Nov 22, 2023·edited Nov 22, 2023Liked by Antonia Malchik
As someone who teaches those disconnected, disembodied freshmen, it's a struggle. They recognize that they don't enjoy their science classes, but their most common response is to hunker down and try to get through them quickly and efficiently, with as little engagement as possible. Even while I stand there and say, "NO, you are right and the system is wrong, and let's agree to do something different."
I'd like to share this piece with them next semester, if I might.
They're so worn out. I've got a 7th-grader and a high school sophomore, and the pressures on them are immense. No matter how many different ways I try to tell them to let go of worrying about grades, or what really matters in life, the weight of messages they're getting from elsewhere are mostly too much. My older kid does have one science teacher who's managed to structure it differently, where it's completely hands-on, but it's part of a special curriculum that the teachers have to get training for and the kids opt into (a biomedical sciences class the first year followed by Human Body Systems the second). His chemistry class is totally old-school and wow I've forgotten how deadening that can be.
A former student of mine taught astronomy to high schoolers for a year or two precisely because there were no state standards for it, which allowed him to do whatever he wanted.
Nov 22, 2023·edited Nov 22, 2023Liked by Antonia Malchik
When I left the university system the second time, in 2014, I had this idea about producing localized textbooks to keep money in communities instead of sending it all to the big publishers in NYC. Turns out that most people seem to be more interested in the convenience, simplicity, and safety of standards. Even adoption of free open textbooks has been surprisingly slow.
I had kept this bookmarked long to be read at leisure and boy was it worth it! So many tiny treasures you have brought back to us in this anecdote, from the caddisfly shell to the mountain lion pee, from the shiny collection of the delinquent packrat to the soothing waves of the river colliding on the rocks - and please the squirrel shrooms, how cute was that! I loved it Nia, yes science is best learned through experience, outside the reaches of classrooms, lab notes, and lectures. Reminds me the poem The Mushroom Hunters by Neil Gaiman. This one’s for you, our own true mushroom hunter!
Oh, Swarna, you have no idea how that poem resonates over here as I sit at my desk watching the sun climb high and thinking of my sleeping kids because it's a day off of school.
When my younger kid was born, one of my best, oldest friends sent a copy of Neil Gaiman's children's book "Blueberry Girl." My kid never quite got into it, but I loved it from day 1 and even hearing Gaiman's name reminds me now of those early days and months. When someone who is becoming such a full, self-knowing person was a tiny baby who slept a lot and all the peace they would often give me.
I love caddisflies. Have I mentioned that a time or ten here? 😂 But squirshrooms and mountain lion pee are definitely new delights.
It makes me emotional when you say that, even if I am not a mother I know the feeling of watching over someone vulnerable sleeping and reminiscing on the life they would eventually live and the love that often be exchanged between you and them. I personally haven’t gotten deep into Gaiman’s work but this one poem is very important to me, I found it at a time I was really struggling with my identity and overall sense of self and I found so much peace reading it. The mushroom hunters with their babies in the sling and pocket knives reminded me that life is full of possibilities and I need to stop being afraid and venture out.
Caddisflies are such amazing beings, I actually have seen a lot of those in my gradma’s pond but didn’t know what they were called. The fish in the pond used to eat them. What do you specifically love about them ?
I am relieved to hear this coming from you, someone who is a mother and love her kids. I felt doubtful to even consider writing about my outlook on motherhood for the fear of harsh judgement. I really feel vulnerable and bullied because people assume we childless women are either barren and jealous of women with pretty babies, or heartless corporate career tribe who are secretly satan worshippers by night. Many people also accused me of being selfish, that confuses me the most? I am the selfish for not being a conduit to someone else’s idea of how I choose to live ?
Freya writes on all these with such prowess and that’s why I love the workings of her mind so much 💜
Being a woman of certain age without a child of your own is so threatening to society, that they assume that maybe we are child haters and may harm children in some way. And this couldn’t be further from the truth. I infact am extremely fond of children, I think they have the potential to be everything that we are not and more. I have been a private tutor for most of my college years and interacting with young curious minds were the best parts of my days. Maybe I should revisit this part of my identity and write about it.
I for one would love reading about your time as a tutor!
This is definitely something that I don't advise anyone TO write or to NOT write about because you're right: almost any writing about motherhood, but especially not choosing it, opens one up to being bullied. I have never understood the claims of selfishness. What does that even mean? Actually, it makes me really, really angry because it's effectively telling women in particular that we never have a right to be a full human being unless we're serving others. As someone who's literally been caregiving since I was four years old and is heartily sick of it, I resent that!
You, and me, and every one of us, have the right to a full and fulfilling life, whatever that looks like, simply for being alive. That's what threatens the critics so much: people who are fully alive and fully themselves. They try to tear them down with accusations like "selfish." Pfiffle.
One of my college roommates has 4 brothers, and loves being an aunt to their kids. She works as a parcel sorter for an airline company, and gets free tickets that she can use to take friends or family members places, so as her siblings' kids got older, she started traveling to different countries with each of them. That's so awesome and something I could never give because my own kids need that time from me (also I don't work for an airline and don't get free tickets). But you know what? She is an awesome person and someone I love dearly and has the right to her own full existence whether or not she's a great aunt! She is, but even if she weren't, it wouldn't be anyone's damn business.
Apologies for the delayed response, Nia. I resonate with your concerns about the persistent gender roles, especially regarding women shouldering the family’s caregiving responsibilities, particularly pronounced in third-world countries. Despite advancements in education and innovation, these traditional roles persist. Post-pregnancy, women often face challenges in achieving personal goals, financial independence, and, in extreme cases, health. Social pressures and traditional values cast a shadow on a woman’s individual growth and well-being.
While I may not be accepted in an absolute sense for being a childless woman in my current socioeconomic and geographical context, I’ve come to accept it. I deeply admire the resilience of mothers, including my own, who faced hardships and sacrificed personal aspirations due to societal expectations.
This brought tears to my eyes. The feeling of constantly moving houses is something I can truly relate to because we rented houses, my entire childhood. My parents only built and moved to their permanent home after I, the youngest, went to college. Like you, I too found my grandmother’s abode a constant midst the turbulent flow of life. You reminded me of the aspect of my childhood that I completely forgot.
I can’t imagine the pain and discomfort you must have gone through due to your condition during pregnancy. It sounds incredibly dangerous and scary. I am so grateful that you found good healthcare at the right time.
I would walk with you down any and every road if you need me to 💜
Moving so often does leave you feeling strangely rootless, doesn't it? I can say that I don't get overly attached to many possessions and can pack quickly and lightly! But having a home is a special thing when it's something you couldn't count on during those formative years.
I was very lucky. It's a rare condition but my obstetrician had a lot of experience with high-risk pregnancies and rare complications. It did teach me to push back when people scoff that women having been bearing children just fine for thousands of years. Very true but we've also been dying in childbirth for thousands of years!
All the roads lead somewhere we can meet someday, I hope.
I agree with you, Nia. I believe that the absence of a constant nest has turned me into a restless wanderer. I find solace in traveling, in the journey itself rather than the destination. It’s a quality that can make me seem inconsistent at times, but I genuinely am not. I think having a stable home during your formative years influences how you perceive the world, instilling confidence because you come from a more reliable background. It’s disheartening to think about how challenging it must be to have no home at all.
The casual disregard with which people often treat women who can’t or choose not to have children is a separate but significant issue. Childbirth is one of the most challenging experiences a human can go through, yet many make it sound like it happens effortlessly. It’s fortunate that you had access to the right medical care, which saved your life, but not everyone is as lucky. Throughout my life, I’ve heard countless times that my mother almost died giving birth to me. Still, I face an overwhelming amount of judgment if I even question the idea of motherhood and whether it’s right for me. People often say, “Everyone does it, it’s not a big deal,” but I think, “It’s not your life on the line.” Even if many people choose it, at what cost? Is it so wrong to at least question it?
I do truly believe that how we are raised, including having a stable, secure-feeling home base or not, determines more about our future lives and the world we co-create than most people realize. And reading your "solace . . . in the journey itself rather than the destination" gives me chills. I've stopped hiking with a lot of my friends because they're so eager to get to the top of the mountain or whatever and I keep telling them "I'm a process person." I want to sink into the journey, not focus on getting there.
I wish more people would talk openly about both childbirth and motherhood. It IS a big deal. I love my kids and would not change that choice--they're amazing humans and I'm glad they're in the world--but I also know that my life, my writing, my senses of freedom and self, would be very different if I hadn't become a mother. (I never wanted to get married or have kids when I was growing up, so maybe came into it differently than many I've talked with, who are honestly horrified that I ever consider what my life would look like without these realities.) It seems to be difficult for people to accept that women can find both those lives equally valuable.
And, you know, I almost died! HELLP Syndrome has a high mortality rate because almost nobody recognizes the symptoms. Lots of women die from it for all kinds of reasons. Lots of women find themselves stripped down and eroded in other ways even if pregnancy and childbirth go well. And on the flip side, I have way too many friends who wanted to have children but couldn't, or wanted to have more but couldn't (like my younger sister). There is nothing wrong with questioning all of it. We have a right to our own existence for its own sake, to be full humans in and of ourselves.
It drives me *nuts* when people go on about how "there's no love like it." I don't think that's true! And it's so demeaning to women, as if our personhood is determined solely by how our bodies can be pressed into service for others. (I'm straying into Freya's realm now; she writes so well about all of this.)
It’s the bond of kindred spirits that allows us to effortlessly resonate and connect whenever we engage in conversation. Grief manifests in various forms, and sometimes, selective amnesia is one of them. For many years leading up to writing that essay, I had actively avoided confronting the notion of death, even when I lost my beloved grandmother, causing my mother to lose both her parents. I deliberately remained oblivious, focusing on building a career and crafting my identity in this world.
However, a couple of years ago, during a visit to her old home, now renovated and managed by my cousins, I came to realize just how much I had lost. Suddenly, the place and the person who were the custodians of countless childhood memories were no more. I can’t help but ponder whether it will be the same when, eventually, my parents also depart.
I felt it was now the right time to compose a letter to her, even though she will never read it, to find the closure I need. I believe we all seek that closure in our own way. I look forward to reading your letter to your grandmother. Sometimes, it’s not about what people say or do, but how they make you feel that truly endures. If you felt safe and loved in her home, it signifies that, in her unique way, she loved you too by providing a secure space for you.
The part about your journey closer to death due to pregnancy complication just broke my heart. It must have been hard to go through so much and then come out on the other side to realise you lost someone. This was a deeply personal and vulnerable revelation, tight hugs for sharing this with me 💜
This is another whole beautiful essay all on its own, about grief, about forgetting, about what we try to hide from when we simply don't have the capacity to face it in all its forms and weight. We should be allowed our own time to come to them.
I went by my grandmother's old house a few months ago and had some similar thoughts. When I was growing up we moved a lot, and my parents are now divorced and remarried (both for the better), but my grandmother's tiny house with her beloved small dogs was always a constant.
"In her unique way, she loved you too by providing a secure space for you." That's it exactly. She wasn't trying to, but she did, just by being herself.
I wrote about the pregnancy many years ago -- I came down with an extremely rare pregnancy-related condition called HELLP Syndrome that is usually fatal, but luckily my doctor recognized the signs--but haven't about losing my grandmother during that time. I think you've walked with me to a place where I can start looking at that. 💖
There's something about that mushroom poem that reaches into my very sense of self and reminds me of the long story we're all a part of in a similar way to paying attention to rocks and geology does. Now that's power in words!
I was an aunt before I became a mother, and a friend before that, and a human always, and strongly feel that those feelings, whether of active nurturing or simply of care, are given to all of us in all kinds of forms to live out in our own individual ways.
I'd love to read more about your grandma's pond! Hm, caddisflies. Well, the way they build their little shells around themselves with the tiniest gravel is just amazing to me, and that those shells are such perfect tiny cylinders much of the time. But honestly? I'm just kind of contrary. If I'm out with a bunch of serious birdwatchers I'll go wander off to get to know the trees. If everyone is talking about the trees, I'm going to get really interested in mosses and lichen and rocks. My attention is always going to that which most everyone around me isn't seeing, or is ignoring. It isn't some special character trait; I honestly think it's just contrariness. The first time I ever watched the World Cup with friends and they were all into Brazil or Portugal or whoever it was, I got super into supporting Belize because nobody else paid them any attention. Caddisflies ARE super cool though. The fact that they exist just delights me.
It’s so fascinating to know that such small creatures have such specific abilities. I’m in awe of your nuanced observations. Paying attention to these unattended things is what makes me admire you deeply, things like talking to sweetgrass. The attention you give is an act of healing; you are a healer who remedies or tries to remedy the brokenness of this world!
Well, I admire you deeply right back! (And how did you know my secret desire is to be a healer?)
Oh my goodness, Swarna, that essay. Maybe this was before we were connected here because I don't remember ever reading it. I am reading it in a coffee shop where I've just been interrupted by an acquaintance I haven't seen in a while, a nurse, and we talked about a mutual friend, one of my closer friends, whose mother just passed away. So this is all resonating for me in ways that I can't even describe. Including that as I was reading your letter, I was reminded that I never really got to mourn either of my grandmothers--the one I knew best, here in Montana, died two days before my first baby was born, and I was so close to death at the time myself (pregnancy problems) that I'm not sure I ever even grasped the loss.
And I finished it thinking, "I'm going to write Grandma a letter." It won't be anything like yours. She wasn't warm or affectionate or talkative, and didn't like children very much, but I loved her and always felt safe in her house. By sharing your homage to your grandmother, you've brought me to a place where maybe I can start grieving mine. And I will be forever thinking of you trying to find that familiar smell in shops that cannot sell what they don't have.
Also I love this line: "I think I might have found my way back into this world simply because I missed being human."
> Lack of embodied, hands-on learning is one of the things that bugs me most about modern education, especially when it comes to math and science.
So very, very much this. Not only would embodied learning help a great many people to understand what they're being taught, it also helps to bridge disciplinary siloes.
That is so true! I've been reading more and more of researchers' and scientists' desire for that recently, but the barriers to truly seeing it happen seem immense. And for no good reason -- just hidebound habits and practices.
Hear hear! Beautifully said! I think of Gregory Cajete in NATIVE SCIENCE talking about how crucial personal participation is to knowing any part of nature. Western education moves everything to the head, to "knowledge of" rather than "knowing." I also think of the difference, in Spanish, between saber (to know something) and conocer (to know someone, always takes a person preposition after it), and how knowing the rest of this dear Earth and all creatures needs to be the personal kind--it is more complete and therefore accurate when it's the personal kind.
That is such a great differentiation -- "knowledge of" versus "knowing." I didn't know that in Spanish, either! Lovely. I consciously avoided writing about Indigenous science and traditions here because I don't know enough not to be at best appropriative, but definitely thought about it throughout the course. They work a lot with the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes, so maybe some point in the future there can be something co-created, if the CSKT would want that.
Wow. I loved this so much. I had to keep stopping to jot down notes so I would remember in my comment 😆 first of all, your writing transports me every time!! Thank you for taking us to your secluded cabin and magical river. I couldn’t agree more about science and getting dirty, and as a former classroom science teacher it is so disheartening to see my kids slog thru the scientific method and rarely, if ever, get their hands dirty!! 😣 my 6th grader just did a short lesson on the flint water crisis (why!?!?) while we have the Great Lakes right outside our back door to study and explore and fall in love with!!! Save the crises for when their brains are more developed and begin with LOVE and CARE and their five senses!!! 💔💔
Also, i hope that I’m never in a place where I need to identify mountain Lion pee, but now I know it’s funky with metallic notes. Lol.
I am so jealous of your master naturalist program and last summer I entertained starting a summer camp with a friend called *MATH WIZ CAMP* that would basically be game/puzzle based with lots of group discussions and mistakes and “getting messy” a la Ms frizzle. But we are both frazzled moms so it didn’t happen. 😆
And I literally JUST witnessed a squirrel snacking on a mushroom last week in our backyard and our (me & my kids) minds were blown! I did not know they ate mushrooms & now I’m going to keep my eyes peeled for little drying ones too! 😍
Wow, thank you for sharing all of these wonderful thoughts! I agree with you about disheartening and YES about the Great Lakes. There's a lifetime of learning right there! Our 5th graders go on a walking field trip to a wetlands at the edge of town, and the time I chaperoned I was so inspired. The Whitefish Lake Institute hosts it and did a great job with different stations, especially the one where they used a huge trailer bed and built a river ecosystem to show effects of different activities along a riparian corridor. It immediately showed how development, deforestation, planting native trees, etc., etc., affected the river and her banks. Why not make it all like that?! 🌊💖
Haha, if you ever smell it, tell me what you think! I'm still trying to shape words around it. And hope I don't have opportunity to smell it super fresh up close and personal. (🐅🐆<-- not mountain lions)
It is so hard to organize things like that. I'm lucky that there were two other women who got really interested in changing relationship with math at the same time I did. It took us two years to even get a pilot off the ground and then that was the school year that Covid came! It's been shaky since then, but playing math games with 3rd-graders 30 minutes once a week is never something I regret, even though I don't usually have the time. I love seeing them so enthusiastic.
Ooh, if you ever get a chance to take a photo I'd love to see one! It's one thing to see the squirshrooms in the trees, but even cooler to see them eating one. 😀🍄🐿️
I never thought you'd have that kind of temptation, given the zeal I feel in what I have read in these posts. If you ever slip into that "fade," I hope to anonymously encounter you on some wordless, gestureless common ground.
I loved, loved, loved reading this. It resonates so very much, especially because I just spent the last weekend doing very similar things. I'm on my third round through a nine-month intensive wildlife tracking course in the Pacific Northwest--one field trip a month plus lots of self-study in between--and we were at the Oregon Dunes for three days. It's a marvelous place to track because the big expanses of sand take impressions so very well, and there is *so much* wildlife active out there, from insects to large carnivores. It's wonderful.
And...I only got into tracking about six years ago, though I'd dipped my toes in a few times before that. And I wish that my science classes in school had begun with these kinds of experiences. A few of my teachers tried, I think they would have preferred to teach this way, but there was the almighty curriculum and achievement testing to get through. I was good enough at that, I guess, but the love of inquiry didn't ignite in me until I discovered tracking and began using it to answer questions like: who else lives here?
I worked in academia for eighteen years with two rounds of graduate school along the way, so I know what I'll be in for if I decide to go back and study something like wilderness ecology. I'm also old enough at this point to know how to make that experience my own, if I do decide to do it.
I still wish I'd found this avenue earlier. Better late than never, though. And it really has shifted my attitude toward the beings who live around us, and especially the ones we've chosen to call pests.
Wow, I loved reading about this! And am envious -- a nine-month intensive wildlife tracking course sounds like absolute heaven, especially in PNW, which isn't *that* far from me but which is so different in the most beautiful ways.
I think a lot of teachers would prefer to teach like this, but the millstone seems to grind harder every year. I wish we could find effective ways to push back against demands about curriculum and testing at state levels, and I have to say one of my big disappointments about this locally is how many parents *want* the testing and benchmarks because they truly believe it makes their kids more competitive. (What if it makes them miserable, though?! Which it does.)
It is one of the many nice things about getting older (I'm 47), that you don't have to care so much about those benchmarks for yourself. You can learn for the love of it. I wish it was something more people realized our kids deserve, too. But in the meantime, we can try for the opportunities when they're available.
Thank you! And yes, I knew so many teachers over my career, especially the ones working in education programs, who really wanted to cultivate curiosity and love of their subjects. Testing and benchmarks definitely made me miserable! This way isn't just more enjoyable, I retain more, too.
Absolutely! It's real learning. (And truly, those of us who pay attention know that a lot of those manufactured accountability measures are often a tool used to erode support for public education. Sometimes there are good arguments for them, but too often they're just promoted by people who don't like public education.)
I'm just over the moon to learn about the squirshrooms! Fantastic! And I so agree about being muddy, about science being experiential. How much more we would actually know if we were able to learn like that. So grateful for the river sounds, the beautiful writing. The packrat--the shiny things we miss. Just beautiful. 💜
I can't get over squirshrooms. Their existence makes me so happy!
I can't remember if I'd mentioned it to you before, but along the lines of your own work and science getting muddy, you might enjoy Melissa Sevigny's new book "Brave the Wild River" about two women botanists who boated the Grand Canyon in the early 1900s. It's a delightful read.
Hopefully, I'll see you on iNaturalist! If you haven't tried it, it's the perfect way to collect observations and keep them organized for later study, with the added benefit of getting identification and interpretation help from kind strangers, and contributing to a scientific tool.
Also, I really like the part where you try to describe a new scent. I've struggled to do the same as I forage new foods. "It has notes of lemon and pine, but something else I can't quite..." I've had an essay in mind for a while about what it means to have our base associations be imported from elsewhere, so that we think about a distant citrus fruit to describe acidity, rather than local sumac berries, or that a mountain flower reminds us of elephants, rather than the reverse.
I am there! I think under amalchik which I keep forgetting isn't a very useful handle to use ("malchik" means "boy" in Russian, so "amalchik" is a popular one for bot/spam accounts). Bryan Pfeiffer, a field biologist who writes Chasing Nature, got me into it. I'm a bit hooked, and it's exactly that helpful from kind strangers that makes it so attractive.
That is definitely an essay I would read. If my immediate association with something is, say, lemon, what is there in my local ecoysystem that would describe the same smell without access to commodity crops? That always bugged me about pine-scented cleaning products, but your idea is taking it a step further. Love the idea.
So many good thoughts in here! Random musings from my side, in no particular order.
A Stranger in Olondria is on my list to read! I've never read anything by Samatar, so now I'm intrigued.
Engaging our senses in learning is really important. It reminds me of a few places in Mountains of Fire where the author talked about how full-body sensing was just as important a measurement tool as any scientific apparatus. “A well-trained nose, he asserted, could analyze a range of volcanic gases, including sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride” – speaking of an old scientist who used his senses to record what was going on. My other favorite analogy was that "like wine, magma is defined by its terroir. The equivalent of a sommelier for magma is an igneous geochemist. A skilled one could immediately discriminate between a full-bodied California andesite and a fruity Auvergne mugaerite."
With respect to being engaged with the area you live in, I randomly picked up a book from the library yesterday called "Wild DFW" about the wildlife and ecosystem in DFW. My first thought was, "wait, DFW has nature??" Apparently yes, cicadas and prairie grass do count as nature. It was a good reminder that it can be easy to romanticize the nature "somewhere else" when really, nature is all around us.
I like that story of finding "Wild DFW." Especially in places that we think of as SO American and so suburban, it's almost more magical to start finding the wild in it all. I think that's why Gavin Van Horn, who heads the Center for Humans and Nature in Chicago, wrote "The Way of Coyote" about urban wilds. Maybe the more we connect with the wild wherever we live, the better chance we have of recreating a world where all life can thrive.
I think you'd like some of the stories in "Love After the End," too. One of the first ones is a boy who's in a secret love affair with an AI. Sounds almost cliche but it's really well-written. Darcie Little Badger has a story in there, and I have one of her novels on my TBR pile.
This was wonderful to read. We need to get muddy to learn. My best memories of college were the Saturday field trips our professors held for extra credit.
I can't think of a good science lesson I've ever had that didn't involve getting my hands involved at the very least. My high school physics teacher (who is also a subscriber here) was one of the best science teachers I've ever had for that reason. Physics isn't really conducive to muddiness but the same general idea!
THANK YOU for clearing up the mushrooms-in-trees mystery for us!
I come from a long line of neuro-atypical folks who are deeply steeped in progressive experiential education -- mostly through Francis Parker school in Chicago, where John Dewey sent his own kids. That we keep small children in those mouse-trap desks, then punish them for being small children -- it fills me with fury. Later, I was lucky enough in college to spend a whole summer in the BWCA at a field station taking classes -- one of the formative experiences of my life. More and more I think we need less discipline and more forest schools, fewer desks and more activities, and get the infernal worksheets out of education.
Totally agree with this! More forest schools and fewer not just worksheets, but online drills, which at this point is what I see driving a lot of kids away from learning. It's so disheartening. The Francis Parker school sounds great. I had my doubts about Sudbury schools when I first homeschooled my kids, but if I still lived in that area near New England I'd send my son there. He'd really thrive.
Someone started a forest school locally. Preschool at first, and I wished it had been around when my kids were that age, and now they're doing K-6 I think? I'm curious to see how it works out for the kids who are doing it. It's fun to see them around town getting dirty!
You're welcome for the squirshroom info! It's currently one of my favorite things ever. 😀🐿️
Great stuff. Janet and I were discussing squirrels and their mushroom gathering on our last hike.
I could imagine she and I on the ground smelling cougar urine with you. That had to have been fascinating. We see one on our trail cams occasionally; love it.
Tell me if you sniff it and what you think. I'm still trying to figure out how to describe it, since "like skunk but a little metallic undertone" is hard for people to grasp. Trying to describe smells is always such an interesting challenge.
As someone who teaches those disconnected, disembodied freshmen, it's a struggle. They recognize that they don't enjoy their science classes, but their most common response is to hunker down and try to get through them quickly and efficiently, with as little engagement as possible. Even while I stand there and say, "NO, you are right and the system is wrong, and let's agree to do something different."
I'd like to share this piece with them next semester, if I might.
They're so worn out. I've got a 7th-grader and a high school sophomore, and the pressures on them are immense. No matter how many different ways I try to tell them to let go of worrying about grades, or what really matters in life, the weight of messages they're getting from elsewhere are mostly too much. My older kid does have one science teacher who's managed to structure it differently, where it's completely hands-on, but it's part of a special curriculum that the teachers have to get training for and the kids opt into (a biomedical sciences class the first year followed by Human Body Systems the second). His chemistry class is totally old-school and wow I've forgotten how deadening that can be.
A former student of mine taught astronomy to high schoolers for a year or two precisely because there were no state standards for it, which allowed him to do whatever he wanted.
Wow! I hadn't thought about it but I bet skirting around the standards requirements helps good teachers make a lot more progress.
Right, they're supposed to raise the floor but they seem often to lower the ceiling as well.
As someone who's worked in textbook publishing for over 20 years now ... hard agree with that.
When I left the university system the second time, in 2014, I had this idea about producing localized textbooks to keep money in communities instead of sending it all to the big publishers in NYC. Turns out that most people seem to be more interested in the convenience, simplicity, and safety of standards. Even adoption of free open textbooks has been surprisingly slow.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1146242.pdf
I had kept this bookmarked long to be read at leisure and boy was it worth it! So many tiny treasures you have brought back to us in this anecdote, from the caddisfly shell to the mountain lion pee, from the shiny collection of the delinquent packrat to the soothing waves of the river colliding on the rocks - and please the squirrel shrooms, how cute was that! I loved it Nia, yes science is best learned through experience, outside the reaches of classrooms, lab notes, and lectures. Reminds me the poem The Mushroom Hunters by Neil Gaiman. This one’s for you, our own true mushroom hunter!
https://www.themarginalian.org/2019/11/25/the-mushroom-hunters-animation-neil-gaiman/
Oh, Swarna, you have no idea how that poem resonates over here as I sit at my desk watching the sun climb high and thinking of my sleeping kids because it's a day off of school.
When my younger kid was born, one of my best, oldest friends sent a copy of Neil Gaiman's children's book "Blueberry Girl." My kid never quite got into it, but I loved it from day 1 and even hearing Gaiman's name reminds me now of those early days and months. When someone who is becoming such a full, self-knowing person was a tiny baby who slept a lot and all the peace they would often give me.
I love caddisflies. Have I mentioned that a time or ten here? 😂 But squirshrooms and mountain lion pee are definitely new delights.
It makes me emotional when you say that, even if I am not a mother I know the feeling of watching over someone vulnerable sleeping and reminiscing on the life they would eventually live and the love that often be exchanged between you and them. I personally haven’t gotten deep into Gaiman’s work but this one poem is very important to me, I found it at a time I was really struggling with my identity and overall sense of self and I found so much peace reading it. The mushroom hunters with their babies in the sling and pocket knives reminded me that life is full of possibilities and I need to stop being afraid and venture out.
Caddisflies are such amazing beings, I actually have seen a lot of those in my gradma’s pond but didn’t know what they were called. The fish in the pond used to eat them. What do you specifically love about them ?
I am relieved to hear this coming from you, someone who is a mother and love her kids. I felt doubtful to even consider writing about my outlook on motherhood for the fear of harsh judgement. I really feel vulnerable and bullied because people assume we childless women are either barren and jealous of women with pretty babies, or heartless corporate career tribe who are secretly satan worshippers by night. Many people also accused me of being selfish, that confuses me the most? I am the selfish for not being a conduit to someone else’s idea of how I choose to live ?
Freya writes on all these with such prowess and that’s why I love the workings of her mind so much 💜
Being a woman of certain age without a child of your own is so threatening to society, that they assume that maybe we are child haters and may harm children in some way. And this couldn’t be further from the truth. I infact am extremely fond of children, I think they have the potential to be everything that we are not and more. I have been a private tutor for most of my college years and interacting with young curious minds were the best parts of my days. Maybe I should revisit this part of my identity and write about it.
I for one would love reading about your time as a tutor!
This is definitely something that I don't advise anyone TO write or to NOT write about because you're right: almost any writing about motherhood, but especially not choosing it, opens one up to being bullied. I have never understood the claims of selfishness. What does that even mean? Actually, it makes me really, really angry because it's effectively telling women in particular that we never have a right to be a full human being unless we're serving others. As someone who's literally been caregiving since I was four years old and is heartily sick of it, I resent that!
You, and me, and every one of us, have the right to a full and fulfilling life, whatever that looks like, simply for being alive. That's what threatens the critics so much: people who are fully alive and fully themselves. They try to tear them down with accusations like "selfish." Pfiffle.
One of my college roommates has 4 brothers, and loves being an aunt to their kids. She works as a parcel sorter for an airline company, and gets free tickets that she can use to take friends or family members places, so as her siblings' kids got older, she started traveling to different countries with each of them. That's so awesome and something I could never give because my own kids need that time from me (also I don't work for an airline and don't get free tickets). But you know what? She is an awesome person and someone I love dearly and has the right to her own full existence whether or not she's a great aunt! She is, but even if she weren't, it wouldn't be anyone's damn business.
Apologies for the delayed response, Nia. I resonate with your concerns about the persistent gender roles, especially regarding women shouldering the family’s caregiving responsibilities, particularly pronounced in third-world countries. Despite advancements in education and innovation, these traditional roles persist. Post-pregnancy, women often face challenges in achieving personal goals, financial independence, and, in extreme cases, health. Social pressures and traditional values cast a shadow on a woman’s individual growth and well-being.
While I may not be accepted in an absolute sense for being a childless woman in my current socioeconomic and geographical context, I’ve come to accept it. I deeply admire the resilience of mothers, including my own, who faced hardships and sacrificed personal aspirations due to societal expectations.
You are starlight, Swarna, and I admire your resilience and talents on many levels! 💫
This brought tears to my eyes. The feeling of constantly moving houses is something I can truly relate to because we rented houses, my entire childhood. My parents only built and moved to their permanent home after I, the youngest, went to college. Like you, I too found my grandmother’s abode a constant midst the turbulent flow of life. You reminded me of the aspect of my childhood that I completely forgot.
I can’t imagine the pain and discomfort you must have gone through due to your condition during pregnancy. It sounds incredibly dangerous and scary. I am so grateful that you found good healthcare at the right time.
I would walk with you down any and every road if you need me to 💜
Moving so often does leave you feeling strangely rootless, doesn't it? I can say that I don't get overly attached to many possessions and can pack quickly and lightly! But having a home is a special thing when it's something you couldn't count on during those formative years.
I was very lucky. It's a rare condition but my obstetrician had a lot of experience with high-risk pregnancies and rare complications. It did teach me to push back when people scoff that women having been bearing children just fine for thousands of years. Very true but we've also been dying in childbirth for thousands of years!
All the roads lead somewhere we can meet someday, I hope.
I agree with you, Nia. I believe that the absence of a constant nest has turned me into a restless wanderer. I find solace in traveling, in the journey itself rather than the destination. It’s a quality that can make me seem inconsistent at times, but I genuinely am not. I think having a stable home during your formative years influences how you perceive the world, instilling confidence because you come from a more reliable background. It’s disheartening to think about how challenging it must be to have no home at all.
The casual disregard with which people often treat women who can’t or choose not to have children is a separate but significant issue. Childbirth is one of the most challenging experiences a human can go through, yet many make it sound like it happens effortlessly. It’s fortunate that you had access to the right medical care, which saved your life, but not everyone is as lucky. Throughout my life, I’ve heard countless times that my mother almost died giving birth to me. Still, I face an overwhelming amount of judgment if I even question the idea of motherhood and whether it’s right for me. People often say, “Everyone does it, it’s not a big deal,” but I think, “It’s not your life on the line.” Even if many people choose it, at what cost? Is it so wrong to at least question it?
I do truly believe that how we are raised, including having a stable, secure-feeling home base or not, determines more about our future lives and the world we co-create than most people realize. And reading your "solace . . . in the journey itself rather than the destination" gives me chills. I've stopped hiking with a lot of my friends because they're so eager to get to the top of the mountain or whatever and I keep telling them "I'm a process person." I want to sink into the journey, not focus on getting there.
I wish more people would talk openly about both childbirth and motherhood. It IS a big deal. I love my kids and would not change that choice--they're amazing humans and I'm glad they're in the world--but I also know that my life, my writing, my senses of freedom and self, would be very different if I hadn't become a mother. (I never wanted to get married or have kids when I was growing up, so maybe came into it differently than many I've talked with, who are honestly horrified that I ever consider what my life would look like without these realities.) It seems to be difficult for people to accept that women can find both those lives equally valuable.
And, you know, I almost died! HELLP Syndrome has a high mortality rate because almost nobody recognizes the symptoms. Lots of women die from it for all kinds of reasons. Lots of women find themselves stripped down and eroded in other ways even if pregnancy and childbirth go well. And on the flip side, I have way too many friends who wanted to have children but couldn't, or wanted to have more but couldn't (like my younger sister). There is nothing wrong with questioning all of it. We have a right to our own existence for its own sake, to be full humans in and of ourselves.
It drives me *nuts* when people go on about how "there's no love like it." I don't think that's true! And it's so demeaning to women, as if our personhood is determined solely by how our bodies can be pressed into service for others. (I'm straying into Freya's realm now; she writes so well about all of this.)
It’s the bond of kindred spirits that allows us to effortlessly resonate and connect whenever we engage in conversation. Grief manifests in various forms, and sometimes, selective amnesia is one of them. For many years leading up to writing that essay, I had actively avoided confronting the notion of death, even when I lost my beloved grandmother, causing my mother to lose both her parents. I deliberately remained oblivious, focusing on building a career and crafting my identity in this world.
However, a couple of years ago, during a visit to her old home, now renovated and managed by my cousins, I came to realize just how much I had lost. Suddenly, the place and the person who were the custodians of countless childhood memories were no more. I can’t help but ponder whether it will be the same when, eventually, my parents also depart.
I felt it was now the right time to compose a letter to her, even though she will never read it, to find the closure I need. I believe we all seek that closure in our own way. I look forward to reading your letter to your grandmother. Sometimes, it’s not about what people say or do, but how they make you feel that truly endures. If you felt safe and loved in her home, it signifies that, in her unique way, she loved you too by providing a secure space for you.
The part about your journey closer to death due to pregnancy complication just broke my heart. It must have been hard to go through so much and then come out on the other side to realise you lost someone. This was a deeply personal and vulnerable revelation, tight hugs for sharing this with me 💜
This is another whole beautiful essay all on its own, about grief, about forgetting, about what we try to hide from when we simply don't have the capacity to face it in all its forms and weight. We should be allowed our own time to come to them.
I went by my grandmother's old house a few months ago and had some similar thoughts. When I was growing up we moved a lot, and my parents are now divorced and remarried (both for the better), but my grandmother's tiny house with her beloved small dogs was always a constant.
"In her unique way, she loved you too by providing a secure space for you." That's it exactly. She wasn't trying to, but she did, just by being herself.
I wrote about the pregnancy many years ago -- I came down with an extremely rare pregnancy-related condition called HELLP Syndrome that is usually fatal, but luckily my doctor recognized the signs--but haven't about losing my grandmother during that time. I think you've walked with me to a place where I can start looking at that. 💖
There's something about that mushroom poem that reaches into my very sense of self and reminds me of the long story we're all a part of in a similar way to paying attention to rocks and geology does. Now that's power in words!
I was an aunt before I became a mother, and a friend before that, and a human always, and strongly feel that those feelings, whether of active nurturing or simply of care, are given to all of us in all kinds of forms to live out in our own individual ways.
I'd love to read more about your grandma's pond! Hm, caddisflies. Well, the way they build their little shells around themselves with the tiniest gravel is just amazing to me, and that those shells are such perfect tiny cylinders much of the time. But honestly? I'm just kind of contrary. If I'm out with a bunch of serious birdwatchers I'll go wander off to get to know the trees. If everyone is talking about the trees, I'm going to get really interested in mosses and lichen and rocks. My attention is always going to that which most everyone around me isn't seeing, or is ignoring. It isn't some special character trait; I honestly think it's just contrariness. The first time I ever watched the World Cup with friends and they were all into Brazil or Portugal or whoever it was, I got super into supporting Belize because nobody else paid them any attention. Caddisflies ARE super cool though. The fact that they exist just delights me.
It’s so fascinating to know that such small creatures have such specific abilities. I’m in awe of your nuanced observations. Paying attention to these unattended things is what makes me admire you deeply, things like talking to sweetgrass. The attention you give is an act of healing; you are a healer who remedies or tries to remedy the brokenness of this world!
My grandma had a beautiful pond behind her house, I wrote about it in this elegy style essay for for : https://berkana.cc/p/letters-to-the-grave
Well, I admire you deeply right back! (And how did you know my secret desire is to be a healer?)
Oh my goodness, Swarna, that essay. Maybe this was before we were connected here because I don't remember ever reading it. I am reading it in a coffee shop where I've just been interrupted by an acquaintance I haven't seen in a while, a nurse, and we talked about a mutual friend, one of my closer friends, whose mother just passed away. So this is all resonating for me in ways that I can't even describe. Including that as I was reading your letter, I was reminded that I never really got to mourn either of my grandmothers--the one I knew best, here in Montana, died two days before my first baby was born, and I was so close to death at the time myself (pregnancy problems) that I'm not sure I ever even grasped the loss.
And I finished it thinking, "I'm going to write Grandma a letter." It won't be anything like yours. She wasn't warm or affectionate or talkative, and didn't like children very much, but I loved her and always felt safe in her house. By sharing your homage to your grandmother, you've brought me to a place where maybe I can start grieving mine. And I will be forever thinking of you trying to find that familiar smell in shops that cannot sell what they don't have.
Also I love this line: "I think I might have found my way back into this world simply because I missed being human."
> Lack of embodied, hands-on learning is one of the things that bugs me most about modern education, especially when it comes to math and science.
So very, very much this. Not only would embodied learning help a great many people to understand what they're being taught, it also helps to bridge disciplinary siloes.
That is so true! I've been reading more and more of researchers' and scientists' desire for that recently, but the barriers to truly seeing it happen seem immense. And for no good reason -- just hidebound habits and practices.
Hear hear! Beautifully said! I think of Gregory Cajete in NATIVE SCIENCE talking about how crucial personal participation is to knowing any part of nature. Western education moves everything to the head, to "knowledge of" rather than "knowing." I also think of the difference, in Spanish, between saber (to know something) and conocer (to know someone, always takes a person preposition after it), and how knowing the rest of this dear Earth and all creatures needs to be the personal kind--it is more complete and therefore accurate when it's the personal kind.
That is such a great differentiation -- "knowledge of" versus "knowing." I didn't know that in Spanish, either! Lovely. I consciously avoided writing about Indigenous science and traditions here because I don't know enough not to be at best appropriative, but definitely thought about it throughout the course. They work a lot with the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes, so maybe some point in the future there can be something co-created, if the CSKT would want that.
Wow. I loved this so much. I had to keep stopping to jot down notes so I would remember in my comment 😆 first of all, your writing transports me every time!! Thank you for taking us to your secluded cabin and magical river. I couldn’t agree more about science and getting dirty, and as a former classroom science teacher it is so disheartening to see my kids slog thru the scientific method and rarely, if ever, get their hands dirty!! 😣 my 6th grader just did a short lesson on the flint water crisis (why!?!?) while we have the Great Lakes right outside our back door to study and explore and fall in love with!!! Save the crises for when their brains are more developed and begin with LOVE and CARE and their five senses!!! 💔💔
Also, i hope that I’m never in a place where I need to identify mountain Lion pee, but now I know it’s funky with metallic notes. Lol.
I am so jealous of your master naturalist program and last summer I entertained starting a summer camp with a friend called *MATH WIZ CAMP* that would basically be game/puzzle based with lots of group discussions and mistakes and “getting messy” a la Ms frizzle. But we are both frazzled moms so it didn’t happen. 😆
And I literally JUST witnessed a squirrel snacking on a mushroom last week in our backyard and our (me & my kids) minds were blown! I did not know they ate mushrooms & now I’m going to keep my eyes peeled for little drying ones too! 😍
Wow, thank you for sharing all of these wonderful thoughts! I agree with you about disheartening and YES about the Great Lakes. There's a lifetime of learning right there! Our 5th graders go on a walking field trip to a wetlands at the edge of town, and the time I chaperoned I was so inspired. The Whitefish Lake Institute hosts it and did a great job with different stations, especially the one where they used a huge trailer bed and built a river ecosystem to show effects of different activities along a riparian corridor. It immediately showed how development, deforestation, planting native trees, etc., etc., affected the river and her banks. Why not make it all like that?! 🌊💖
Haha, if you ever smell it, tell me what you think! I'm still trying to shape words around it. And hope I don't have opportunity to smell it super fresh up close and personal. (🐅🐆<-- not mountain lions)
It is so hard to organize things like that. I'm lucky that there were two other women who got really interested in changing relationship with math at the same time I did. It took us two years to even get a pilot off the ground and then that was the school year that Covid came! It's been shaky since then, but playing math games with 3rd-graders 30 minutes once a week is never something I regret, even though I don't usually have the time. I love seeing them so enthusiastic.
Ooh, if you ever get a chance to take a photo I'd love to see one! It's one thing to see the squirshrooms in the trees, but even cooler to see them eating one. 😀🍄🐿️
All of this — wonderful. My favorite moments: your sitting by the river for hours. That's my kind of sitting.
If I ever fade away from the public sphere (ever-tempting!) it will probably be for exactly this reason and I know you'd understand the draw!
I never thought you'd have that kind of temptation, given the zeal I feel in what I have read in these posts. If you ever slip into that "fade," I hope to anonymously encounter you on some wordless, gestureless common ground.
I am always tempted. :)
I loved, loved, loved reading this. It resonates so very much, especially because I just spent the last weekend doing very similar things. I'm on my third round through a nine-month intensive wildlife tracking course in the Pacific Northwest--one field trip a month plus lots of self-study in between--and we were at the Oregon Dunes for three days. It's a marvelous place to track because the big expanses of sand take impressions so very well, and there is *so much* wildlife active out there, from insects to large carnivores. It's wonderful.
And...I only got into tracking about six years ago, though I'd dipped my toes in a few times before that. And I wish that my science classes in school had begun with these kinds of experiences. A few of my teachers tried, I think they would have preferred to teach this way, but there was the almighty curriculum and achievement testing to get through. I was good enough at that, I guess, but the love of inquiry didn't ignite in me until I discovered tracking and began using it to answer questions like: who else lives here?
I worked in academia for eighteen years with two rounds of graduate school along the way, so I know what I'll be in for if I decide to go back and study something like wilderness ecology. I'm also old enough at this point to know how to make that experience my own, if I do decide to do it.
I still wish I'd found this avenue earlier. Better late than never, though. And it really has shifted my attitude toward the beings who live around us, and especially the ones we've chosen to call pests.
Wow, I loved reading about this! And am envious -- a nine-month intensive wildlife tracking course sounds like absolute heaven, especially in PNW, which isn't *that* far from me but which is so different in the most beautiful ways.
I think a lot of teachers would prefer to teach like this, but the millstone seems to grind harder every year. I wish we could find effective ways to push back against demands about curriculum and testing at state levels, and I have to say one of my big disappointments about this locally is how many parents *want* the testing and benchmarks because they truly believe it makes their kids more competitive. (What if it makes them miserable, though?! Which it does.)
It is one of the many nice things about getting older (I'm 47), that you don't have to care so much about those benchmarks for yourself. You can learn for the love of it. I wish it was something more people realized our kids deserve, too. But in the meantime, we can try for the opportunities when they're available.
Happy tracking! 🐾🐾🐾
Thank you! And yes, I knew so many teachers over my career, especially the ones working in education programs, who really wanted to cultivate curiosity and love of their subjects. Testing and benchmarks definitely made me miserable! This way isn't just more enjoyable, I retain more, too.
Absolutely! It's real learning. (And truly, those of us who pay attention know that a lot of those manufactured accountability measures are often a tool used to erode support for public education. Sometimes there are good arguments for them, but too often they're just promoted by people who don't like public education.)
Beautiful… thank you…!
Thank you, Sean!
I'm just over the moon to learn about the squirshrooms! Fantastic! And I so agree about being muddy, about science being experiential. How much more we would actually know if we were able to learn like that. So grateful for the river sounds, the beautiful writing. The packrat--the shiny things we miss. Just beautiful. 💜
I can't get over squirshrooms. Their existence makes me so happy!
I can't remember if I'd mentioned it to you before, but along the lines of your own work and science getting muddy, you might enjoy Melissa Sevigny's new book "Brave the Wild River" about two women botanists who boated the Grand Canyon in the early 1900s. It's a delightful read.
https://bookshop.org/p/books/brave-the-wild-river-the-untold-story-of-two-women-who-mapped-the-botany-of-the-grand-canyon/18919270?ean=9780393868234
Oo I can't wait to read, thanks for the rec! 🐿
Hopefully, I'll see you on iNaturalist! If you haven't tried it, it's the perfect way to collect observations and keep them organized for later study, with the added benefit of getting identification and interpretation help from kind strangers, and contributing to a scientific tool.
Also, I really like the part where you try to describe a new scent. I've struggled to do the same as I forage new foods. "It has notes of lemon and pine, but something else I can't quite..." I've had an essay in mind for a while about what it means to have our base associations be imported from elsewhere, so that we think about a distant citrus fruit to describe acidity, rather than local sumac berries, or that a mountain flower reminds us of elephants, rather than the reverse.
I am there! I think under amalchik which I keep forgetting isn't a very useful handle to use ("malchik" means "boy" in Russian, so "amalchik" is a popular one for bot/spam accounts). Bryan Pfeiffer, a field biologist who writes Chasing Nature, got me into it. I'm a bit hooked, and it's exactly that helpful from kind strangers that makes it so attractive.
That is definitely an essay I would read. If my immediate association with something is, say, lemon, what is there in my local ecoysystem that would describe the same smell without access to commodity crops? That always bugged me about pine-scented cleaning products, but your idea is taking it a step further. Love the idea.
So many good thoughts in here! Random musings from my side, in no particular order.
A Stranger in Olondria is on my list to read! I've never read anything by Samatar, so now I'm intrigued.
Engaging our senses in learning is really important. It reminds me of a few places in Mountains of Fire where the author talked about how full-body sensing was just as important a measurement tool as any scientific apparatus. “A well-trained nose, he asserted, could analyze a range of volcanic gases, including sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride” – speaking of an old scientist who used his senses to record what was going on. My other favorite analogy was that "like wine, magma is defined by its terroir. The equivalent of a sommelier for magma is an igneous geochemist. A skilled one could immediately discriminate between a full-bodied California andesite and a fruity Auvergne mugaerite."
With respect to being engaged with the area you live in, I randomly picked up a book from the library yesterday called "Wild DFW" about the wildlife and ecosystem in DFW. My first thought was, "wait, DFW has nature??" Apparently yes, cicadas and prairie grass do count as nature. It was a good reminder that it can be easy to romanticize the nature "somewhere else" when really, nature is all around us.
I really look forward to your writing about Olondria! I hadn't heard of Samatar either; it was Stefanie who told me about her, along with a lot of other great sci fi and fantasy writers like Catherynne M. Valente (this short story of hers was wild and cool: https://www.tor.com/2022/11/23/the-difference-between-love-and-time-catherynne-m-valente/?utm_source=pocket_saves).
I like that story of finding "Wild DFW." Especially in places that we think of as SO American and so suburban, it's almost more magical to start finding the wild in it all. I think that's why Gavin Van Horn, who heads the Center for Humans and Nature in Chicago, wrote "The Way of Coyote" about urban wilds. Maybe the more we connect with the wild wherever we live, the better chance we have of recreating a world where all life can thrive.
I think you'd like some of the stories in "Love After the End," too. One of the first ones is a boy who's in a secret love affair with an AI. Sounds almost cliche but it's really well-written. Darcie Little Badger has a story in there, and I have one of her novels on my TBR pile.
This was wonderful to read. We need to get muddy to learn. My best memories of college were the Saturday field trips our professors held for extra credit.
I can't think of a good science lesson I've ever had that didn't involve getting my hands involved at the very least. My high school physics teacher (who is also a subscriber here) was one of the best science teachers I've ever had for that reason. Physics isn't really conducive to muddiness but the same general idea!
THANK YOU for clearing up the mushrooms-in-trees mystery for us!
I come from a long line of neuro-atypical folks who are deeply steeped in progressive experiential education -- mostly through Francis Parker school in Chicago, where John Dewey sent his own kids. That we keep small children in those mouse-trap desks, then punish them for being small children -- it fills me with fury. Later, I was lucky enough in college to spend a whole summer in the BWCA at a field station taking classes -- one of the formative experiences of my life. More and more I think we need less discipline and more forest schools, fewer desks and more activities, and get the infernal worksheets out of education.
Totally agree with this! More forest schools and fewer not just worksheets, but online drills, which at this point is what I see driving a lot of kids away from learning. It's so disheartening. The Francis Parker school sounds great. I had my doubts about Sudbury schools when I first homeschooled my kids, but if I still lived in that area near New England I'd send my son there. He'd really thrive.
Someone started a forest school locally. Preschool at first, and I wished it had been around when my kids were that age, and now they're doing K-6 I think? I'm curious to see how it works out for the kids who are doing it. It's fun to see them around town getting dirty!
You're welcome for the squirshroom info! It's currently one of my favorite things ever. 😀🐿️
I believe you are a gift to us Nia! Your writing ALWAYS makes me feel! Thank you! ❤️❤️
Back atcha, Val! You make my life and world better in SO many ways! 💖💖💖
Great stuff. Janet and I were discussing squirrels and their mushroom gathering on our last hike.
I could imagine she and I on the ground smelling cougar urine with you. That had to have been fascinating. We see one on our trail cams occasionally; love it.
Tell me if you sniff it and what you think. I'm still trying to figure out how to describe it, since "like skunk but a little metallic undertone" is hard for people to grasp. Trying to describe smells is always such an interesting challenge.
Squirshrooms! 🐿️🍄
Nature has always been my divinity ( not quite sure If that's the right word) Who needs a god when when we're made of universe?!
Thanks for the thought provoking read and for sharing your time!
I don't know if it's the right word, either, but I am with you on the feeling. It's never not been that for me. Thank you for being here!