Students gather around the campfire. Photo by Rick Allen.
We had a wonderful time with the Whatcom Hills Waldorf
School when they joined us at the Environmental Learning Center from September
14-16. Kuros Zahedi, their fifth grade teacher, wrote about their experience
for their school’s weekly newsletter. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and your
wonderful students!
“The trip offered us the opportunity to be led on many
nature outings by the passionate Mountain School naturalists. We
also got to sit around the campfire singing songs and performed funny
improvised skits. We laughed a lot, played a lot, learned a lot, ate
excellent locally grown food together and bonded as a class
community. The children were taught about the natural history of the
area we know as the North Cascade mountains (our back yard - aren’t we
lucky!!). They learned basic concepts about the geology of the area
including the types of rocks which make up the mountains and how glaciers
eroded them into their present spectacular formations. They also
learned ecological concepts about communities of living and nonliving things
and food webs. They felt the icy grip of a snowmelt stream on their
hands, ate salal berries, smelled cedar bark, listened to bird songs, sat alone
in nature, drew in journals, touched bear scratched tree bark, marveled at
details revealed by microscopes, watched the moon rise, and saw the early
morning sunlight dance upon distant glaciers. While some of the
science lessons could have been taught in any classroom, the experiences the
children had were both irreplaceable and priceless. NCI is a gem of
an institution and we are lucky to have been able to participate in their
Mountain School program.”
No comments:
Post a Comment