five years of serving the outdoor education needs and challenges of modem society.

Wasted Places, Kate Golden

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Wasted Places is a collaborative investigation by six nonprofit newsrooms into federal and state programs designed to cleanup and redevelop polluted tracts known as brownfields. The project was coordinated by the Investigative News Network, and reported and written by the Connecticut Health Investigative Team, City Limits, Iowa Center for Public Affairs Journalism, the New England Center for Investigative Reporting, the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism and INN.

Conference Calendar, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section provides a list of conferences in the field of outdoor education including the "Council of Outdoor Educators of Ontario: Make Peace with Winter Conference" and "23rd Annual International Challenge Course Conference and Exposition."

Interview With Joan Maloof, Charles Yaple

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

DR. JOAN MALOOF is the author of Teaching the Trees and a new book titled, Among the Ancients: Adventures in the Eastern Old-Growth Forests. She is also the founder of the Old-Growth Forest Network – a nonprofit organization dedicated to identifying and preserving one forest in each county of the United States which will never be logged and will be open to the public.

How The City Hurts Your Brain, Jonah Lehrer

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Now scientists have begun to examine how the city affects the brain, and the results are chastening. Just being in an urban environment, they have found, impairs our basic mental processes. After spending a few minutes on a crowded city street, the brain is less able to hold things in memory, and suffers from reduced self-control. While it's long been recognized that city life is exhausting – that‘s why Picasso left Paris – this new research suggests that cities actually dull our thinking, sometimes dramatically so.

A Visit To Sigurd, Grandfather And Thoreau, Robert T. Leverett

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

Our destination was the Trailhead at Dunbar Brook. We were half serious about trying out an experiment in Japanese ―woodair- bathing,‖ which we read about for the first time in one of our friend Joan Maloof‘s excellent books. We both agreed that Dunbar was the place to try out shinrinyoku. The basic idea is to absorb the compounds of the forest by breathing them in as free molecules, released by the trees and a myriad of other forest organisms, but mainly by the trees. The molecules enter the lungs and make their way into the blood stream, presumably imparting health …

Book Reviews, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

In this section, the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors gives A Fifty Year Salute to Ron Reed and the Mohican Outdoor School and commends the book "Mohican School: An Experiment in Outdoor Learning, 1961-2005" by Ron Reed, as well as reviews "Among the Ancients: Adventures in the Eastern Old-Growth Forests" by Joan Maloof and reviewed by Charles Yaple.

Book Nook, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains a list of suggested reading for those in the field of Outdoor Education, Conservation, or Environmentalism. Some titles include "Thunder Tree: Lessons from an Urban Wildland" by Robert Michael Pyle and "The Failure of Environmental Education (And How We Can Fix It)" by Charles Saylan and Daniel T. Blumstein.

News Briefs, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section contains multiple brief news items related to conservation, environment, or outdoor education.

Professional Organizations, Coalition For Education In The Outdoors

Taproot: A Journal of Outdoor Education

This section includes numerous organizations related to outdoor education and environmental or conservation education. Some organizations include: the American Canoe Association and the Environmental Literacy Council.